The Beat Goes On....

Life has been moving on here at the baby-less house of dawgs. I've been in school this week - a new and exciting experience for me. I began studying in a master's program in January. It is a distance program, and each course ends with a two and a half day intensive. It's kind of cool. You spend the whole course talking to classmates and the professor on line through message boards and blogs, and then get to legitimately meet with your internet friends! I'm taking two courses each semester, and am loving it. I began the first intensive on Wednesday and will finish up the second one Monday.

It was interesting - one of the women that I had been 'chatting' with throughout the course stood up from the desk yesterday and only then did I realize that she is very pregnant - due in July. I am so truly on the road to recovery and acceptance. For the first time in a very long time, it didn't fizz me at all. In fact, I am quite happy to be hanging with her, and have been able to ask all the appropriate questions and share in the pregnancy focused discussions at lunch. God, it feels good to be able to do that without feeling like I'm faking it! A milestone for sure.

At the same time, it was fascinating to note how people still don't recognize infertility as a problem. We were having this really cool discussion in the classroom about the problem our province is going to be faced with in the near future when we run out of people to fill jobs because of our declining birthrate. They were kind of pondering why women today weren't having as many children, when I suggested that ummmm perhaps infertility was an issue, along with the usual "women are waiting longer to have children" argument. The response was "nah...not a big problem, and even if it was, what could we do about it?" Hello? How about sinking some money into subsidizing treatments? One of the women laughingly said "treatment? Just give people more booze".....I don't know why I'm still amazed at how people don't get it.

We've also reconnected with HB's uncle. He had been living in a licensed boarding home, took sick and is now living in a transitional unit of the local hospital until he can be placed in a nursing home. He's a smoker, and because it's a hospital setting, no one on staff can take him out for a smoke. We went down last weekend to take him out for lunch and then wheel him around by the water while he chain smoked. It's such a small act on our part, but meant so much to him. Now he calls every day wondering if we can come visit again. Breaks my heart. HB has gone down two more times, and in fact, is there right now. We don't have a lot of extra time in our lives, but if you don't make time for family like this, who will?

And as for Big Dawg ... he's had a bad day or two in the past week, but he's still hanging in. The days weren't bad enough to cause us to make the decision we're dreading. I just hope that we both are given the strength and wisdom we need to know when we have to make that decision. I had him in for a check up on Tuesday evening, and while waiting for the vet to see us, a couple came out who had obviously just had to put their dog to sleep. Everyone was so hushed and expressing their sympathies. The woman was crying, and I couldn't help it ... I had a little cry right along with her. This is so going to suck. Big time.

There ya go. Update from the land of drool. What's up with you?

Leaping in Faith

Quick update:
We're still all here and hanging in. The big dawg is continuing to have good days and good nights. This prednozone is like grass for dawgs! He's happy, puppyish and when he doesn't have the munchies, he's sleeping! When it's time for me to go, that's the way I want to do it.

We're still spending much free time hanging with both of the dawgs. Taking lots of walks, albeit shorter than what we used to, and just basically cuddling. I've undone every bit of obedience training that HB did with the big guy ... even to the point of having him up on the couch (a total, absolute, no-no in our home) the other night. To quote a country song, my give-a-damn's busted around that piece of obedience. I'm taking tons of pictures and enjoying these good days. It's been three weeks today since the diagnosis.

Landseer Newfs are a rarity around here. We've already begun talking about our desire to have another newf in our home - actually we had been talking about it before this guy got sick even. He has been the best pet! They take a bit more work in terms of grooming and watching their hips etc, but are so worth it. I'd have 10 of them if I had the room. So, we're beginning to interview breeders. I've never in my life paid for a purebred dawg. This guy came from the SPCA. Imagine. Imagine! Who in their right freaking mind would let a beauty like him go to the SPCA? Oh well. My gain.

We're off to celebrate Easter this weekend ... and I am actually singing a psalm at Good Friday service today. With an organ. And no practice. Hmmm. A leap of faith indeed!

Cuddling and crying

You guys are awesome...thanks for checking in on us.

We're taking it a day at a time. The prednozone is keeping him happy thus far. We're not seeing too many of the side effects that we were warned about. He's pretty energetic, although he is drinking a lot of water. We're noticing a few more accidents in the house the last two days.

What's weird is that the 'little' dawg seems to know what's going on. They seem to be distancing themselves from each other. No one will ever be able to tell me that dawgs don't understand what's going on - they are incredibly intelligent.

In the meantime, we're all just spending as much time together as we can. We're taking a lot of walks, cuddling on the blanket together, and just generally hanging out. I'm better now in that I can at least talk about it without crying ... the one day at a time approach is helping.

Thanks for all the positive thoughts - we'll take each and every one of them!