Shhh…. I have a secret

I did something today that I didn’t want to do. I did it alone because I didn’t think that my husband could handle doing it and because I knew I would need time after I did it.

I went to our vets office and I picked up the ashes of our beloved Minxi, the dog that we had for almost 14 years. I didn’t want to pick up her ashes because once I did, it was over. There was no hoping that it had all been a bad dream.

No, I’m not stupid. I knew she was gone. But until I picked up her ashes I could pretend that she was just being boarded or visiting at a friends.

But, she’s not. I knew because I held her while she died.

I held her while they gave her the stuff that would make her sleep forever.

I held her because I wanted her to be able to hear my heartbeat, and hopefully feel all of the love I had for her. I wanted her to know she was loved, so very much.

Minxi was 14 or 15 depending on which records you believed. We got her form the Humane Society. We originally got her with the idea of making her my son’s therapy dog. Didn’t work out that way. She attached herself to me fairly quickly, or my mom when I wasn’t around.

We had her for 3 years before we moved to the area we live in now. From 2 acres to a stupid apartment. We all hated it. She missed the acreage she had to play on, and we missed the room we had.

A couple of years later, we adopted her sister. While Minx was a mix of what we believe was chihuahua and mini pin, her sister is a purebred red wire-haired Dachshund. Not papered since she had a broken tail and could not be shown.

Like we care.

She was 3 lbs when we got her. We were told she was a tea cup Doxie and would never be more than 9 lbs.

They lied. She is 25 lbs. A full tea set. We know now that she is considered a standard dachshund.

Minx was her big sister. Reluctantly at first, but the first time Jax cried in her sleep, Minx put her nose on her and calmed her down.

They were inseparable for 10 1/2 years. Our Jaxi is now lost. She wanders from room to room looking for her. I can see in her eyes that she misses her sister too.

I think she knew that Minx was sick, dying really for the last few months. She was always with Minx and started lying closer to her. It was like she knew their time was limited.

Minx was diagnosed with Cushing’s disease. She had been on meds for almost 2 years. The vet said that if she took her meds regularly, she should live for several more years.

But the last year she has been losing weight. We managed to stabilize it for a few months, then it dropped. And kept dropping. Every month when we took her in for her pain shot, she had lost weight.

The last time, our dog that had once weighed 22 lbs, that we had to put her on a diet until she hit 16, was down to 7. She was basically skin and bones.

We had a family meeting the day before. We talked about what would be best for Minx. At this point, she hadn’t eaten for almost days. Her back legs had been randomly giving out on her for a couple of months. We had started to pick her up to take her outside (we bought a house with a big yard right before the pandemic hit). She was running or playing. She was just sleeping. Getting up once in a while to wander around and go back to where she had been lying.

We tried every food on the market to get her to eat. She was taking medication to stimulate her appetite. Nothing worked.

As a family, we decided to take her to the vet for a ‘quality of life check’. I think we all knew what the vet would say.

My husband and I took her to the appointment.

We both knew before we went in what they would say. But, we were both hoping we were wrong.

Instead, I held her while she went to sleep forever.

I know we did what was best for her, but it broke my heart, and I will always wonder if there was more we could have done.

I hope that she knew we loved her.

I hope that holding her was a comfort; I didn’t want her to feel alone.

I don’t know if I will ever get over saying goodbye to her.

But I held her, told her I loved her.

I told her to go find her first sister, the one we lost 2 years ago. And the one we lost in April.

I told her to go find my mom.

And I held her while she died