I’m regretting….. yup… I know it’s not a good thing.. and it just gets me teary eyed…but I am starting to regret some things.. I think we all go through it when we have lost a tripawd…. it is just so gawd dang hard sometimes. Every day there seems to be a moment… a wave… I wish I knew how to surf.. it would be much easier!! Lol
Yesterday we went to the pet store where we buy our dog food. We wanted to check out the puppy food in the brand that we have our Maggie on. It was the first time that we have been to the store since Franklin left us. We met the lady there.. who always asked how Franklin was. Of course, I had to tell her that he was running at the bridge. This is the kind of pet store where you can take your dogs there when you shop. They loved Franklin. My sweetie used to take him there shopping for pig ears. Ok….. picture this.. Franklin standing in front of the pig ear box.. on his level..at a WHOLE BOX of pig ears!!! droooooool My sweetie would say ok.. and he would pick out pig ears one by one and he would give them to Fred to put in the bag… lmaoooo. I regret not getting THAT on video!!
Needless to say.. my hubby broke down in the pet store when he looked at the box of pig ears. Geesh…Men!!! At least I waited till I was in the car!!! lol
I have a whole bunch of “little regrets”….. like not taking him ice fishing one more time, not taking him for more ice cream cones, not taking him to the dog park more often. But one of my three biggest regrets are:
I regret my decision of just letting Franklin be a dawg when he was diagnosed in September 2012.. I should have had his leg amputated right then.. but I was so un-educated, unknowing, uncertain. I kept thinking.. “man.. he’s 14!!” But it does make me wonder if we had done the amputation 4 months earlier, would he have gotten the lung mets? Would he still be here?
I regret not doing the chemo… I read so many success stories on this site of puppies and kitties having chemo and going through it with flying colors! And they are still with their owners being the damn cutest tripawds on the planet! And that is the coolest thing and it makes me smile!! Yet, the other part of me wishes I could be posting those posts and blogs as well… But then again, there are many of us here who chose not to do the chemo as well. I just wonder if we had done chemo, would he still be here?
I regret not getting another dog sooner… last year. It certainly would have helped Maggie get through the loneliness that she is going through. It will be interesting on Thursday when we get the pup though.. lol Oh we will be posting some pictures of that.. lol
Thought I would share a few more memorable pics of my Frankie….
Did you know my Franklin was a model? My girlfriend makes hot/col corn packs. They have a removable cover and can be used from the freezer or the microwave. When Franklin tore his knee, she made him one. He loved it! I also used it for him when he had his amputation.
Here he is the day we got him from the SPCA on November 20, 2005. 6 years old..
This was his spot at the end of the deck… he was watching the backyard.. making sure those squirrels did not invade and take over the kingdom!
And one of my favs.. of ying and yang… Maggie and Franklin.. always touching butts, or head to butt, when they were sleeping together.. lol
bark atcha later
Christine,
I know regrets are so hard NOT to have. The thing is, Franklin wouldn’t want you to have regrets. You did what you thought was right by him. That’s whats important. Chemo, no chemo, amp, no amp. He didn’t know. Jill got OSA one year ago this month and we didn’t amputate her leg (tumor was on her toe). 6 months later, a met appeared in her leg. Do I regret it? I guess. But what’s the point? She doesn’t know….She wouldn’t want me to second guess myself. This whole thing is really just a crap shoot. You just NEVER KNOW. You might’ve amputated in September and gone down the same path, or you might not have. There’s no reason to question it now – Franklin just wouldn’t want that. He is up there, snuggling with Diesel, and I KNOW on Thursday the two of them are going to be SO HAPPY to see you with your new baby.
So no regrets, I think that’s the best last thing you can do for Frankling, because that’s how he would want it!
All my love,
Erica
I think it’s ok to regret some things (like not taking enough pictures or missing out on the ice cream stops), but some of the others require a crystal ball. I don’t have one of those.
To regret not doing chemo, for instance, would require that you know that chemo would do Franklin some good. To imagine that he wouldn’t have had lung mets if you’d amputated 4 months earlier would require that you see into his body on a microscopic level. Just because they don’t show up on xrays doesn’t mean they aren’t floating around waiting to pounce.
When you look at the big picture, you did the things that mattered. You took his leg and gave him the best chance at having a full and happy life. And he did. It wasn’t as long as you wanted to give him, but he was probably very pleased with what he had. It’s never long enough, you know; not to us, anyway.
We can’t look into a crystal ball and we can’t tell what happens if we turn left instead of right, or give this drug instead of that one, or any number of choices we’re asked to make. We take the information we have and make the best choice we can. Around here, we all understand the agony of choices and decisions and regrets. But try to bury the regrets. They’ll suck the life right out of you.
Shari
Those “little regrets” you mention…those aren’t regrets. They are a sign of a life well-lived. They mean there were so many good times, you want to have those moments again and again.
As for the others? Those aren’t things to regret, either. Could you have done the amp a month earlier? Sure. Does it mean anything? Nope. For all you know, a butterfly could have flapped its wings in China during the procedure, and instead of all the time you DID get, Franklin could have left for the bridge in two weeks.
As for chemo…do you know how many medium to large sized dogs make it to 14? At all? Healthy dogs? Very few. It is a rarity. It is a long, long time to live. You are already at the point end of the scale. Even if he had done the chemo, and come through in flying colors…the time you MIGHT have gained (and again, butterfly, china, all that happy crappy), odds are would have been very small that it would be much more than he would have had had he been 100% cancer free to begin with. And I know we all say “odds are just odds”–but like it or not, it informs our choices. Regretting something like that–some pointy end of the scale thing–is soooooo not worth it. He lived BRILLIANTLY. You helped him do that–to the max. And you helped him cross the bridge with dignity and with love when that time came, too.
