I'm not sure where to post this exactly, because altogether it's about the loss of more than one loved one, but because the most recent loss is of a pet I think it would fit here. On the 21st I lost one of my dearest companions and family members, a sharpei-pug mix named Baby(nicknamed Pumpkin by my fiancee). She was somewhere between 16 or 17 years old, and as far as we can tell died peacefully in her sleep lying in one of her favorite spots on the floor. It was a perfectly normal day and she hadn't been acting any differently, she had no serious health problems we were aware of. My fiancee and I had gone out to a Christmas party and when we returned later that evening I found her while getting dinner for our two other dogs. The loss of any pet or human family member is difficult, but due to my past experience with the subject I feel like it's all combining to make things even worse.
For a little history(or a lot of history), I was raised by my grandparents since I was 3 and still live in the same house. Originally I had a cat(a siamese-persian mix named Paris), raised from a kitten who was my first real pet. We grew up together. Later in his life my grandparents got a puppy from one of our local pet stores, a sharpei named Snuffles. The two never really got along very well. Five years into our life with Snuffles tragedy struck. One day while he was running around circles inside the house(we have an island kitchen in the middle of a living room next to another front room, and this was one of his favorite things to do which he did very often) he hit his head on a corner of a table and the force of the blow or angle was enough to kill him. We were all devastated, but especially my grandpa. He couldn't stand the grief, and not more than two weeks later we went to the same pet store and met a new puppy who we took home, our Baby dog(she and my cat still didn't get along). Some time after that, I don't even remember how long anymore, I lost Paris to a thyroid disease and old age. He had been taking medicine for it for a while but it was his time to go, and my grandma and I went to the vet to have him euthanized. He was around 18. Fast forwarding a little more my grandparents decided to get a new puppy for my grandma from the same pet store Snuffles and Baby came from, a golden lab we named Dusty. Though I never really voiced my opinion I had been against the idea. Having so recently lost two pets part of me felt this would only mean having to experience the pain and grief again someday, but I loved him all the same. Dusty and Baby grew up together and were a dynamic duo.
Fast forward again to 2002 and we're dealing with humans now. My grandma, during what was an otherwise normal day and who was in good health, suffered from a stroke. She was rushed to the hospital where my grandpa and I were told there was a blood clot in her brain and she needed surgery that was supposed to have a high success rate. He agreed and we went home after, only to be called back in later that night because something had gone wrong. We spent the rest of that night in the hospital waiting for my aunts, uncle, and mother to arrive, so my grandma could be taken off of life support and we could let her go. I had always been closer to my grandma than my grandpa, but for the next year we grew closer than ever. We went to grief counseling together, but I was there more often to support him than to relieve my own pain. Within that time frame my grandpa on my father's side of the family had become ill and was lost to a blood disease IN 2003. Going back momentarily instead of forward, I lost my father to suicide when I was 3. Something that I was too young to remember experiencing, but now that I'm older still sometimes gives me grief. Forward again another six months in 2004 and my grandpa, with some health complications of his own, had to go to the hospital. All of this was something he was able to overcome though, and he spent a month at a rehab facility to get better. After he came home again everything looked like it was going to be ok. A little over a week later I woke up late, he usually woke me up earlier in the day, and found him lying in his bed having passed sometime in the night. His death was officially attributed to health issues he had been dealing with for years, but I personally think it may have been due to mixing medication or an overdose. Not something he did on purpose, but on accident. When he came home he was ready to live again. He had talked about wanting to travel and living a more healthy lifestyle. He was 67 and my grandma 65. My other grandpa was 72. My father 22.
Fast forwarding several years more through family/life drama and back to the near present and I'm living with my now fiancee in the same home I've always had, the one my grandparents left to me when they died. A few years ago we got a third dog, a husky lab mix named Miska. There was a lot of adjusting in the beginning but he, Baby, and Dusty became great companions and he is a welcome addition to our family(though he can be a bit of a bully sometimes toward Dusty). When we got him he was a little over a year old, and his high energy has sometimes been difficult for the other two, but at the same time helped give them new life. In a house of two dogs, Baby has always been the boss, and that did not change when a third was introduced(despite her being somewhat smaller than the other two).
Last year around this same time she had been acting like she was having difficulty getting around and couldn't hold her bladder anymore when she slept. I was so terrified it was going to be her time. I took her to the vet, who after running multiple tests said that she was remarkably healthy for her age and nothing out of the ordinary was wrong. She was given medication for the bladder issue and everything was fine. Back to the present, now the three have become two. I sit here on Christmas Eve, in more pain than I ever have been before. I mourn for my Baby dog, for all the loved ones in my life I've lost. I'm sad and worried for Dusty, who's the same age as Baby and is now missing one of his lifelong friends. And for Miska whose daily routines have changed so much without her. And for my fiancee who never had a pet before, but adopted Dusty and Baby as her own and now has to deal with this loss as well. I'm also afraid for the future, knowing that this will not be the last time it happens. I've been here before, I know it can get better. But it hurts so much right now and doesn't feel like it will.
On a small side note not entirely unrelated, I was laid off from a job of 3 1/2 years just before Thanksgiving and have yet to find another. So I'm sure that's adding to my emotional baggage right now as well. Thank you anyone who takes the time to read my story here. I hope putting everything out there will help start the healing process. I've read some of the other threads posted here and I feel for you all as well.
