Sunday, June 28, 2009

Sandy's With The Angels

Our oldes doggie, Sandy, is with the angels as of this morning.

I write about our dogs sometimes. We have three, all golden retrievers. Sandy is the oldest, at 13 1/2. She is not a specimen, as my father in law calls purebreds that are truest to their breed. She is more of a field golden - short hair, reddish color, almost like an irish setter in color.

Over the past few years she has begun to have health problems and had been slowing down. She has had several surgeries, to cut out this or that, as well as other treatments. I tell friends, remember, we live in Jersey. It remindes me of the Steve Goodman song, Watching Joey Glow, about a kid that lives near a nuclear reactor - lovely. We live in a great area, no nuclear reactor or chemical plant, but it creeps me out to watch our animals get cancer.

Sandy has always held her own. She has had a number of health problems over the years but was always spritely through it all. In the past few months, however, she had been slowing down. She has always been the alpha dog, and the matriarch of the other dogs. She was loving and gentle. She was born on Christmas Eve, and really has been a special treat and gift to us. She recently allowed our youngest doggie, Janey, to become the alpha. She has passed the baton.

She still made it up the stairs at night to sleep in our room, but finally gave that up a couple of nights ago. The vet has prescribed some pain medication and she had been getting into palliative care. We savored these last days with our girl. One of my friends asked me recently if she was hanging on for us, if we have told her it is okay to go. It really got me thinking.

Our daughter Julia has been away for 6 weeks and just got home a couple of days ago. Sandy loves Jul (all the animals do). I think she was waiting to see Julia. Please send blessings and prayers to our girlie Sandy.

No comments:

Post a Comment