I’m going to share Ellie’s final story and am confident I will not be able to get through this without crying. Death is not a fun topic, but it is what happened to me this week. I haven’t eaten anything since Thursday but I promise I will today. Today is Saturday and my girlfriend is coming over at 11:00 am to help get my life back together. We are going to an animal shelter to donate Ellie’s things.

On Tuesday after I walked Ellie, my 13-year-old shih-tzu, I went to give her a potty treat (it’s something we started when I was potty training her and just never stopped 13 years later) and she refused to eat it. It was weird but then I made myself pasta and she always used to watch me eat like I watch the real housewives on TV. Like every bite I took was a huge housewives argument scene. Super entertaining and shocking. And she wasn’t watching me eat. She wasn’t interested in playing with her squeaky toys.

Then I noticed she wasn’t eating her shih-tzu dog food and I started freaking out. I put this product on her food which is irresistible to dogs, it even says that on the package. (When I’d leave for like a weekend trip, I used to put this on her food knowing she might not eat as well when I’m not there to try to get her to pig out before I’d leave). Nothing. I put Parmesan cheese on her food. Nothing. I tried to give her a ‘special treat’ which is what I called these bones called SmartBones. I said in my high-pitched dog mom voice, “Ellie, do you want a special treat?” Always I’d make her earn these special treats. So in routine fashion, she lied down and rolled over. She performed, so I gave her the special treat. But she didn’t want it. That performance, she did, was… just for me. I started balling crying.

As I’m googling vets for her, she was lying in her dog bed, right where I put her staring at me. She only had one eye which I talked about in this post, but her eye and face told me exactly what she was thinking. “Mom, you’re not getting it. This is bad.” I put her on my lap and noticed her breathing was off. Very rapid and deep.

It was during a snowstorm and she could barely walk so I carried her. The vet weighed her and I instantly started crying. She weighed 8 pounds. She used to weigh 12. How could she have possibly lost 4 pounds? I mean her fluff hid a lot, but I was in shock. A third of her weight. She’s always been a graze eater and would rattle the bowl with her paws when it was empty. Very bossy and demanding, part of her charm. I just realized she hadn’t done that in a while. The vet told me because of the snowstorm he wouldn’t be able to get her labs back fast enough and recommended me to take her to an animal hospital.

I took her there and I couldn’t believe how fast everything happened. They immediately put her in an oxygen tank. I have never even heard of this before. The only light in this story is the girl I met in the waiting room. She could tell I was crying and I told her what was going on as her new puppy was crawling up and down my leg (I wish I knew the bread, but it was super cute). I asked her why they were there and she said he had swallowed a sock. It made me laugh through my cries.

The vet called me back to tell me the news. She had congestive heart failure. He said she couldn’t live more than 3 weeks if I could even get her to eat anything. And she’d likely suffer. I asked if I could go down and see her in the oxygen tank. They let me go down there and I brought her leash like that scene in My Girl where the girl said: “he needs his glasses.” I so was not rationally thinking. I saw Ellie in the oxygen tank, and… she looked peaceful. I laid down next to the tank and asked the vet if I could crawl in there with her. He told me no because it would take away oxygen from her. We were looking at each other and she just sat there.

They made me go back to the waiting area while they finished some labs and paperwork. I remember looking at the paperwork, like how do they know she was born on June 19th? I don’t remember giving them that info, maybe they scanned the chip in her head. Everything was just happening so fast, I don’t know. I saw the same girl in the waiting room and she hugged me. It was nice getting a hug from a complete stranger. Her vet brought out that sock. In a Ziploc bag like… the evidence. We both laughed.

My grandfather passed from pancreatic cancer. He was given a choice to pass in a week, or suffer for six months on tubes and meds. He decided to say goodbye to loved ones and pass on within the week. This is a whole other tear-jerker story I can tell another time. Pennies aside, I thought it’d be best for her to not suffer than go on suffering another 3 weeks if even possible. It’s really the worst thing to have to go through.

My boy dog Ernie passed on 3 months ago. And although Ellie would disagree with me, I think she died from a broken heart. She started acting needier after his passing and they spent every second together. They never snuggled. She was super bossy. Always had to go through the door first. He let her eat first. She always had to walk on the right because she had OCD. He let her do anything she wanted, she was his princess. They had a special bond, more than I realized. Now she can boss him around again, in heaven.

They had many dads, many moves, many homes. Young adult years are crazy. I once put them in the front seat of a 17-foot u-haul and drove from Arizona to California for six hours in the pouring rain with my car attached to the back. And I’m a terrribbblllle driver. I don’t know how we all didn’t die sooner. I have never had an adult life without them. And now they can see everything I went through, all the struggles I’ve had, when I had to go to work, why I wasn’t there. I feel like they can see I’m a hot mess now. But I hope to make them proud someday.

MY FAVORITE ELLIE QUALITIES

She always had to walk on the right and have her leash hang to the left ALWAYS FOR 13 YEARS (or she literally couldn’t walk), the way I could read her face, when she’d lick my tears, get mad at me for going away for the weekend, how she always slept upside-down, her intense morning kisses, lay in my lap as I worked, hopped like a bunny, snorted when she smelled things on the street, how she was a lady and sat down when any dog tried to smell her butt, how she refused to learn how to swim, when you held her and she’d just fall overbackwards like ‘someone will catch me,’ would hide bones from her brother and try to barry them in the couch with her head only to find out that didn’t do anything and then find another hiding place, rolled over when anyone tried to pet her to get belly rubs, when she’d wine because she wanted to lick my shower water, peed with her right foot forward in the air, her attempts at being a dog that fetches squeaky toys, how she’d hyperventilate when I’d come home after leaving for an hour, her Cindy Crawford’s beauty-mark, the way we would stretch together every morning when I said STRETCHHHHH. She was my best friend and I’ll miss her every day.