I Miss Her...

Its funny, and very sad, how we humans hear only what we want to hear, what works for us, and what will justify our decision making.

I have spent the greater part of my adult life making a good deal of my decisions based on the availability of money.  Yesterday when I called the humane society, and my vet, to find out how much it would cost to euthanize my eldest dog, I distinctly heard the Humane society say that at one of their facilities I could be with my old companion, as she was forced to walk toward the decision that I had made for her, and since the price was a third of what my vet would charge…I took my old girl across town to the Society for Humaneness.

When I arrived and the paperwork had been filled out, the assessment accomplished, and the money exchanged hands…I was told that I could not accompany my old friend to her last intake of breath.

I was stunned by the news, hadn’t I heard the woman on the phone tell me that I had to take her to the Sunnyslope location if I wanted to be with her?  Hadn’t I promised her that I would not leave her side?  Hadn’t I willed myself to do the hard thing and not turn away from my decision and its consequences?

It seemed to late to turn back once I heard that I had heard what I wanted to hear, and not what was truly available.

And so, I had to leave her with strangers in a strange place…the only place that has ever frightened her, to walk that lonely mile by herself.  Yes the vet tech tried to say all the right things assuring me that she would do it quickly, mercifully, and that she would be Mocha’s “new friend”…and thus my old girl would not be alone.  But the vet tech, despite her desire to be kind, gave me no comfort with her platitudes and assurances, and talk of dogs going to heaven.

It seems to me, that there is perhaps a hand full of people alive on the planet, at any given moment, who can do the hard thing and leave you alone to feel what you are feeling, while standing firmly by your side, and NOT attempting to fix you out of your experience.

Life is hard.  Decisions are hard, particularly when those decisions take the life of another being.   But I find no value and no comfort in folks attempting to fix me, primarily because they themselves are uncomfortable with what I am feeling or expressing, and wish me to stop expressing it…merely because they cannot meet me where I am at, and would rather I be somewhere less scary.

True help would have come in the form of someone capable of standing still inside themselves, as they witnessed my shock and grief, and helping me to uncover, by virtue of empathetic and accurate questioning, the sense of having betrayed of my old friend, as I was leaving her alone with strangers to meet the fate she had no hand in deciding.

Never avoid.  Do the hard thing…first, fast, and thoroughly.  On the long road to recovery from fear, that it has been my great blessing and horrible load to undertake, that could well be my motto…Do-The-Hard-Thing.

In a culture that has gone entirely soft with its praise, approval, applause and “lightness” it seems there is no one left who can do the “hard thing”.  I have spent a lifetime teaching myself how to do the hard thing…in fact, as I look back over my life, it could well be the one redeeming fact of my life.

Somehow I missed a crucial piece of information that allowed me to do the soft thing, the avoidance dance, and to find myself in the turning away position, which my old friend had to pay the price for.

And in this way…I have sinned against her…and it may take me some time to recover from having let her down in this way.

I miss her…

Adayre R. Miller

4/16/13

How Much Beauty I Saw in Her...

 

I have loved several animals in my life.  Animals who provided solace in times of need, care in times of sadness, hope in times of loss, and love…always love…

My oldest has lost all semblance of relationship with me.  She spends her days in a type of sleep that can only be described as comatose.  Sometimes that sleep cannot be achieved as she is suffering to much with her bad back or her kidney failure, that has been pushed to rougher seas, when I have to drag her to a hotel in order to work and pay our bills.

When she once loved a car ride of any length, they now cause her fragile kidneys to flair up into an infection that requires me to stick her with a needle to deliver medication twice a day, until the rotten smell of her infection dies down once again, and she can go back to the sleep of old age and slow descent.

I have decided to put her down tomorrow, as I must go out of town again for almost two full weeks and it will be a long stressful drive with an infection already raging.

I am struggling with the decision because it is so powerfully convenient for me to do so.  Living with her has, long ago, become a stressful process.  Watching the suffering she goes through when her back or her kidneys flare up.  Listening to her early morning scratching on the floor, which she is prone to, whenever her pain reaches levels to high to manage.  (Yes I give her pain medication, and as far as I can tell it does nothing whatsoever for her.  Once in shear desperation I gave her several pills, which finally she just threw back up.)

I have come to the place that my life would be better without her…and that causes me agonies of self-doubt.  I have never had to put a dog down before, yet I should have a strong constitution for it, as I was very capable of letting both my parents go without strenuous and prolonging maintenance care, that would have protracted, but not enhanced, their lives.  I suppose the difference is that they could agree with the decision, whereas she cannot.

In her youth, she was such a good pet.  Smart beyond all measure.  Beautiful in line, form, color, and grace.  Regal in bearing, behavior, and deeply composed…I found her to be elegant, civil, and more like a cat than a dog, in how she handled our interactions.

She never begged or pleaded, like my other dogs.  If some condition where not optimum, like I had not fed her on time, walked her early enough, or opened the door quickly enough…she would come into the room I was in and merely look at me.  There was no judgment in her gaze, no need for atonement on my part, she would simply inform me, with her golden eyes, that I had forgotten some essential care that needed addressing as soon as possible.  She did not approach, or bark, or whine, or pant…merely and only…gazing.

But each time, I knew exactly what was missing or neglected, and her very regal bearing would get me up out of bed, or off the couch to come to her aid, because she deserved it, and I could give it, and I wanted, always, to give her the best.

I suppose if it were not so horribly convenient for me to put her down now, rather than later, I would not feel so awfully conflicted about it.

I have on many occasions thought about this day and had decided that when she would no longer eat, that would be my cue.  But that was before I had to travel and drag her away from the sleep that makes her days easy and, in some measure, comfortable.

So many things have ended this past year.

I stopped believing, even for a moment, that I would ever become the spiritual teacher that I had once yearned to become.  My beloved teacher died.  I let all of the relationships, that only I seemed to care about, go… the strongest of which was three decades in the making.

I stopped searching the horizon for a better life, and became capable of sitting silently inside myself listening to the whispers of an internal rhythm that feels like home, but is not as accessible as I would like it to be.

I have created and crafted for myself, endurance and calmness, silence and stillness, equanimity and poise, but not the bloom of promise that I once had hoped might be mine.

I do not know how that weaves together with the decision to end my dog’s life…but somehow they are a part of one another.

I sat down to write this, in the hope that it might make me feel better.  Even though I am no longer so immature that I need life to “feel better” for me, to find its value.

I suppose I am merely marking her ending with this conversation, so that one day I will be able to look back and remember, how much beauty I saw in her, how much poise, and how subtle and palpable was her strength of character.

Adayre R. Miller

4/14/13