Needle Noses and Fat Tyres

A loud void

I had a bad night recently.

As you'd expect, tears came less frequently. I had to concentrate on Tamale and how much I missed her in order to become weepy. Nights were hard, but usually only after everyone else was asleep. Two days ago, I felt as low as I did in the days immediately following her death. I cried as though I just lost her again.

It was the day her ashes came home.

I was spared at first. Matsie, her foster dad, came by just as I was receiving her box. With him around, I could talk about Tamale. My eyes would sting, but I could keep it together. Well, not too together. I forgot to offer him beer. I did offer him a red velvet cupcake a friend had made. Who knew that men would also want a beer. Thank dog my husband came home.

I thought I was okay.

Then I was alone with the ashes. How could something so big in my heart and my life be reduced to just bits of bone? Tamale was going to live to 13 at least. I was going to get sad when she couldn't zoom like she used to. I was going to watch her black face get grayer with age. She was going to be there when Omo died.

But she's in a box by my bed. They shaved some of her hair and it's in a little bag clipped to my bedside lamp. Quiet memorials for a loud personality.

I know she's gone every day. She and Omo were tight but polar opposites. He stayed clean; she was a ratbag. He rarely farted; she rarely didn't. When I made their dinners, she went outside to wait, he sat next to me and followed me out. She came to sleep in our room in the middle of the night; he stayed all night in his bed in the living room. She was a night owl; he loved the mornings. She spun in circles at the beach; he lay down and let the waves wash over him. She curled her head down when hugged; he rested his head on your shoulders. He was limpy; she was spritely.

He was going to die young; she would live to be old and batty.

I wasn't the only one to miss her.

Omo slowed down. He didn't cause me to worry, but we all know that if your joints are funny, it can be a use-it-or-lose-it situation. Tamale made him play. Tamale was wild, and conservative Omo had to rein her in. Tamale showed her appreciation for his keeping her out of Canine Reform School for Wayward Dogs by grooming him. They were different, but they were tight.

And he had no BFF to confide in. All he had was this sad sack of a human, whose grief made her mopey and overly huggy.

Tamale left a loud void, which needed to be filled. Omo needed a new friend. Sad Sack needed a distraction.

"I eat grief for breakfast."

DIC--WTF?!

 

How often have we said "That's not how I want to go"? I think or say that a lot. The discussion with others or myself always conclude with wanting to not know and go while I'm resting. I have a long list of ways not to die. 

I never thought about how my convenient, comfortable, and quiet death would affect those I left behind. 

Tamale died from DIC--disseminblahblahblah intervascblahblahblah coagulblahblahblah. The vet, a vet nurse friend, my mom (a pulmonologist), and Mr Internets all say the same thing: "Death Is Coming." Trust me. Look up DIC. Everything calls it Death Is Coming/Certain. Brutal and helpful all rolled into one mnemonic. There was nothing anyone could do. She tried to get up around 7 pm. She was in good spirits, if not a tad inconvenienced by her paralysed back legs. She died three hours later in her sleep.

She was in a cool room, on a comfy mat, and saw my husband and me after our trip. She had time with her foster dad, Matsie, and Brooke and her greys. While we were at the vet, I lay beside her on the floor. We spooned; I rubbed her ears. 

It was a peaceful death for her. For me? Horrible. What happened? I wasn't ready. Not Tamale. She was going to outlast everyone--everyone with a tail. She was going to get me through Omo's death. What happened? It was never going to be Tamale. 

I'm still grieving. Knowing that she died peacefully doesn't make me feel better. It does make me feel less worse. Does that make sense? 

What has made me feel better are all the email messages, blog tributes, Facebook posts. I'd say "Thanks" Tamale's way, but that would require me to nose-doink your crotches and pass room-clearing gas. I'm just not sure that I'm ready to go that far … yet. 

I've planned a few posts to help me through this. I've posted the news and now the reason. In my head are a few more. I call them transition posts. They'll eventually be more about Omo and less about Tamale. I promise you (and myself) to get the humour in. Tamale was a crack up. It wouldn't be right to remember her without humour. 

