Three Lessons I Learned From the Grief of My Dog Dying

I saved his life, but to say he saved mine is the biggest understatement

I came home from my survival job last night, the waitressing job that’s supposed to support me while I get my feature film made, having made less than enough to even cover my utility bill. My sister who I live with, you know the temporary arrangement that’s supposed to get me through until I make the aforementioned film, tells me I’m not paying enough and I should vacate soon so she can get a high-paying renter in. I already decided today I’m not going to let the $13 in my bank account or any negativity for that matter get me down. I’ve braced myself for doing whatever I have to do to get back on my feet.

And then my sister says, “Oh yeah, this came for you today.”

She hands me a piece of mail from the vet at Petco. It’s a card with my dog’s paw print and handwritten notes from the vet staff.

“We’re sorry about the loss of your fur baby.”

“Luigi was the sweetest. I was his nurse and he was always so special to us.”

“Luigi knows and knew how much you loved him. I’m so sorry for your loss.”

I look at the black ink of his big paw print and I start wailing like a four year old whose stuffed animal just got yanked from her grip.

I put my dog to sleep a month ago. Luigi was a 62 pound Staffordshire Terrier, Boxer, American Bulldog mix. I rescued him from a high-kill shelter in Harlem, New York on Christmas eve of 2009. He was on doggie death row, like so many Pits and Pit mixes. I saved his life, but to say he saved mine is the biggest understatement. The profound loneliness that was my constant companion was replaced by this muscle machine with a head bigger than a bowling ball. He wanted nothing more than to be by my side. And to appear in bit roles in all my film productions. Not a big ask.

He slept curled in the crook of my shoulder at night. And napped on my legs during the day. He didn’t care about my constant bouts of depression or phases of anxiety. I told him I loved him every single day and every single night.

A month ago, the decision to put him down came when it was clear he was ready to go. The morning before the vet appointment I brought him to Starbucks and got him two pup cups. I still have the pictures of his ginormous tongue lapping up the whip cream splattering everything in its wake.

I laid with him in the vets office, my nose buried in his white fur saying “I love you so much and I always will. I love so you much and I always will. I love you so much and I always will…” Until the vet removed her stethoscope and said, “He’s gone now.”

That pain….

It’s like organs are ripped out of your body and you’re faced with a different reality.

They say grief is the price of love.

A price I will indeed pay.

Because this grief did something to me that was unexpected.

It taught me some incredible lessons.

1. LOVE IS ALL THERE IS

The only thing that’s real, that exists beneath any and all things, that is the very reason we are alive is love. Suffering only exists when we’re in our heads. It’s the perception of being disconnected from love that leads us to think we are alone/broke/not good enough/things are not as they should be etc. etc.

Being sad is not bad. Being numb is. Being sad means your heart FEELS. To have a feeling heart is everything. Feeling things is the beautiful experience of being human. Even the extraordinary, machete-to-the-heart pain from grief is an experience of being alive. Alive is what we want.

Your ego self is trying to protect you. It tells you the coffee, alcohol, sugar, drugs, sex will be a better way to go because your sadness might kill you. But I’m telling you, sitting WITH love, you can honor and embrace and hold (the way you would a little baby) all the uncomfortable feelings which you were taught your whole life to repress.

The biggest lesson is that love IS the reward. Being in your heart is the gold at the end of the rainbow. Regardless of what the feeling is.

2. YOU OWE IT TO YOUR DOG TO BE HAPPY

My biggest regret when my dog died was that I was so depressed for the last year of his life. I was so mad! Why couldn’t I have been happier for him? I would have taken him to the beach more. He could have seen me as a happier person and that would have made him happier!

My friends reminded me that he was likely just happy to love and be loved by me. That he didn’t care. But something doesn’t sit right with me. My prolonged unhappiness is not okay.

In my quiet and peaceful moments when I connect to my dog’s heart, I truly sense something I’ll call a “Permission Slip” to be happy. If I gave myself permission to be depressed so much, I sure as hell have permission to be happy. My dog wants it that way.

We get caught up in WAITING til things are as they SHOULD be. Til life is better for us. Til the circumstances are more favorable. Tying our joy to circumstances is the number one way to find unhappiness.

No more waiting. I will find joy any way I can. In the fact that I’m alive. That I can connect to people through my words. That old school house music exists. That one day soon I will get to taste oysters again. That life is one big question mark and no one knows anything for certain, therefore…anything is possible.

The pain of losing my dog was so great, that the only way to deal with it is to make it sacred.

I will use this sacred occasion to have what I really want: happiness. And my dog tells me to bequeath it to myself at once.

3. BE WHO YOU CAME HERE TO BE

In grief your heart is so raw that there simply is no space for pretense.

You have no desire to pretend to be someone you’re not. Especially to yourself.

You see when your best friend dies (or any human close to you for that matter), that everything is transitory. Everything changes. Everyone dies. Nothing is permanent.

Therefore, why waste any f-ing time not living your unique, authentic TRUTH?

My best friend is gone. So now, I’m gonna get busy living. MY life. The life I want to lead. The life I felt with a pure, unjaded heart at four years old.

Creative. Unique. Silly. Weird. Flawed. Too-sensitive. Too-loving. Quiet. Idealistic.

If my best friend could die, then that means I, too, will die. Maybe sooner, maybe later. So there is no time to waste not living my authentic truth. Because nothing really matters. Certainly not what other people think.

If you let the fear in your mind stop you from being you, doing you, expressing as you — then that becomes the great big regret at the end of your day…or your life. Death is certain. Therefore, does it even matter what anyone thinks of you?

Do what you came here to do. Be who you came here to be. And be it to the fullest so that when it is time to go, you know you weren’t held back.

My dog was unconditional love. And he didn’t spend his last breaths at Petco in South Bay Los Angeles with any regrets about being inauthentic.

My dog, in life and in death, taught me to be more like my four year old self. And less like the limitations and expectations in my head.

At the end of the day, all you have is your love.

Let it be your ruler.

Let it be your why.

Get in touch with me at marlenerhein.com

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