Five years since my last blog entry...I don't even know where to start.
Nearly 14 years ago, I brought home this sickly little chihuahua mix and we named her Willow. Specifically, Princess Willow Rosenberg Brave-Fisher. She had this reddish/brownish fur and she reminded me of Willow from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. When I met her, she was sitting in the corner at the pound angrily barking at the other dogs in the pen with her. She was shaking with fear and wouldn't acknowledge anyone who tried to speak to her.
I knelt down and told her, "Everything's going to be alright, little girl." She came over to the side of the pen so I could pet her. And it was love at first sight for me.
I had to wait 10 days to bring her home. She had a chip and they tried to reach the previous owner. Once they did, the owner said they didn't want her back. She had not been spayed, so I had to wait for them to do this as well. They said that she was 12-18 months old at the time and she only weighed five pounds on that first day. I visited her every day at the pound until I could bring her home. By the time I got her home, she had lost almost a whole pound because she wasn't eating very well.
The day after we got her home, she had a fever and was coughing up this nasty phlegm. She was diagnosed with pneumonia and I sat up with her for two nights until it ran its course. Eventually, she got stronger and we got her weight up to a very healthy 14 pounds.
Flash forward 8 years and I would be sitting up with her for a week after she had to endure several major surgeries due to getting into a fight with a much bigger dog. She had a long road to recovery including being in a body cast for 4 weeks.
She has been attached to me at the hip constantly now for the past 13 years and 6 months. She's been my camping buddy, sleeps right next to me every single night. I've never loved a dog as much as this one...and now she's battling liver cancer. We know it's just a matter of days before we have to say goodbye, and it is killing me.
There's no real reason I'm putting this out here today except to try and get some feelings sorted out and dealt with...I really thought I would be able to prepare myself for this. But, I can't.
I know that this stuff is inevitable...we're all going to face our final moments on this earth in one way or another. God knows, I've lost my dad, mom, brother, all of my grandparents, and some aunts and uncles and cousins....close friends...it's a part of life. This one is hitting me really hard right now...perhaps the stress of the pandemic is taking a toll. I don't know...all I know is that I need to figure out how to best handle it. She's laying just a few feet from me after our emergency vet visit last night and every time she lifts her head up to look at me, my heart breaks. I see the pain and confusion in her eyes and I just want to make her all better. It's a very helpless feeling.
