I am writing this in memory of my beloved dog Lady. A friend suggested I get this on paper before I forget those precious last 3 weeks that Lady and I spent together.
When I started writing this I never intended to share it, but now I share it for all those who have lost their precious pet.
Lady and I lived together for thirteen years.
She went everywhere with me. We were together almost 24 hours a day, and yet the last three weeks of her life was the first time I experienced how deeply we were connected. I am not sure who was taking care of whom in those final days. On the outside it looked like I was caring for Lady, but now as I reflect on that time, I realize she was really caring for me.
She was caressing the tightness of my broken heart strings. The areas in my body that did not want to let go and sit with the all the pain and loss I had experienced over the years.
She was teaching me how strong I am, how much easier it is to sit with pain than to push it away, and that I can do anything to which I set my mind.
She taught me the remarkable beauty of sitting in the back yard with her at my side.
It is funny because when I recall our last weeks together it seems to me it was so much more than 3 weeks. I have had to check the calendar because it felt like an eternity and a flash all at the same time. There were times I felt we had been living this way our whole life, and yet when it was over I wanted every millisecond back. I longed to have her sweet body sitting next to me.
I remember finally accepting and enjoying that I got to stay home, be still and not have to make any plans or have any obligations. The weather was perfect spring weather and we got to sit in the backyard most afternoons. I sat Lady up as comfortable as possible and just felt so much gratitude for our time and our love.
What I got was fully present.
It was a switching point. I had heard about being and living fully present but I did not really understand what that meant until the time with Lady. I became committed to being with her fully from my heart and just loving her and tending to her needs. It was such a special place to be.
I find that I can be in that place more and more with people now. The best part of it is that I get to be in that place because it is so enjoyable. I am not forcing myself to be there I am there out of pure choice. Because all there is is love. Lady showed me that, as only animals can.
We had sat together in the woods, in many backyards, and on street corners, but it was the first time I became fully present to how much love she brought to those moments. How different my life would be without her sitting with me wherever I was.
Why is it so difficult to be fully present and grateful for something until you loose it?
Luckily, since Lady’s death that has shifted. I have become much better at telling those I love how much I love and appreciate them. Sometimes the beauty of everyday living overwhelms me. And it is not because my life is full of so much ease, it is because I learned from Lady to appreciate what is there in front of me, much more deeply than I ever had.
The most remarkable thing that I learned from Lady was her resiliency and just wanting me
to be ok.
Here she was in so much pain, and having to be completely at my beck and call, and she
just remained this bundle of love and acceptance.
I had melt downs, I felt sorry for myself for having to stay at home and she was the paralyzed one.
I imagine how scary it must have been for her having her sole caretaker having anxiety attacks, crying and feeling inadequate to the task.
Some months later a friend told me how inadequate he felt when he was around me. It was a huge awareness because I could feel when he felt inadequate and I felt insecure when he went into that place.
It made me aware of why the wildlife I had rehabilitated felt scared around me. I always wondered. It was because I felt inadequate in caring for them.
I think of Lady, just needing me to love her, and I was feeling completely inadequate. I did everything I could for her, and the last 10 days to 2 weeks I was able to be present to her but I was still very scared.
I slept with her on the floor most nights, looking into her eyes until we fell asleep. There was a song a friend had introduced me to the night before her fall. It is called ‘Stay‘ by Rihanna. It is a song about wanting to keep a relationship going that wasn’t a healthy relationship, and the addiction the singer felt for her love. I sang this song to Lady often. At the time I didn’t realize the significance of what I was singing but since then I listen to it often and as I cry all the way through it I realized the power of believing that a person or object and in my case my beloved pet made me feel whole and complete and in hanging on to this thing outside myself I had in fact made her life miserable.
It is something that I have thought about often. Did I do all I did because I was scared to let go of yet another thing. I had a lot of loss that spring, and I just couldn’t believe that I had to let go of one more thing. And the thing that I loved more than I have ever loved any being, including myself. Through Lady I experienced love, unconditional love that would never judge me, ridicule me, or tell me I did anything wrong. Lady only ever saw all that I did was right. It stuns me how animals can see what humans cannot. The fact that there
isn’t ever anything wrong. Everything is right and beautiful and perfect all the time.
I wonder if I held onto her too long. Did I cause her more pain than she ever needed to endure because I couldn’t let go? Obviously I will never know the answer to that question and for Lady I know she would have stayed as long as I needed her too, she loved me that much.
Questions to self:
1. Are there any areas in my life where I am holding on to something that no longer is healthy?
2. Are you willing to let that go? If not why? Who would you be without holding onto that?
3. Is there anything you are running away from, that you haven’t been able to sit still and be quiet with and feel the fullness of it in your body?
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