Living No Other Way

To start, I want to thank you for your sympathy and support on the loss of Bailey.  And also for sharing your own experiences. It really does mean a lot. Your words have (again) helped to fill some of the emptiness from losing Bailey.

Several times I've heard, "I don't know how you do it."  Honestly, I don't know either. What I do know is that I'm a bit of a crumpled mess right now. The tears are just under the surface. When I was at work yesterday and today as well, I really tried to keep my emotions from bubbling up at an inopportune time -- like when I was with patients, or picking out produce at the grocery store. And of course what has gone along with all of this is that I am eating all the wrong things. Can you go through the drive-thru twice at McDonalds? 

~My heart-stopping breakfast this morning~

I've decided that taking in the senior dogs has allowed grief to shadow me in quite the same way as Bailey did - It's always by my side, touching me at unexpected moments, chasing me until it catches me and forces me to look it squarely in the eye. I can't get away from it. However, despite the sadness and heart-break I'm feeling right now, the words of the Irving Townsend Quote still ring true.

“We who choose to surround ourselves

with lives even more temporary than our own, 

live within a fragile circle;

easily and often breached.

Unable to accept its awful gaps,

we would still live no other way.

We cherish memory as the only

certain immortality, never fully

understanding the necessary plan.”

― Irving Townsend

As hard and sad as it can be and is, I would live no other way. 

Thank-you again, friends, for sharing the loss of Bailey as well as Cissy and Joy too.  

You all are truly the best!