Last night's Packers loss, it's had me unable to sleep and deep in my feels because without them going into the playoffs, it may be the last time I ever get to watch a game with my Packers pup who picked out her own first jersey at her first Christmas and insisted she wanted it more than food and that it had to be the Packers jersey, not any other team and not any of the other shirts or outfits but the team jersey... And she gets so excited as soon as the weather gets football season crisp for her to wear her jersey and so depressed when the season ends and I switch her out of it. This year, I already decided that no matter how long or short the season, and no matter how sad seeing it makes other people for the season being over, Audrey will get to wear her jersey all the rest of winter. Because if she dies before the Spring, I want her to die wearing it and to be buried in it. Weirdly enough, Audrey insisted on needing to be a Packers pup the same season Brett retired and Aaron became starter -- with all the talk about if this might be his last season, with the Packers and playing football at all, it's making it hit even harder that Audrey may not make it to her next birthday let alone to next Packers season.....  

I mean, I'm very deep in my feels lately, all of December and January I'm in my feels about my dog's mortality. Ever since she stopped having her normal interest in food and I took her off the Prednisone because it was making her so depressed she didn't even care about the fresh snow. And baby girl LOVES the snow, it's always been one of the absolute favorite things ever. 25 hours after I decided to stop the Prednisone, just at the point it was cleared out her system, she got so happy and excited about the snow fall and she was back to her happy self instead of the numbed not caring depressed her.... And the thing is, she has so much joy in life (but especially snow, she's so upset it's all melted and the lack of snow is definitely not helping my sorrowing) and so much more energy than she's had since she got so sick over the summer from the salmonella peas -- but she's still hardly eating anything at all. And I KNOW corticosteroids depress her body's own production and it can be a month or more before her appetite comes back and I know that some of the lingering side effects like upset to her go can also take a month to heal.... But she's just eating so little... Sometimes when her breathing in her sleep gets shallow, I'll go check on her just to make sure she's still alive. And I'm also losing weight getting gaunt in the face right now since I've been pouring my energy into her to reduce inflammation and to block any tumor growths/shrink them and to reset her endocrine system and truth is I've hardly been eating much (I haven't gone grocery shopping or bought myself any food since I got back from Seattle.... Everything I've eaten has been something bought for me or made from what little stores I had in my pantry and freezer....) And I know that Audrey worries when I don't eat, she will refuse to eat until after she sees me eat when the ADHD hits strong and i forget to eat for too long... But it's more than that this time because she's refusing a lot of her treats as not of interest to her and not eating her kibble much at all, though she will eat pieces of pulled beef and steak and salmon and veggies off my plate. She's also generally been consistent about eating beef liver crunchies and the Stella & Chewies 93% beef and organs freeze dried meat mixers (which can count as meal substitutes but she not eating enough of it to count.) She's just not eating enough and she's feeling frail and I'm worried and facing her mortality. 

She doesn't have a blockage of any sort, ultra sound didn't indicate it and she's still pooping. It could be pancreatitis from the Prednisone or other gi inflammation, it could be diabetes though her blood sugar levels were fine her last CBC as was her liver and kidney function. It could be her age causing inappetence especially as taste/smell decrease with age, (and since dogs can get COVID, it's possible she has been exposed to it again and so food doesn't smell or taste good to her right now), it could be an internal bleed or cancer but it would take more extensive ultrasounds and MRIs to find that out and it wouldn't help to know other than for considering euthanasia because I refuse to put her on chemo drugs that would take away her remaining appetite and joie de vivre and  she's not a good candidate for surgeries between her age and her anemia/platelet issues... I wonder if she's having allergies to poultry after years of having issue with duck (but loving it) so I'm buying her kibbles and soft foods and treats with no chicken because that's what she'll eat when she will eat..... It's unclear WHAT her inappetence issues are, but she's old and everything is only palliative and making sure she has good quality of life anyway when a dog is as old as she is.... 

And it doesn't MATTER how damn much I tell myself or anyone else that the price of adopting a fur baby is the loss of them or that since she'll be 15 years old in March and I've had her since she was 12 weeks old, I've already had more time with her than most pet owners ever get and I know I'm spoiled and I should be grateful for all the time I've had.... But she's my baby girl who I got as a handful of puppy and she's the first animal I've ever had deeply bonded to just me (as opposed to my family growing up) and she's always been such a chow hound we joke about her having an inner lab and so it's so hard on me every time she refuses food.....because when a dog has no interest in food, it's usually the indication they're nearing the end.... And I just.... I already feel the brink of the hollows form in me at just the though of her absence from my life... It's there waiting for me. And every time I think how she if we don't get more snow soon she might never get to play and eat snow again or she might never get excited for touchdown treats for the Packers games next season or how maybe I should cancel her BarkBox before it renews in February or how soon I might never get to hold her and  cuddle her ever again, I just start crying and I can't help it or stop even by finding myself she's still here right now and I need to appreciate all the time and snuggles and walks and joy in food when I can get her to eat while she's still here. 

It's all the things that may be the last time with her and it's just breaking my heart making me cry so many oceans of tears I feel like I'm drowning in my hurt and grief. And I'm trying not to eat it bleed down any of my empathy bonds or show in my eyes when I make me go see people (mostly my parents and Crissy and Mikaela and Sarah and other coworkers. I ended my meet cute dating fling with the soccer player when Audrey started getting worse even with me being home now because I was too destabilized in my sorrow and anxiety over her and every time I wasn't with her I was regretting the time lost that I could never have back because it just feels so finite right now. Which wasn't fair to him, but also you can't bring someone into that deep end of grieving heart break on such a short term of acquaintance.) But it's always there right now threatening to spill over and out of my control and drown not just me but anyone with an empathy bond to me or who's empath enough to hear me broadcasting my sorrow and loss and I magnify all my emotions loud if I don't control them.... If you reach for me down the bond right now all you will get is deep oceans of sadness and impending loss and emptiness. 

