Trigger Warning: Death, Grief
I was in Michael’s picking out a stand for a new, lovely copy of the Silmarillion my parents and dog got me for my upcoming birthday, when my phone rang. I picked it up, I heard that my parents were in the car and my mom was crying, and I knew.
I knew that my dog, who was part of my life ever since I picked him out as a puppy fifteen years ago, had died. I didn’t know the specifics, which turned out to be a lot more peaceful than I ever could have imagined. It didn’t even feel real at the moment - he had been declining, and we were pretty sure he had liver cancer, but that didn’t change the fact that I hadn’t actually said goodbye to him and was nowhere near ready.
Luckily, I had run into a close friend in another aisle of Michael’s a few minutes before, and I texted them, telling them to come to the stands aisle. They stood with their arms wrapped around me as I sobbed, not caring that I was in public or that my friend didn’t even know what was going on or that COVID is a thing that exists. Everything fled out of my mind in that instant except for the horrible truths:
I am never going to get picked up at the airport by my parents and see my sweet dog getting excited in the back seat and feel him wiggle as much of his huge body into my lap as he can possibly fit.
I am never going to boop his snoot again, or even just hold my finger out and let him come to me and boop his own snoot (something he only did with me).
I am never going to spoon with him or watch Dr. Phil with him or lay with him as he falls asleep on the blanket I got him for Hanukkah that he slept in every night until the end.
I am never going to call home and ask to talk to him, only for my mom to exclaim that he’s licking the phone when I call him a good boy.
And yes, while I told him goodbye at the end of every time I visited, and had seen him a week before he died, I didn’t get to say a real goodbye and mean it.
In his life, there were a lot of “never again”s - including the fact that he stopped one of his cutest behaviors, squeaking while yawning, several years ago due to a collapsed trachea - but I wasn’t ready for the ultimate “never again.”
My friend walked me home, and we sat down by the computer, looking through old photos of my sweet dog. They let me share stories, helped me pick out pictures to tape in a grief journal my therapist recommended, and then I proceeded to distract myself as much as possible while still processing what was going on.
The only problem was, I couldn’t find a balance between distraction and processing. My dog died right before Christmas, which meant almost all of my friends were out of town, local events had stopped, and the days were short and bitterly cold. Sadness and loneliness felt overwhelming, and I had no idea what to do to get the more unpleasant thoughts of the reality of his death out of my head.
Even though I knew my dog was old and would die at some time in the near future, I wasn’t prepared to think about his body. When my therapist asked me what I would have wanted to happen to his body instead of cremation, I answered that I wished he could have just faded away into nothingness like Yoda. For the week it took for the cremation company to pick him up from the emergency vet in Florida, I couldn’t help but think about the fact that his body had to be in some sort of freezer. Far too cold, then far too hot, for a warm fuzzy friend.
I thought of his last moments, and even though it hurt my parents to ask about how things happened, I still did. I needed a story to tell myself instead of the horrors that my brain could invent. It comforted me to know that he didn’t pee or poop after he died and that he still smelled like his medicated shampoo.
There were some distressing details I fixated on, like the fact that he felt stiff when my parents took him out of the car. That - and the freezer and incinerator, which I imagined like the incinerator in one of my favorite psychological horror video games - stuck in my head for days, and I was unable to get them out. They felt almost like obsessions, except that there was no compulsion, nothing I could do to make the truth any less sad, scary, and disgusting.
Most of all, I felt a loss of control. I was terrified that Nana, who is 93 years old and has some health problems, would die too. I felt helpless to make my family feel better or to even improve my own quality of life. I wished that, somehow, someone could have known he was dying and called me so I could have said goodbye, since I was in no shape to have the existential crisis over whether the Rainbow Bridge - dog Heaven - is actually real.
But my therapist told me that even if my parents had called me at that very moment, I wouldn’t have been able to change anything. Death is a situation over which I have no control, and listening to everything happening but being unable to help might have felt even more frustrating. My therapist helped me list things I could control, and with the help of my family and the couple of friends who were still in town, I started to trudge through the days, learning as I went along.
I learned that healing looks different for everyone in my family, but we have certain commonalities - like stuffed puppies that look and feel like my dog and smell like lavender and can be warmed in the microwave for a hug - that we can do together.
I learned that, for me, it helps to imagine a positive story instead of dwell on the negative facts, and the same strategies - reminding myself of the positive thought every time the negative one rears its ugly head - is my best bet to get through this.
I learned that, unlike what I believed when I was a kid and getting bullied, it’s okay to cry, especially in front of friends. People who really care won’t mind, and through this experience, I have learned to treasure the people around me who have stepped up to take care of me when I’m usually the friend who gives care instead of receiving.
I even got to the point where I could go back to Michael’s and buy the book stand for what turned out to be my dog’s last birthday present to me, which now sits in a prominent place on my desk.
I’m nowhere near being okay about this, but I’m getting to the point where I can be productive at work, occasionally smile and laugh with my friends, and look forward to my upcoming birthday. It’s going to be a weird birthday, and things are likely going to feel weird for a while. But I have moved past the first, horrible wave of grief, and hope that one day, after more grief and growth, I will be able to cherish another dog who I tell stories about my beloved “little brother.”
Ellie, a writer in the Chicago area, was diagnosed with OCD at age 3. She hopes to educate others about her condition and end the stigma against mental illness.