[Dailydrool] My Flashy Pants to the Rainbow Bridge

[Nicole Haase]

I put this on the FB page, so my apologies if it's a duplicate to some. The
response over there already has been overwhelming. This group is so amazing
in its amazing generosity, love and giving. If that's what it means to be a
crazy basset lady, I would never want to be anything else. My gratitude for
your shared grief can never be expressed. I am humbled.

We had to put down Flash last night. He was in respiratory distress and the
tumor in his abdomen had spread to his lungs.

Flash was 14 and I was lucky enough to love him for more than eight years.
He was our Flashy Pants, Pantalones, Buddy and my heart dog. He lived far
longer than we expected him to, but it's still not enough. This house and
my heart feel very empty and lonely without him.

He was my second ever foster and our Foster Failure. He was left chained to
a porch and his family moved without him. Their loss was one of the best
things that ever happened to me. He was spectacular with the parade of
foster dogs through our house. He loved chin scritches, peanut butter and
being buried under a pile of blankets. He hated when I loved on him here in
the house, often running away from me, but couldn't stand when I was out of
his sight when we were out in public. He proudly won Biggest Butt and
Biggest Paws at multiple Basset Fests and never got offended when people
not so quietly exclaimed "Look how big that one is!" (Though I didn't
always handle their rudeness as gracefully as he did)

Many of you have been wonderful help to me as I have navigated my first
senior hound. You might remember that he went down in the rear about two
years ago and then somewhat miraculously got up about a week later. He's
been senile and had difficulty adjusting to the house we bought about a
year ago, the the "Puppy Prozac" he went on about 4 months ago greatly
helped.

I am totally devastated today in the way one can only be with their first
lost dog as an adult - and I'm lucky to only now be discovering this pain.
But you all know the loss in a way others don't.

The experience at the emergency vet was just awful. I will never go back to
this location. They were cold and we spent so much time just sitting in a
room without him. We chose to be with him while they administered and it
did not go smoothly and in some ways I'll always regret that decision, as
he jerked in my arms and gasped and moaned and I wish that wasn't the last
memory I had of him or that it wasn't playing over and over in my head
whenever I close my eyes now.

Hug your fuzzheads a little tighter today and light a candle to help Flashy
find his way to the Rainbow Bridge.

-- 
Nicole Haase
nicole.haase at gmail.com
414-708-3542
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