And the thing is, other than the not eating enough, Audrey is doing really well and she's so happy and has souch joy in life and seeing everyone. And she's super cuddly snuggly again, which she stopped being while on Prednisone and in addition to Prednisone, aloofness is a common side effect for dogs. By every obvious indication other than the inappetence and how frail that's making her, Audrey is doing amazing and everyone remains surprised whenever I say her age because even if they'd guess senior dog they think maybe 8 years old.... And I myself have always jokignly insisted since she was a puppy that she would live to be 21.5 years young, and my Pisces pup is not yet 15..... And that wasn't a precog, just something I've always said about her. Just as I've said to her since she was a small puppy that if she still wants to be with me after this life of he's ends, she can find me again to be my dog or my child if I ever have children. It's not her soul that won't share time and life with me, but I will miss snuggling into her fur holding her and this personality version of her as joyous highly intelligent little bear luck dragon tomboy of a Pisces pup princess deeply soul bonded to me.... 

And yet, when I can't get her to eat enough or when she feels more frail to me than the day before, I keep thinking of all the things I'm not ready to be the last time I have with her and it starts me crying and feeling the future loss of her so keenly.... I've cried more tears since the start of the year over the potential imminence of my dog's mortality being sooner than I'm ready for than I cried tears in all of 2020-2022..... I don't think anyone understands how much I've been crying over the thought of losing my baby girl and all the "never agains" and having to bring her wrapped in a sheet or towel for my father and I to bury her in the backyard along with all our other fur babies who have passed away..... Every time I think on these things it starts me grieving and crying because I know that even if not this year, they're coming and they will happen and I will be deep in the hollows over the loss of my sweet puppy child.

All night since the loss I've been crying off and on about next Packers season maybe not having her with me and how I'm going to handle living in Wisconsin when every Packers jersey will make me mourn my dog. I'm crying about it again now while writing just thinking about how she might never see another Packers game now or get a Packers touchdown dance treat while I'm writing, even though she's curled up next to me in her bed using my left foot as her pillow in deep happy contented sleep. And it's stupid as it is inevitable for me to be drowning in such sorrow and sense of loss NOW while she's here with me..... But her not eating enough getting frail is pushing me to contemplate her mortality and all of the "last times" with her and how few and finite my moments remain to have her in my life at all.... Because I know the moments I'm seeing are coming for me even though I don't know if they are this year or in a future year. And those with the gift of prophecy always grieve and mourn out of sync with the flow of time's passage.... 

I am grateful not to have many concerts or major travel plans or even fest season holding much for me this coming year.  As much as my heart breaks about being with her or the one it find her when her time comes, it devastates me far more to think of her dying in my absence knowing that I am the center of her world and how desperately she misses me and longs for me and gets depressed in my absence.... I just wish she would eat so it wouldn't be so omnipresent with me thinking about all the last times she and I will get to do certain things together... Because if she can get through this month, I think she'll be back to her self-regulated pre Prednisone levels of health and with my healing her she will get better enough to still have years of life in her - but I'm really uncertain if she can make it through this month and then to her next birthday. I don't think she could without me here spending so much time with her and pouring souch energy into her.... 

But yeah, if you've been getting waves of ineffable deep sorrow and grief and loss that you feel like you'll drown in since just after the New Year, that would be me facing the mortality of my dog because she's hardly eating much at all right now and it's got me thinking about how I'm approaching all of the last times with her for everything she loves brings us joy and how finite my remaining time is with her and me acknowledging to myself how deep into the hollows (where the numbness of nothing touches my heart protects me from drowning in my grieving) I'll go when her absence is real not just somewhere in the future nebulous. That's me, that's my grief at the potential of these being the last times and the heartache on the horizon. If you don't want to be swamped by sorrows, I'm sorry but my only advice is that if you can't shut off the bond to me you at least refrain from reaching down it if you can't swim in the depths of feeling grief and loss completely as deep as it goes.... 

I don't have any songs or music for this grieving or to help lighten it for me. And just like I won't be able to see anyone wearing a Packers jersey without wanting to cry after my baby girl dies, it will be many many long years before I'll be able to listen to Billy Joel songs without thinking of her and breaking down. Which given my deep love for both the Packers and Billy Joel is going to be hard on me, no matter how near or far my baby girl's death day is.... It would be nice to have music to turn to when I hurt like this, I have in the past but right now there's no songwriter or vocalist who fills those holes in my heart and soothes me when I'm upset like this.  There were, but, for reasons I've stated in the past, those songs no longer bring me joy or peace as they did. I can't love your songs if I can't respect or admire you as a human....if you cross that and don't make things right, you take away any comfort present or future that your music could ever hold for me. Even when I need it most toa other my heart's aching, the songs I once loved or could have loved won't work any magic on me so long as I can't respect the creator of it. (But I'd give just about anything to be able to turn to Meaning of It All on repeat right now for some soul comfort while I'm grappling with the 50ft waves of this grief that feels like it might drown me in the futures that will be but aren't yet.)

Audrey's holding on, in hope and joy despite her body failing her, for something or someone. But I don't know what or why. All I know is that other than whatever has her holding on still, she wants to be near me and with me and if she wakes up to find I'm not nearby she sets off to find me or to keep watching the door for my return.