My Story – The Heart Behind the Work

Why PerPETual Love Began 

Animals have been part of Ann’s life for as long as she can remember, beginning with her first cat, Nikki, and continuing through a lifetime shared with many different species. 

Over the years she has loved and lost many animals herself.

What began with puppy and dog training naturally evolved into something much broader. Over more than 35 years, Ann found herself working with people and animals in many different settings, teaching dog safety to children, training animals for television and film, and supporting the human-animal bond in many different ways.

Through the mobile animal farm she founded, Ann also had the privilege of working with a wide range of people and communities, bringing joy to children at parties, schools, and events, and taking animals in to bring comfort and smiles in disability services, aged care and hospitals.

Across training, animal-assisted work, television, community work and everyday conversations with pet owners, Ann saw again and again just how strong the connection between people and animals could be, and how deeply people could be affected when an animal they loved had passed. 

So the significance of pet loss was not new to her.

But when her much-loved Labrador Matilda passed on 14 March 2020, it became deeply personal in a different way.

Matilda had worked alongside Ann in puppy classes and animal-assisted work, appeared on film sets and brought joy to thousands of people through therapy visits and community work. Her loss brought together Ann’s own experiences, everything she had witnessed through her years working with animals, and a growing understanding of how often pet grief is underestimated.

That became the turning point.

Ann went on to become a Certified Grief Educator through David Kessler and began writing PerPETual Love: Forever In Your Heart, which was released in March 2025.

From there, the work grew in a new direction. 

Today, PerPETual Love provides free pet-loss support and resources that have reached more than 2,600 pet owners across Australia, New Zealand, the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada.

It has also expanded into the veterinary profession, with a 6-Step Pet Loss Support Pathway that clinics can offer selected clients, and the CPD course Supporting Pet Owners Through Loss – While Looking After Yourself Too, created for veterinarians, veterinary nurses, technicians, receptionists and practice managers.

The work may look different from Ann’s earlier years in animal-assisted work, but the purpose has remained closely connected: helping people through the profound impact animals can have on our lives.

Today, that means helping pet owners feel better understood through grief and loss, while also helping veterinary teams support those clients, respond when grief turns to anger or blame, and manage the emotional load this work can place on them.

The work now brings together the three parts of Ann’s life that once seemed separate: a lifetime with animals, the experience of loving and losing them, and a commitment to helping both pet owners and veterinary teams feel better supported around pet loss.