Remember when I said...
things were going great for us? That all came to a screeching halt. Saturday.
We were in Rockville visiting friends when my dad called and said April wasn’t acting right. She was coughing constantly and seemed very lethargic and wouldn’t eat. For her not to eat is a major thing, so I told him to take her to the weekend ER vet and call me when he was talking to the vet.
Before I go any farther, let me say before this weekend, se was in awesome spirits. Really really active, she’d run to the house when we called her, she was very playful at home, just seemed to have lots of energy. She wasn’t coughing or snotty or any of he usual problems. We were even commenting throughout the prior weeks how much fun she seemed to be having. Maybe she was just trying to enjoy as much as possible.
At first I was thinking my dad was overreacting, but when he put the phone down for me to hear her cough, I knew something was wrong.I got on the phone with the vet. We talked about her age, she is 11, and she has fought back and bounced back from two bad cases of hemolytic anemia. So she has had a tough time medically, and she’s on constant prednisone. We talked about this new cough, I asked if it could be congestive heart failure. He said it might be, he had to take x-rays. He called me back and said her heart was very, very enlarged. It didn’t look good and that there might even be a growth/tumor on her heart. I said just make her comfortable and would she last long enough for us to get home. He said yes. We left and drove home and got home at 11pm. I drove the whole way. I needed something to do. We didn’t fly or anything, we weren’t going to the vet that night. But we did a lot of talking and crying those 4 hours. As soon as we got home I broke down. I knew what was coming.
I woke up at 6 and went through all my boxes and got out all my photos with her in them. Dan woke up and we went to the vet about 8 I think. We took her blanket with us. When we go to see her, she was in a bottom kennel crate. She didn’t wag her tail or whimper, she didn’t seem glad to see us, she seemed like she really didn’t feel good and was miserable. We stayed with her for a long time – until the vet came back. We looked at her x-rays, and talked a bit. We called my dad and had him come down. He was with me when we picked her out and actually was the one who said, "no, no- look at that one over there, see how she’s got her nose the ground, pick her."
So we were with her, holding her as we put her to sleep. She just went to sleep. I’ve never had to be so strong to make a decision. But we knew we had to. She couldn’t survive this, and we couldn’t stretch it out. It wouldn’t be fair to her. We loved her too much.
That was yesterday. I don’t know how but today is worse. She’s not there to wake me up and rub her face under my chin, put her paw on my face to wake me up. She’s not here to let out, let back in and watch her legs slide out from under her as she tries to round the corner into the kitchen as quick as she can to get to the bowl of food she knows is waiting. We keep looking up to see if she’s on her couch, our crappy old futon, and then realize she’s not there.
I’ve had her since she was a puppy and she was 11. She was my baby, my girl, my Grape Ape. I miss her so much. She was the main thing that got me thru my divorce. We took miles of walks together at Oglebay. I walked everywhere with her here at the house. She would lay in the sun near us while we worked outside. Her ears were so soft and velvety, and she smelled musky. She had a birth mark on her nose, and a patch of hair missing on her right hear where she had a spider bite. I picked at her, cleaned her ears, checked her skin, gave her baths, trimmed her nails, gave her her meds. She was part of everything of my day and night. And Dan’s too. This is killing him as well, it’s just harder on me I think because as a female who hasn’t had a baby yet, I’ve transferred all my maternal instincts to her. I miss her.
She had so much attitude and personality. She really did. She didn’t like other dogs, it seemed because they were beneath her. Because she of course wasn’t a dog. God I just hope she knew how much we loved her. I told her all the time. This hurts so much. I miss her so much.
We buried her ourselves and wrapped her in her dog bed cover. We buried her were I can see her out the kitchen window. She had a dedicated path through the woods from our house to our neighbors. She would go over there and bark at their door to be let in. She visited them everyday. We buried her right were she would walk into the woods. In the summer the greens were so dense she’d disappear from sight. We think it was her favorite place.
I knew this would happen one day, but you just never know, and never prepare. This might sound callous. But I don’t want to wait to long to get a puppy. I don’t want to forget her or replace her, but I need something to take care of. I need to add that back to my day, because without it, it seems so empty.Today I’m putting all her pictures together in a big frame collage as a memorial. It’s hard to pick which photos are the best. I just seemed to want to make each one I pick up as big as possible. I want them BIG so I can see her. I’m also writing a little book of all her "Aprilisms". There were many. This will take awhile. My heart is just broken I guess. I go a little while and I’m ok, then something hits me and I cry.
April was our dog, but she was so much more.