We all second-guess ourselves in the immediate days later. It doesn’t even have to be about dogs and cancer. It can be any life-changing event (hell, some days it can be about as something as small as which shoes you wore to work). There will ALWAYS, ALWAYS, ALWAYS be a “what if” or a “but only.” I don’t care if it is the happiest ending ever told, there’s always that one. inch. more. we will kick ourselves over–because that’s the way our brains our wired.
There are myriad possible futures in every single moment we live. The blessing and the curse of being a human is that we can see them–and when they are gone, we know which path we chose, and which ones we didn’t…and we will never know how those other paths would have ended.
Like Erica said–YOU know that. But Franklin doesn’t. Franklin knows he had a wonderful, bang-up time of living his gassy, snuggly, completely Franklin-esque life.
And even though it’s in our nature to wonder and to self-doubt… he would absolutely want you to stop being so HUMAN and just be more dog. <3 <3
Christine,
All the others have said it so well. We all have little regrets but we SHOULDN’T. We did the best we could do. Shari said we don’t have crystal balls and we don’t but sometimes I wish I did.
You did the best you could do at the time with the information given. We make choices, sometimes right ones & sometimes wrong ones we do the best we can at that time.
Franklin doesn’t regret anything you did for him. So you can’t.
Hugs
Michelle & Sassy
DITTO ERICA
DITTO SHARI
DITTO MEGHAN
DOTTO MICHELLE
AND DITTO TO YOU SWEET CHRISTINE because you would be saying the exact same things to us!
AND, we ALL understand all to well what you are feeling. The ONE thing…..the only one thing that works for me most of the time is:
Franklin would NOT want you to spend anymore to e on the regrets…..it’s certainly natural, but like others have basically said, they aren’t even “big” enough to get into the regret section!
When we “cross over” and have taken on the title of “master guardians” 🙂 🙂 of how loved ones, think how SD we would feel watching them struggle with regrets!
We, and Franklin, only want to “see/feel” the energy of our loved ones smiling because of the millions of happy moments we left them!!
I do want to address the chemo thing though. First of all, for me, I’m just using the “excuse” of chemo dates as a way to really just celebrate the joy of Happy Hannah being alive and free from pain! You’ve been on the site enough to k ow it is a “crap shoot” WITH OR WITHOUT the chemo. Several dogs do have awful side effects, several dogs do develop lung mets before even completion g chemo. So,again just for me, I have NO idea if chemo has made the slightest difference…….it’s just usi g that as a milestone to get Jerry to post Happy Hannah’s photo And then there are those who derful dogs who had NO chemo and far outlived many with!
Yeah, you darn right you should regret not having a video of Frankie going after those pig ears. HOWEVER, YOU THEN WOULD HAVE A REGRET OF INTERRUPTING FRANK’S JOY OF FOCUSING ON THAT SPECIAL PIG EAR.:-) 🙂 I’ve seen that “get that camera out of my face” in soeof his photos!!
Oh yeah, one more thing regarding g Maggie and your ew puppy. I doubt that she was in the mood for a new dog initially…..especially a uppy! And really, it wouldn’t have been fair to the pup as your grief was soooo step g and he would have felt the despair and thought it was related to him. Yeah, FRANKIN N” FARTER k ew exactly what n’ was doing g picking out a puppy that wasn’t ready til now!!
Gosh Christine, I LOVE the photos you posted today. They really do take you to a joyful p,ace filled with such happy memories. He really is a handsome——strikingly hadsome——gentleman! You can must tell he has manners!!
……except when it comes to smelly doggy farts a d try and blame it on Fred:-) 🙂
Or is it the other way around d?? Does Fred blame Maggie. ow…….or you??:-) 🙂
Soooo glad you are here Christine and so glad you know we are the family who u derstands like no other!
If our love could heal your heart, you would be all smiles all the time. But our love can help you stay focused o. all Frank n” Farter’s glorious memories he left for you to surrou d yourself with like a warm fuzzy blanket of clouds.
Can’t wait to see if the puppy likes pig ears! Hmmmmmm……
Love, Sally and Happy Hannah
I doubt there is any of us who haven’t felt some regrets. I know I tortured myself for months afterwards. That’s the curse of being human!
Others have said it so well. You did what you thought was best at the time with the knowledge you had. And if you had done things differently you don’t know that they would have given a better result. The path you took was the right path for you and Franklin. No matter how much time we have with our beautiful dogs it isn’t enough. What matters is the quality and Franklin certainly had that.
Hugs
Karen and Spirit Magnum
Christine,
I sure can relate to your pain and I’m very sorry you are feeling this way, having lost my Maggie April 27 at 6 yrs old. I actually had her leg amputated right away and opted not to do chemo but she got mets right away. I feel sure the chemo wouldn’t have done any good but who knows. I do regret not getting a video of her leading my horse around. By the time I bought the video camera she too weak to drag the horse around. I also had someone just today at the store ask about her. I actually felt bad I had to tell her what happen to Maggie. I want to get a puppy for her sister Blink but my husband is opposed to it (at this time). But I’ll keep at him till he gives in. Hang in there, have fun with the new pup.
Penny, Blink and Spirit Maggie
Christine – Everyone has said it so no repeats here. Franklin knows just how much he was loved and in the end that’s all that matters. How deeply we love them is what makes this part so hard and we get to overthinking everything we’ve done or are doing just to make sure we didn’t miss anything. You did the absolute best for Franklin and will continue to do that for all your dogs.
Thinking of you.
Luanne and Shooter
Such great memories of a life well lived and a dog well loved! What a handsome handsome doggie. He was so so lucky to have you in his life. My Daisy has never had an icecream cone, so I will make her one in honor of Franklin. It’s time we lived a little. : )