One Last Post

This is Lexi's mom.  I know we haven't posted much in the last several years and I apologize.  Our family has been busy with life and Lexi has been busy doing her dog stuff along with Lucas.  She has had a wonderful life, full of adventure.  Which makes this post all the harder to write.

Tonight, my husband and I sat with Lexi at her vet's office and held her, and petted her, and told her how much we loved her while she crossed over the Rainbow Bridge.  It was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do, but also, I know, one of the kindest for our sweet girl.

Lexi was ten years old, and for most of those ten years she was in excellent health and very spunky and fun loving, sassy as heck and a HUGE part of our family.  Every night she slept next to our bed, on my side, which is where she started out in her kennel ten years ago.  She was my baby, just as much as my three human kids are.  

But this past month we noticed a change in our Lexi.  She started limping quite severely and seemed to be in a lot of pain.  At first I figured she'd just strained a muscle or something and it would pass.  But then gradually other symptoms appeared.  She started panting and pacing, and peeing in the house and having diarrhea.  I also noticed that her tail, which previously had never stopped wagging, was now hanging straight down and still.  Then she stopped eating. 

We got her right into the vet and he did xrays and took blood work but aside from a little arthritis in her ankles everything looked fine.  Only it wasn't.  For two weeks we treated her with pain and stomach medicine with no results.  We returned to the vet for more xrays and more bloodwork, but still everything came back fine.  But Lexi was not doing fine.  She refused to eat even the slightest thing, her peeing around the house got worse and she could no longer stand for more than a few minutes at a time. 

This morning I called the vet yet again and said she needed help.  They had me bring her this evening for a urinalysis, but when the vet put the needle in he discovered she was full of blood.  Lexi had a mass on her spleen, possibly cancerous.  I was devastated.  Surgery was a possibility, but, if the mass was cancerous she would only have 3 months to live or less.  We didn't want to let her go, but we knew we couldn't ask this poor sweet girl to suffer anymore.  So we made the hard decision to let her go peacefully with no more suffering.

I already miss her so badly, she really was the most wonderful dog, but she was way more than that.  There will always be a special place in my heart for a dog named Lexi, may she run around in the sky chasing butterflies to her heart's content.

We love you baby girl!!!