Missing My Grace
Missing My Grace
In April of 2015 I made the very difficult decision to let go of our precious Grace. She was a 14 year old lab/collie/beagle mix and although a “mutt”, the most amazing gift to my life and to my son’s growing up years.
Without one single illness during her entire life, Grace was the smart, kind, loyal, protective sort. She had quirks and funny habits like most any other living creature and that made us love her all the more for her individuality. For a mixed breed, she was a healthy, salt of the earth sort of dog.
Before it even thundered before a storm, the fur on her back would stand on end. She would sometimes shake prior to a big storm because she knew it was coming. She hid in the bathtub or a closet or stood next to us for comfort. A few minutes before a very strong derecho (aka an intense, crazy and windy storm), she nudged me to go outside to pee. She walked out the front door, squatted, peed, came back in the door literally five seconds before the wind knocked the door wide open, swept my ceramic pot across my stoop and hurricane force winds took over our lives for several hours. How did she know? She had an intuition we found fascinating. Her looks of love and soft, gentle nudges were our reminder to stay present and relaxed.
She was goofy, silly and had her little issues. Grace did not like the car and let us know by consistently letting off her “discomfort farts” whenever we needed to take her somewhere, usually the vet. It usually took a few hours of rolled down windows to remove the smell from the car.
This dog became a rock to me and a warm blanket during the chaos off single motherhood. Her goofy ways were an indication that dogs, or pets in general, feel for us as we do for them. We are their pack, their group of humans, and their special form of identity. Moving through 14 years of stages in my life and my son’s life, Grace was a constant. Her strength and heartiness were taken for granted until the day I brought her to the vet for tummy symptoms that turned out to be late stage lymphoma. Fourteen years of a completely healthy dog, then a diagnosis of late stage cancer. I would have probably dealt with it better had the young female vet not come into the office to give me the news and started tearing up. This to me was a gesture of compassion. I could have been more upset for her not being stronger in her role, but what it told me was that she absolutely cared not only for pet owners, but for the well-being of the animals she treated.
So fourteen years became a flashback of memories and funny stories. Of Grace waiting patiently for me to pull out of my parking spot in front of my townhome before softly jumping up and placing her paws upon my kitchen counter to see what was up there. I caught her doing this once when I saw her through the bay window and laughed – little stinker, she just waited until I pulled away to begin her investigation. Or the time my son and his 10 year old friends made a cake for a neighborhood mom. We adults sitting at her house when the kids whispered in my ear that they would run up to our house and get the cake to surprise Sue only to arrive there and find that Grace had jumped up and conveniently made it half way across the table in order to eat a half moon shaped section out of the cake. They arrived back at Sue’s house with the cake to coyly inform us that “Um, Grace had a bit of the cake.” We celebrated anyway and laughed! We placed the candles accordingly and went back sooner than we would have to make sure Grace was not regurgitating her large portion in the house.
Time does fly. The small little puppy I saw at a dog adoption at a pet store, surrounded in a pen by 10 other siblings, vying for food. She was the runt. I told the owner if she did not adopt her out by the end of the weekend I would consider it; to call me if that was the case. And so it was.
Grace was my girl, Stinka, the Gracinator, Grace Grace… She was to me a part of my life that I still grieve. A kind, giving, unconditionally loving part that we all wish to contain. But alas, her 14 years was a gift that will remain a gift. It has several years and I still cry when I think of the diagnosis day, the weeks after when her system continued to fail. The numerous times a night getting up so she could pee; her inability to hop on my bed anymore; my unconditional patience with her and the doggie massages before bed and singing her favorite song into her no-longer-hearing years. “You are my special girl, you are my special girl…”
Can we honestly say we loved an animal? I believe it is absolutely a viable and real emotion. Where else do we receive such unconditional love? But where else as well do we receive a reflection of ourselves so perfectly offered in God’s creatures? They speak to us with their eyes and reactions, their loyalty and greeting.
On the day of her passing, my brother, mom and son attended. We found an angel vet who came to our home to assist in her leaving us. It was a sunny day and a light snow had fallen. It was Good Friday, April 3, and this particular year the day designated as the day Jesus rose from the dead. I sobbed and sobbed as we proceeded through the injection of medications and the final injection of what would put her at peace and move her into her final moments. I felt her body give way, relax and let go. I do not believe I have ever cried that much in my life. The decision and the responsibility of this act is overwhelming. My son and the vet gently placed sweet Grace on a blue stretcher, covered her in a warm, soft blanket and carried her down the steps out the front door and into the sunshine. As I followed out the door, I recall seeing a beautiful yellow daffodil covered in a light, soft snow. As they placed her in the back of the vets SUV, the sun shone on her soft brown ears. She looked peaceful and I thanked God for the sun on her face. I kissed her goodbye; my son kissed her goodbye as did my brother and mom. My heart was full and depleted.
A day does not go by when I do not grieve my Grace. One of the most difficult decisions a pet owner has is the decision to let them go. It is an honor, however, to be placed in that position and I know she received our love, caring, kindness and affection her entire life. We loved our Grace.
I miss her attention, her goofiness, her soft ears, her comfort laying next to me in bed, her silly habits and quirky ways.
She was my Grace and filled so many years with joy. May she rest in peace. I feel her with me always and as a huge part of my life I know she was sent here to remind me of my priorities. It will be a while before I find another dog to care for but in the meantime, I will recover from this loss knowing that she enhanced this world and left me deeply Missing My Grace.
