My Dog Died and You Really Do Care

Part Three: Letting go

Note: October’s Online Intuitive EcoWriting Workshop is Writing Down the Moon on October 28th, 5-7pm on Zoom. Registration closes October 25th. See more about the class at the bottom of this post.

---

Read Part One here.

Read Part Two here.

Even weeks after my elder dog Codee’s passing, my body remained achy and sorrowful, sensitive and tight. If I was honest, I wasn’t ready to lay her to rest completely. I wanted her to be at peace, but my heart still held onto her.

Going outside in the morning to journal, I still felt her presence there with me, a welcoming breeze. Purple asters sprouted in my yard for the first time. A family of quail waddled past. I was pleasantly surprised by a tabby cat peeking around the corner at me. I wanted her to come over for a visit. The loneliness persisted. A part of me couldn’t be comforted by human love or wild nature but required the comfort of subtle communication, simple loving and the ever-present knowing that only a pet can provide.

Grief continuously visited me in waves of body pain. This was the rollercoaster of grief. My shoulders, neck or stomach would send up an alarm and I would do my best to listen, let the tears go, let myself indulge in messy sorrow. I was learning to be in the deep emotion and not let it settle and calcify in the pit of my stomach. I kept remembering again and again that I lost my best friend.

Maybe it sounds dramatic to some to call a dog a best friend. Your dog can’t discuss your problems with you and give you advice, but your dog is an excellent listener and is always available for a hug. She can’t go to the spa with you or out to dinner, but she’s always eager to climb a mountain with you, to trapse through the woods and across rivers. When Codee was younger, she always stopped and turned around on walks to make sure I was still following close behind. She always watched out for me, every day for years by my side. In some ways, a dog is a better friend than a human.

I met a woman who said that it took her two and a half years to mourn her cat. I thanked her for giving me permission to continue to mourn for as long as I needed. In Caravan of No Despair, Mirabai Starr writes, "Everyone grieves differently, and science collapses in the face of the mysteries of the heart. There is no map for the landscape of loss, no established itinerary, no cosmic checklist, where each item ticked off gets you closer to success. You cannot succeed in mourning your loved ones. You cannot fail."

I still wasn’t ready to let Codee go. I was still trying to hold onto her love, to have her love near to me. I went on a walk. I saw Codee in front of me. Codee behind me. I kept crying, leaking onto the earth. My dreams remained haunted with pain, hurt and death. My therapist wisely suggested that if I couldn’t let her go completely then before I go to bed at night, I could imagine giving Codee permission to run free and return to me in the morning.

When I imagined her, she was always in her younger body, the one that sprinted and leapt over rocks and could go farther and longer than me. The agile body that loved to shove her whole head in the snow and come up for air covered with snowflakes before rolling around in the snow pile, wiggling her spine over the ice. The body that loved to snuggle her nose into my neck. The body with sharp ears that could still hear the gentlest click of my tongue and quickly return to my side.

Then one day, unexpectedly, I did it. I let her go. I was amidst the most ordinary task, hanging broom hooks. I was standing in the mud room with Eric. I was holding up a hook array for brooms, which I had purchased weeks before but didn’t get around to hanging. Eric had a free moment to help. The day after Codee died, the mesh fell off the top corner of the screen door frame and peeled back each day collapsing more. As I stood there looking at the falling screen, my stomach churned. The sickness of grief took hold again. A wave of nausea swept over me. I felt myself hanging onto Codee. She was always just out of sight. Her spirit hanging close. I was tired. I had been holding on for my life, not hers.

Out of nowhere, so unexpectedly that I surprised myself, I said internally, intuitively, “Okay, you can go now.” A gentle breeze swirled around outside the door. “Yes,” I said, “It’s okay, you can go now.”

The wind picked up and spun, growing in intensity. Eric lifted his head at the sound as he turned the last screw. “Uh oh,” he said, “That was a big one.” He hoped nothing in our building project would get displaced by the giant gust.

But I knew it was Codee, set free from my tether, my deep desire to keep her with me. The wind is a courier for spirits and spirt communication and she was eager to run off. I don’t blame her. Finally free from her old painful bones, she wanted to fly.

Eric looked at the screen door. “I guess I should fix that too,” he said. I nodded. Her spirit would no longer be scratching at the door to be let out.

After hanging the broom and mop on the new hooks, I found a can of gold spray paint on the floor. I took the large smooth rock that I had chosen for Codee’s gravestone outside and began to coat it in metallic gold coats. I was overcome with a sense of aloneness then, different that the loneliness I had previously felt. Now I felt instead like Codee was missing from my side, like Codee was no longer at my side. Maybe that sounds like the same thing, but it isn’t. Loneliness felt like she was just beyond reach. Aloneness felt like she was nowhere within reach.

Waiting for the paint to dry, I walked along the south trail, resolutely alone. I would have to make my own way now. No one would lead me back when I lost sight of the trail as I often did. No one would tread the way, searching for snakes, sniffing for coyotes. No one would bark to let me know if a predator was nearby. I would have to be more alert now. I walked up and down the trail overgrown with rabbit brush, retracing my steps, embedding my path deeper. I have to make my own way now.

P.S. I hope that in some way, sharing my grief was helpful to you. Though this essay is complete, my grief is not. I still cry every day. I want to thank the many of you that have reached out to me with kind condolences. I really appreciate your love and support. Thank you for caring. Let’s continue to care for each other.

---