One

So it's officially been ONE day since we had to let Ruby go. It's been a very hard day. Ruby had surgery for suspected hemangiosarcoma in her spleen on Monday. She was doing ok and so we transferred her to our hospital on Wednesday. She wouldn't eat but her blood values were holding and she didn't seem to be developing any major complications. All day Thursday I had an anxious feeling. Then right when I was leaving to go teach dance Nathan called and said she looked really dumpy and she'd become very tachycardic. I recommended to give a fluid bolus and we decided that we would take her back to the EC for the night for more monitoring. He wanted me to leave dance but with no one to take over my classes I couldn't leave until 6 pm. He called again and she had blow out diarrhea and he thought was having a seizure and was agonal. We had to euthanize her. I feel horrible that I couldn't be there with her. I feel horrible that her last few days were spent in a hospital. I feel horrible that I wasn't there to tell her I loved her one more time. I wasn't ready to let her go. 

I always thought maybe I'd be 'better' at dealing with losing a pet since I have to deal with it on a day to day basis at work. But I've quickly found out I'm not. It's hard. It sucks. I've cried more in the last 3 days than I ever did dealing with my 5 miscarriages or losing any of my grandparents. 

I'm so aware that she's NOT here. I still don't really believe that she's not coming home. We already have her ashes. I'm painfully aware that she's not at the end of my bed as I type....licking her feet....which used to drive me crazy. I miss that she wasn't sitting on the rug in front of the oven...another annoying habit of hers....while I made dinner. No matter how many times I'd shoo her out of the kitchen...she'd always find her way back. I miss her moaning for her dinner. I miss helping her up the stairs. The stairs had become more of a problem for her in the last couple of years. I don't think she was ever a fan of this house since we had so many stairs. Even in her advanced years she still wanted to follow me everywhere....and she found the baby gates particularly bothersome. I've already picked up her water and food dish....but Wrigley still races back into the house after dinner to make sure she didn't miss any food. I wonder how long it will take him to realize we only have ONE dog now. 

As a vet, I've ran over her 'case' a million times in my head in the last 24 hours. And I don't know if there was anything that anyone could have done. We suspect she threw a clot or dislodged a clot and she bled out into her abdomen very quickly....or went into DIC. It all happened so fast. 

We've received many condolences from family and friends since her passing. She truly made the full circle with us. We bought her in vet school from a breeder in Kansas City (we had no business getting a dog....let alone an expensive purebred dog). We'd been married 6 months. We gave up cable TV in order to afford her. She was a beautiful puppy. Our vet school friends knew her. We took her to Arizona while we suffered through our internships. Our 'big nights out' in AZ consisted of loading her into the backseat of the Honda Civic and going to the drive-in movie....just so the three of us could be together. Then we moved to Houston....and she figured out how to crawl under the fence. I still have a 'missing dog' poster saved on my computer that Nathan made the one time we were sure we'd lost her forever. And then she made the final trip with us back to Iowa. She was here to greet us the day we brought Vivian home. She was so good with Viv too....never growled or really paid much attention to the baby at all. Reading through all of the 'sorry for your loss' comments is truly a walk down memory lane over the last 12 years of our life. 

She'd had a rough past six months. We fixed her second cruciate and she battled a nasty urinary tract infection for a month. She had some other chronic conditions too that we were medically managing. But she never complained. Even after her surgery...when I'm sure she was painful...she never tried to bite, never really let you know how bad it really was. 

I miss her so much. My chest aches. There will never be another Ruby. I look forward to the day where I can meet her soul again in Heaven...and I can tell her I'm sorry and that I love her. She was truly the best dog.