Goodbye

I am heartbroken. Miserable. Wretched. And the worst part is I feel like I'll never be happy again.

J's and my beloved dog, Kiley, died today. It hurts to even write that... As if it makes it more real than it already is. I said this on Facebook and I'll say it again: today is the worst day of my life.





For those of you who never got to know Kiley: I'm sorry. You truly missed out. For he was the most gentle, sweet, blindly kind, loyal and loving being you could ever come across. I say "being" because he was so much more than a "dog." Rather, to those who knew him, he was a kindred spirit; gentle and happy, intuitive and intelligent, and coincidentally covered in fur. He was my first baby. And I loved him more than life.

Kiley and I had a rather auspicious start... On March 4th, 2003 (my mom's birthday), I found Kiley running around by himself -- dragging a heavy, red leash -- alone in the rain, in the dark, scared and unsure... Traipsing around the gate of my mother's apartment complex in Chatsworth. I tried to stop traffic; to follow him... Only to be brutally rebuffed by drivers who stopped only long enough to ask 'is that your dog?' and upon being told 'no, but I'm trying to help him,' they split. Their help (or lack thereof) was of little or no consequence, however... He refused to come to me. Alas, my first attempt at saving this poor, sweet, lonely dog ended in defeat.

Dejectedly, I parked my car and headed upstairs to my mom's flat to explain to her what had just transpired. After a quick exchange of cards, hugs and flowers for her birthday, I relegated myself to my post by her balcony widow, looking out for the little black baby dog I'd seen earlier. Not five minutes later, he reappeared, attempting to be coaxed by a pair of strange women. Not having appropriate footwear for the purpose of saving a dog, I borrowed a pair of my mother's tennis shoes (two-sizes-too-small), and grabbed a piece of a muffin from a Starbucks pastry bag that my mom had yet to eat.

In a flash, I dragged my mom downstairs and told her her we should split up in opposite directions, so as to have better odds of running into the lone stray. We did, and as luck would have it, I ran into him first. I approached him slowly and methodically... Reaching out with the muffin and cooing sweet, reassuring words all the while. But he wasn't an easy sell. Instead, he took off in the opposite direction, forcing me to chase him down for a quarter of a mile, in the rain. Yep. He made me work for it.



Eventually, I cornered him in a remote area of the complex, and (in an effort to be as non-threatening as possible), sat down in a puddle on the concrete. I held out the muffin. "Come here, boy... That's a good boy. Come here, sweetie." I coddled and cooed, but he wouldn't come. This boy did NOT want my muffin. He did, however, come close enough for me to eventually grab his leash he'd been dragging. And as soon as I did take it, he became a different dog: attentive and almost confident. He let me take him all the way back to the front of the building where my mom was waiting. She was shocked I'd even found him, much less brought him back. Together, we went upstairs.

Over the course of the next few days/weeks/months, I discovered what he was all about: he had a microchip put there by LA Animal Services but had been abandoned by his previous owners... Abused, malnourished, neglected, left for dead. ...You name it, and that was his history. In fact, upon being notified (via the microchip contact information), his previous "owners" didn't even know he'd been missing. It had been four days. Upon receiving the call, the "owners" hung up on the LAAS officer. Period. Done. Couldn't care less about their dog. So I (gratefully) took him home.



What ensued over the next seven-and-a-half years can't even be described as a "beautiful friendship," for it was more than that. Some people called us Besties. Some called us Soulmates. I describe it as the purest, most unconditional love I have ever known. Kiley and I could speak without saying a word. We could exchange a mere look and feel mutually loved and comforted. We both spent our formative years in dysfunctional relationships... He with his previous owners, and me with my dad. And though we weren't part of the same species, we found a special comfort within each other. And once J came into the picture, he became the center of both of our worlds. There was nothing we wouldn't do for him... Granted, he was always an incredibly easygoing dog with regards to 'doggie demands' (so our job was easy), but truly, he was our Prince. And he earned that title every day with his undying devotion, loyalty, and unconditional love.

People have patted me on the back over the years for 'saving him.' But really, he saved me. He saved me from feeling alone in the universe, unloved, and without purpose. And truly, that's what he gave me (among many other things): Purpose. He gave me a reason to get up in the morning, to come home and night, and to smile when all else in my word seemed lost. He was my Raison d'etre. And now he's gone.