Okay.

Six days down.

(Written at a café on my phone. Scuze my typos.)

R.I.P. Tamale

 
I started this blog to keep a record of the greyhounds we--Mark and I with, of course, Tamale the Wonderpooce--fostered. Without my realising it, it became a sort of cyber house in a greyhound neighbourhood.

When we decided to take in Omo for hospice care--one billion years ago--we stopped fostering. We didn't have the room or the extra finances. Omo forgot to die, becoming Tamale's BFF and luvva (she's against marriage--who knows why).

This blog was about fostering, and, because I stopped fostering, it became a lost-themed blog. I decided that I had to stop. I gave myself until October, when I'd have to pay up at TypePad, to decide whether I'd restart it. I didn't think I would. I had two permanent dogs. My stories dried up.

Then yesterday happened.

I had been in the US for three weeks with my husband and his daughter; we promised my stepchildren a trip to the US when they turned 15. This was C's trip, and we had a fabulous time.

We arrived back in Brisbane on Tuesday. By the late afternoon, I was falling asleep standing up. I knew that driving to Brooke's after Mark arrived home from work would be dangerous, so we planned on having Brooke's Matt deliver the kids on Wednesday--yesterday.

We don't know what happened, but who does with clots and strokes. She got out of the car on her own, but was dragging her right hind foot by the time she reached the gate and couldn't walk at all in within a few more minutes.

She was clearly in distress, and we treated it like heat stroke. Poor Omo ran into the house, but came back to Tamale and watched. We filled the clam pool; I brought out my ice packs. Matt, who had planned on making his way to see Brooke in the hospital, got on the phone with her for advice and coaching.

When Tamale still couldn't walk after calming down, we bundled her up and took her to a new vet. A closer vet. I wanted to find one closer, but since none of my pets was due for a visit, I kept forgetting. Now I had to take her to an unknown vet. A friend of mine who is a vet nurse knew the clinic and recommended it. I wasn't worried that she'd be in excellent hands. Brooke was in the hospital, so I sent Matt to her. He had done all he could. I'd get my husband. I felt for him. He knew that Brooke would grieve and stress about Tamale. Brooke would ask that he stay while she battled an army, suffered from H1N1 influenza, and lifted a truck from her leg. That's Brooke. I asked that Matt go. Brooke doesn't get to be alone; that's not right.

Without going into too much detail about the vet--I understood so little with emotions and jetlag fighting me--the prognosis was that she had something pressing against her spinal cord. Something was paralysing her. He was gentle but honest--it wasn't good. She was also dehydrated. He supposed that she was probably experiencing a minor stroke or other problem and didn't drink. She, like all healthy greyhounds, just lay about. How can you tell? We got her pumped with fluids, into the vet cage, and she looked much better--lifting her head, looking at me, eyes focused, drinking on her own.

Our plan was to have her in the vet's care for 48 hours. We'll know more to make an informed decision later. Mark had arrived by then. He, poor guy, was in shock. Tamale? Of all our pets, Tamale?! Not the old cat Zuni, the roaming cat Peppa, or the gimpy dog Omo. Tamale. Rough as guts Tamale. We left. My last words to her were: "I love you. I won't let you live in fear."

Mat, Tamale's foster dad, called to arrange to go with me back to the vet for a visit and to hear the latest development. I thought I'd come back to send her off. Had I known that the vet was going to call at 10:30 at night to tell me that she died, I would have repeated "I love you" and--spinal cord schminal cord--hugged her until she yelped.

So here we are.

It's October.

Omo is lost. Tamale was his live-in therapy dog.

My husband and I are grieving.

I won't start to foster. Omo wouldn't be a great host. He's not 100%, and I don't know how he'll fare without his ... lady friend.

But I miss blogging about my kids. I feel less alone because of the community this blog brought to me. A blog doesn't have to be necessary to everyone, just to the writer--me.

Now, I'm going to look through my photos of Tamale and cry. What did Carrie Fisher write that her grandma used to say? "Go on and cry; you'll pee less." There's my silver--yellow--lining.