Well, it’s over and done with. I know losing a pet or having to put one down is a common occurrence, yet the pain is still sharp; the grief biting into me at different moments. One such moment was upon the return home from the vet. Coming into the house to see his paw prints in the snow, his other bed (because of course he had more than one), his food dish, and the eerie quiet without the jingle of his collar caused me to lose myself in uncontrollable sobs.
Both Brett and I passed out from exhaustion at Jamie’s bedtime, which is why I’m awake in the middle of the night. I keep expecting to hear Baxter shake his collar and need to go outside. These past three or four months he needed to be carried and helped outside and back in. He would try to maintain his balance and usually fail, peeing on himself, and/or falling backwards on his back and scrambling, trying to recover his balance. Our linoleum kitchen floor became too slippery of a surface for his back legs that had lost their strength and coordination due to nerve issues and loss of muscle.
Furthermore, the silence in the house is a reminder of how difficult things were from him constantly of late. He was always shaking, crying in his sleep or for food no matter how much we fed him, and he could never get comfortable without at least two blankets in his dog beds. There is relief behind the pain that confirms that we made the right choice. Knowing we did the right thing doesn’t make it any less hard.
Despite all this, I still woke up thinking of him and am crying lightly on and off. It’s no longer the deep uncontrollable sobs of yesterday. Still, saying goodbye was one of the hardest things I’ve had to do because he was our family.
We miss you. We love you. Thanks for being ours.
Baxter Larimore
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