I’m miserable.  and my head hurts.

How is this for irony?  I read back over THIS blog to see the instances where I first noticed Caddie. 

On June 27, 2006:

Caddie my cocker spaniel has been having hip problems.  She went to the vet today and of course it was gloom and doom.  So she is on meds and she’s got a condition that will only worsen.  Oh well.  She will be fine and if she isn’t, then she has had a good life.  No one can ever claim that dog isn’t loved.

On June 29, 2006:

Thanks for all the concern about Caddie. She will be fine. This, like my horse’s hocks, are an ongoing issue so it’s hard to rattle me about it…. She will have to get alot worse before I start to be scared.

I finally got some sleep last night. Birdie, of course, was like glue. She stuck right beside me all night. I went to the bathroom and she whined outside the door. Even as I type this, she is underneath my feet. Literally.

I am going to give it some time (~hopefully a week) but if this continues then I will bring Kenny (the cat) home from the barn sooner. I don’t want to bring Kenny home right away full time, because 1) I want to heal a little bit from Caddie, and 2) I want to get some things done around the house like steam clean my carpets … and 1 animal is the easiest.

At Xmas, I was playfully complaining about how many animals I have to live with, sleep with, care for. All the horses at the barn, the 3 I love - Miss Cook and Fox, Birdie, Caddie, Trevi (Eric’s dog who was here briefly) and Mighty the Mouse.

Trevi went back to Texas. He didn’t die…. (although he often smells that way.) Joke! Joke!

Caddie and Mighty are gone.

I wished I hadn’t complained, even joking. Maybe someone upstairs took me seriously.

So I just wanted to state that I can handle everything I have got. The fatigue of caring for animals is a far easier burden to bear than this pain in my soul that I feel from losing Caddie.

I’m heartbroken.

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By the way, thanks so much for everyone who is being way kind to me and wants me to have another puppy. I know you know it won’t replace Caddie, but my heart is in pieces and I don’t think it would be fair to bring another baby into the family (especially when Birdie is like Peter Pan, the puppy who never grew up). I think one dog is enough when you own horses.

Caddie. I love you, babe.

I’m really tired. It’s 530AM and of course, I can’t sleep.

There is nothing right now to make me feel better or comfort me. But that doesn’t stop me from longing for some peace that will ease this.

It’s only been 6 days of the New Year but I was so hopeful that 2007 would be a new beginning for me. My luck is just the pits.

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Scott took me and Caddie to the vet to have her put to sleep.

What should I say here? “It went as well as it could”?

I think, overall, I did pretty well.

My vet was completely awesome. I really can’t say enough good things about him.

I can’t actually talk about anything else with Caddie because it’s simply too upsetting …. but I do wanna talk about Scott. I can’t never put into words how much it means to me that he took me and stood beside me while I wailed. I was with her through the sedation, I waited until she was asleep, and then I left the room. Scott stayed while they gave her the final dose. It was painfully heart wretching and it took alot of strength to deal with me crying and a poor pup getting put down.

My brother had to work at his job and couldn’t come up.  Scott had already volunteered but Rich was hunting down his phone number to call him.  I think that speaks volumes that my brother wanted Scott as his replacement.  I know several men in Raleigh and Scott is pretty much the only one I would ask - and the only one that has the patience, strength and loyalty to do it.

Thanks so much.

**BTW, just for the record, Theresa was out of town and Meredith volunteered as well. I don’t know if I could have handled either going.  They lost animals recently and Im sure they both would have been upset.  and that would have made me even more hysterical.  I cried so much that I was sick to my stomach.
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I went and rode after cause I didn’t want to go straight back to my house. Miss was completely awesome. She gave me an easy easy easy ride. Ridiculously easy. Her canter was completely the perfect, nicest canter ever. I hopped Cook bareback. She was way good too. Ponies had mercy on me.

Although I have known for a while that it was coming, the pain of losing Caddie is so very hard to bear.  I took her to the vet and simply there is nothing more that can be done.  It is highly probable that she has an accelerated cancer, and simply there is nothing more to be done.  I have to work tomorrow and take Eric to the airport tomorrow at 5, and I wanted to be able to spend some time with her, so I made the appointment to put her down for Saturday at 830am.

I have raised Caddie from a itty, bitty thing for 9 years.  She has been with me through a whole heck of alot.  I just can’t imagine my life without that dog.  It just makes my head hurt so painfully bad.
People often tease me about Birdie.  Birdie is the baby at 6 yrs old.  Birdie is so needy and clingy and attention wanting ALL the time.  She will drive you batty.  Birdie needs company all the time because she has never known a life without Caddie.   They have never been apart, except for Birdie’s excursions to the barn.  How sad is it that the one I feel most sorry for is Birdie?

I have a vet appt tomorrow to discuss whether to put Caddie down.  I gave her a bath tonight and I don’t know if I can right now.  we will see what the vet says tomorrow.

I was going to embed this in the comments below to Beth but I decided to pull it up and post it in a new post.

I have -decent- eq. My most current problem is jumping out of my tack. Here is a picture over one jump where my crotch is out of the saddle and on her withers! I’m laying on her neck!
Missy is thinking here…  “Hey fatty!  Get off my neck.  Thanks for making me jump with you laying like that!”

I think I have better eq on Cook (see above header on blog) BUT I can’t trust Cook over fences. Missy has really given me confidence back over fences and is teaching me to ride bigger fences than I ever could do on Cook (2ft).  The things that I am working on now like getting around a course, picking spots, flying changes, etc are all things that I WANT to be working on.  I love working on.  With Cook, I was working on “please don’t stop at this fence.”   I was so -worried- all the time.  It has taken a long time (months…  I started with Miss in the August timeframe), but finally I am getting out of the defensive riding habit… I TRUST Missy.  I’m not saying that Miss won’t ever refuse a fence…  she probably will at some point, all horses do.  (Although… Miss is the most honest horse I know, I can’t really imagine her refusing.  She would knock it down before she refused).  But Miss isn’t a random stopper.  I am just grateful every day that my trainer lets me borrow her.  It was good timing.  Cook was hurt and I honestly don’t know what I would be doing without Miss to ride.
God couldn’t give me everything in ONE horse, so he gave me Cook to love and Missy to teach me to ride.

So here are 2 more pics that I like.