February 5th. 

Today is the one year anniversary of my previous dog’s death, and I’ve been incredibly mopey today…and just generally irritable and withdrawn all weekend. I feel extremely restless, and I just don’t really know what to do with myself.

To some people it may seem pathetic to still be so upset over a dog, but I am sure that a lot of other people can understand the attachment you can feel for your animals.

She was my best friend. We got her when I was 8 years old and she lived for 11.5 years, so I’d kind of grown up with her. She was the cutest, funniest little dog I’d ever known. I have gotten better over the past year, but I still am far from being ‘over’ her death. I’ve lost people and other animals before, and somehow this one was by far the hardest I’ve dealt with.

We have another dog now, and while I love this dog too, I just still compare everything to my previous dog. Every time I do something nice for my current dog, I feel guilty…like, what if I didn’t give that many treats to my previous dog? What if I’m spoiling this new dog more? I just feel awful. I don’t want to feel this way, and I really don’t want to compromise any time I have with this new dog, but I just feel so conflicted. 

Every so often I replay the night that my dog died over and over in my head. She died extremely suddenly. We’d taken her to the vet for a regular check-up just a few months before, and they went on and on about how healthy she was and that they wouldn’t have guessed that she was 11.5. I thought that she’d have a few more years in her. I always knew that losing her would be one of the worst things that could happen to me, but imagining it didn’t come close to actually experiencing it. That night was one of the worst of my life, but I am glad that I was at home when she died. I’m so glad that I didn’t go out that night. I stayed with her until she crawled over to me and died in my arms. 

I just hope that she was a happy dog.

I’m really not ready to face this week.