Misty will be Missed

My parents recently had to put down their dog, Misty. Misty was a dog my folks found at an animal shelter about 9 years ago. They suspected that she had been with an abusive owner prior to my parents adopting her. She was an excellent dog, I never had to worry about leaving my babies with her. On May 3rd, my parents noticed that she was walking very unsteadily and having trouble sitting down. She would circle several times like she wanted to, she just couldn't figure out how. We all suspected that she had had a stroke. My mom told me that if I wanted my children to be able to say goodbye, that I should do it then, because they were taking Misty to be put down the next day.

I took Madison and Malachi over to my mom's and explained to them that Misty was really sick, and that tomorrow Grandma was going to take her to the vet. The vet would then give Misty some medicine to help her sleep forever, and that now was the time to say "goodbye". Malachi seemed pretty unphased by the whole ordeal. He said "goodbye" to Misty then took off to play. Madison, however, had a pretty tough time with everything. She's always been a big animal lover anyway, so to lose an animal that she was close to was hard for her. We had brought our camera with us to Grandma's, so she wanted to take some pictures of Misty (which was hard, since Misty could hardly stand, she was so off-balance). Madison then just sat with Misty for awhile and laid her head on her back. Over the course of the next few days, I would notice that Madison was much more subdued than normal, (okay, I guess "subdued" and "normal" don't exactly belong in the same sentance when we're talking about Madison) and occasionally, I would notice her crying. At these times, I just tried to hold her and stroke her hair, not wanting to say much, just let her grieve. During one of these sadder moments, Madison asked me, "Mommy, when Misty is "Sleeping Forever" can she breathe?" "No, honey." I said. That's when I think she really knew that Misty was not coming back and that she had died. This was Madison's first real experience with death. I think she handled it really well. We miss you Misty!