It's worth noting that Kiley was sick at several times throughout his life with us: an infection here, Demodetic Mange there, stitches-due-to-Maggie-biting-him-in-the face half a dozen times... But nothing held a candle to what we went through this year.

When Kiley first got sick back in September, we were optimistic enough to believe it was an infection. After a round of antibiotics he seemed better -- and though we still took it easy with him, we thought we were out of the woods. ...We were wrong.



As I've consistently worked 5-6 days a week over the last few months, J spent the majority of time with him. He watched our baby -- our 1st baby -- go from robust to thin, from clear to bleary-eyed, from hopeful to listless. After a battery of tests, a 4-day hospital stay, and eventually an ultrasound, we were told our 12-year-old dog had a condition called Gallbaldder Mucocele. For many dogs in this position, surgery is an option. For Kiley, it was not, due to a combination of age and weight loss / frailty (he went from 65 to 43 lbs over the course of the illness). At the time, we were just so thrilled to hear that it wasn't liver cancer -- as we had feared -- that we were ready to hit this head on. So we went at it with a vengeance. Age and circumstance be damned!

Our doctor prescribed no less than six medications for Kiley, which we administered to him twice a day. That's a lot of pills. Still, he was such a trooper... After the hospital stay (wherein he only ate a quarter-can of food over the course of about a week), he was weak and thin. J and I knew we were facing an uphill battle. ...But we stayed with it. J painstakingly fed him minimum of three times a day, administering pills and petting/comforting him all the while, and we paid what can only be described as a moderate car payment for the luxury of medication. And he seemed to improve. Over the course of about two weeks, he ate -- with a voracious appetite -- whatever we gave him. Yes, he was cold at night (we have him a hoodie), and yes, he was frail (we helped him up the stairs and gave him all the love in the world), but it seemed he had turned a corner.



And then last night happened. Last night, wherein he threw up every hour to hour-and-a-half (almost on the dot). For those of you who have followed our story, yes -- that was what happened when we last hospitalized him... But the difference all lay in his demeanor. In September, though he was sick, he was in good spirits. He wanted to go out, he danced when he could, and he lit up when we walked in the room. This time... This time was different. The fight was taken out of him; the life, the joy, the desire to go on... All gone. All that was left was our emaciated, sweet and endlessly loving, but tired, exhausted and helpless boy. It was time.

I'm not going to lie; this was - by FAR - the hardest decision J and I have ever had to make in either of our lives. It didn't help that right up until the end... Kiley still managed to wag his tail against the ground when I entered the exam room. It was the most bittersweet glimmer in an otherwise heavy, precipitous fog punctuated by heavy sighs, lethargy, slowed breathing, red eyes, and (ultimately) a failed liver. He was suffering... And we knew it. But trust me -- to actually go through with putting a dog to sleep is the worst moment of your life. To agree to it, sign the papers, and ultimately hold your dog's head as he lays and first struggles against and then succumbs to the shot is an overwhelming agony that I wouldn't wish upon anyone. It is the worst torture I can ever imagine. It's like visiting the 7th circle of Hell. And suddenly, it's over... And you're holding your lifeless dog in your arms, watching his eyes get all-the-more bloodshot while his whiskers unconsciously twitch (long after he's taken his last breath and his heart has stopped). And then (if you're me), you just lose it.

Even now -- a mere 12 hours (exactly) since his death, I know we did the right thing... Yet I feel like I let him down. Like he trusted me, and when I promised him it would be alright and that I would never let anything bad happen to him, I failed. I lied. It wasn't alright. He's no longer here.

A piece of me is forever gone. There is my hole in my heart that will not -- cannot -- be filled. The throbbing muscle has been ripped out of my chest, and I have no idea how to go and and continue living as if nothing ever happened. I mean, due to his various fears and insecurities, I unconsciously learned how to walk, talk, and move objects without disturbing him. Together, J and I became super-humanly adept at snapping to in the middle of the night (even out of a deep sleep) when we'd hear him pace, pant, or heave. Just because he's gone doen't mean I can retire the feeling from my subconcious. Instead, I channel the over-doting on poor Maggie, who has no idea why Mommy and Daddy can't stop crying.

Kiley was the first 'person' to ever love me unconditionally, and he was so much MORE than a dog. He was my Bestie. He was my Soulmate. He was the male canine (so as not to impugn Maggie) love of my life. I would have given him my liver, if I could.

Here's to Kiley. The most universally loved dog of all time. I love you.