She was Grape Ape, our girl.
We were in Rockville visiting friends when my dad called and said April wasn’t acting right. She was coughing constantly and seemed very lethargic and wouldn’t eat. For her not to eat is a major thing, so I told him to take her to the weekend ER vet and call me when he was talking to the vet.
Before I go any farther, let me say before this weekend, se was in awesome spirits. Really really active, she’d run to the house when we called her, she was very playful at home, just seemed to have lots of energy. She wasn’t coughing or snotty or any of he usual problems. We were even commenting throughout the prior weeks how much fun she seemed to be having. Maybe she was just trying to enjoy as much as possible.
At first I was thinking my dad was overreacting, but when he put the phone down for me to hear her cough, I knew something was wrong.I got on the phone with the vet. We talked about her age, she is 11, and she has fought back and bounced back from two bad cases of hemolytic anemia. So she has had a tough time medically, and she’s on constant prednisone. We talked about this new cough, I asked if it could be congestive heart failure. He said it might be, he had to take x-rays. He called me back and said her heart was very, very enlarged. It didn’t look good and that there might even be a growth/tumor on her heart. I said just make her comfortable and would she last long enough for us to get home. He said yes. We left and drove home and got home at 11pm. I drove the whole way. I needed something to do. We didn’t fly or anything, we weren’t going to the vet that night. But we did a lot of talking and crying those 4 hours. As soon as we got home I broke down. I knew what was coming.
I woke up at 6 and went through all my boxes and got out all my photos with her in them. Dan woke up and we went to the vet about 8 I think. We took her blanket with us. When we go to see her, she was in a bottom kennel crate. She didn’t wag her tail or whimper, she didn’t seem glad to see us, she seemed like she really didn’t feel good and was miserable. We stayed with her for a long time – until the vet came back. We looked at her x-rays, and talked a bit. We called my dad and had him come down. He was with me when we picked her out and actually was the one who said, "no, no- look at that one over there, see how she’s got her nose the ground, pick her."
So we were with her, holding her as we put her to sleep. She just went to sleep. I’ve never had to be so strong to make a decision. But we knew we had to. She couldn’t survive this, and we couldn’t stretch it out. It wouldn’t be fair to her. We loved her too much.
That was yesterday. I don’t know how but today is worse. She’s not there to wake me up and rub her face under my chin, put her paw on my face to wake me up. She’s not here to let out, let back in and watch her legs slide out from under her as she tries to round the corner into the kitchen as quick as she can to get to the bowl of food she knows is waiting. We keep looking up to see if she’s on her couch, our crappy old futon, and then realize she’s not there.
I’ve had her since she was a puppy and she was 11. She was my baby, my girl, my Grape Ape. I miss her so much. She was the main thing that got me thru my divorce. We took miles of walks together at Oglebay. I walked everywhere with her here at the house. She would lay in the sun near us while we worked outside. Her ears were so soft and velvety, and she smelled musky. She had a birth mark on her nose, and a patch of hair missing on her right hear where she had a spider bite. I picked at her, cleaned her ears, checked her skin, gave her baths, trimmed her nails, gave her her meds. She was part of everything of my day and night. And Dan’s too. This is killing him as well, it’s just harder on me I think because as a female who hasn’t had a baby yet, I’ve transferred all my maternal instincts to her. I miss her.
She had so much attitude and personality. She really did. She didn’t like other dogs, it seemed because they were beneath her. Because she of course wasn’t a dog. God I just hope she knew how much we loved her. I told her all the time. This hurts so much. I miss her so much.
We buried her ourselves and wrapped her in her dog bed cover. We buried her were I can see her out the kitchen window. She had a dedicated path through the woods from our house to our neighbors. She would go over there and bark at their door to be let in. She visited them everyday. We buried her right were she would walk into the woods. In the summer the greens were so dense she’d disappear from sight. We think it was her favorite place.
I knew this would happen one day, but you just never know, and never prepare. This might sound callous. But I don’t want to wait to long to get a puppy. I don’t want to forget her or replace her, but I need something to take care of. I need to add that back to my day, because without it, it seems so empty.Today I’m putting all her pictures together in a big frame collage as a memorial. It’s hard to pick which photos are the best. I just seemed to want to make each one I pick up as big as possible. I want them BIG so I can see her. I’m also writing a little book of all her "Aprilisms". There were many. This will take awhile. My heart is just broken I guess. I go a little while and I’m ok, then something hits me and I cry.
April was our dog, but she was so much more.
She was Grape Ape, our girl.
posted by Ren at 6:37 AM
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