Reason Behind the Light Blogging Last Week

I've had to do some difficult things in my life, but the toughest thing I may have ever done in my life to this point occurred last Wednesday, March 7, at approximately 8:25 am. I had to put my good canine friend and almost nine year rommate Bear to sleep.

My sister got my friend as a six week pup, had him for about a year before moving and having to give him up, but despite her best efforts at finding him a good home, nothing ever really worked out for him. My mom wound up with him for a number of months, but he was quite a handful in his younger years, a little too much for her at least. I took him off her hands when I moved to Ohio in 1998 when he was about three, and he was my constant companion from that point.

He had gotten ill Monday morning, a most unusual event for him, so I took him to the vet that afternoon, and the doc decided to keep him overnight for X-rays and some lab tests, and possibly an ultrasound the next day. The good doctor discovered a large, inoperable tumor with the ultrasound, and it was causing life-threatening internal bleeding. The doc informed me of Bear's condition Tuesday afternoon. I went to visit him that evening for over an hour & they kept him stable overnight while I slept on the decision that I was pretty much forced to make by his steadily deteriorating condition.

He was really struggling early Wednesdsay morning when I returned. His breathing was labored and he was unsteady on his feet, but really glad to see Dad again. We spent some time together again and then I had the vet come in and give him the shots that took him away from me until we meet again in the next world. It will be a long time before I recover, if one can ever recover from tragedy like this; while he was getting pretty long in the tooth for his kind, he'd always been a very healthy guy, so losing him this suddenly was quite a shock. He would have been thirteen in May.