The Blog

Dedicated to my dear friend, Juliette

When you are ready, you will finally do that thing. Changes can be exciting. But changes can also be extremely hard and you need to be mentally and emotionally prepared to do the work. When the time is right, you will find a better job, start exercising, quit smoking, eat right, leave the abusive relationship, get on the dating app, write the book, read the book, apologize to someone you hurt, offer support to someone who needs it and so on. Whatever the big thing is, you can only do it when you’re good and ready.

You might not even see the thing that needs doing. Sometimes, everyone else sees the thing before you, but when you are ready to see it, you will too. And when you are ready to do it, you will. You can’t do it for anyone else but yourself. Otherwise, you may end up resenting the person you did it for if it’s not really what you wanted to do. Of course, you can do it in honor of someone. That’s a good thing. You can leave the abusive relationship to honor your children (but also yourself!). You can read the book that means a lot to someone you care about to connect with them on a deeper level. It’s all about intentions. Think about your why. Why do you want to do the hard thing? To be a better person? Great! For who? Yourself? Your kids? Your partner? Your parents? Some people may never be ready and that’s okay. You have to honor where you’re at in your journey and accept and be patient with yourself in your personal development. 

This applies to big hard things as well as everyday things that may be tedious. I moved into a new house in 2017 and I didn’t see the blank walls in my house for three years until I was stuck at home all day every day because of Covid. So, I treated myself to some art for Christmas that year. I had a similar experience with landscape lighting. It never even crossed my mind until I saw how nice it looked in my neighbor’s yard and I thought, “I should do that.” While there are literal examples of seeing external things that could be improved, the same is true for seeing the internal personal opportunities for improvement.

The big, harder stuff took much longer to address. It was at the beginning of 2021 that I first noticed that my beloved 16-year-old dog Sage was starting to decline. I adopted Sage as an 8-week-old puppy and he moved around with me to more homes than I ever expected. He was my first baby. Literally, I was having maternal urges, but not in the right place in my life to have a child so I got a puppy and that helped suppress those 27-year-old biological yearnings.

Sage held on much longer than most dogs and I honestly think in some way he held on for me to be ready to let him go. He was that loyal. I could not deal with losing a family pet after losing my marriage. I had visualized and gotten upset over Sage’s last days so often over the years knowing that a pet’s time is usually way shorter than what you have with a spouse. But, after losing my marriage, I think Sage knew he had to tough it out and hold on a bit longer. 

So, Sage stayed out of the way somewhat quietly (because he still barked anytime the doorbell rang) and resigned to taking care of his business in the backyard instead of going for walks 2x/day. He was in pretty good shape overall.

But eventually, I was waking up to dog messes every morning and I grew weary of cleaning Sage and the floor. Doggy diapers for his incontinence started to feel undignified (yes, I’m humanizing my dog). And eventually, I could tell he was in a lot of pain as he hobbled around the house on his stiff legs and occasionally snapped at one of my kids if they came too close or got a little too rough with him.

Making the choice to put Sage down was so hard. I postponed it as much as I could, but eventually I couldn’t put it off any longer. The kids and I had a special trip to Disneyland planned and Sage was at the point where I couldn’t ask anyone else to take care of him and I didn’t want to risk not being there if he had an emergency. It was time to end Sage’s suffering and, ultimately, mine as a dog nurse caregiver. I think I cried that whole week. We had a woman come to the house and euthanize him in the backyard. The kids sat with us on blankets and I held Sage in my lap and we gave him treats and pet him until the end. It was such a beautiful, peaceful way to go. I wish we all could pass so comfortably, feeling safe and surrounded by love. They even gave us a clay paw print keepsake.

RIP Sage.