Today is the two-year anniversary of the death of my dog Doodles. Her actual name is Sydney, but for some reason we called her Doodles. She was the sweetest Labrador Retriever. She was 12 years old and passed away of cancer. She was more than my best friend, she was family. I don’t talk much about her anymore, but I think of her everyday. Excuse me this is hard to write. Every night before I go to bed I say my prayers to God and I always ask him to tell my precious Doodles that I love her and to be sure to give her a kiss on the nose and a Trader Joe’s bone for me. Those bones were her favorite amongst the other foods she loves.
I truly miss my best friend! I cry at the thought of her not being here. Putting her down was the hardest thing I have ever done and I regret doing that so much. I wish I had another answer, but I couldn’t watch her suffer anymore. That day we took her to the vet,I hugged her and she kissed me on the nose, I think she knew. I can’t write about this anymore. All I can say is I still till this day can’t watch the ending of Marley and Me, because that is what it felt like but worse because it was real life.
I wrote this two years ago on Facebook and I am not going to read it right now. I will post some pictures of her for you to see. Bless you my beautiful dog! I love you and I am so sorry, please forgive me. I love you!!!
From facebook
It’s funny they say she just a dog and at one of those time I was that person. I didn’t understand a dog where I was always a cat person. Then one day my boyfriend said lets get a dog. I was still unsure, but agreed to getting a dog anyway. We drove in the winter to Warsaw NY and saw a bunch of yellow lab puppies. I saw one that liked me, but my boyfriend said I want this one. She was white, fluffy, cute and had a pink nose. I said ok. This dog that I was bringing home didn’t want anything to do with me. I thought OMG, what am I doing. After having her for a week, I told my boyfriend that I didn’t want her anymore. She was up crying all night and I was so exhausted. I never knew having a dog would be so tough. The poor guy thought what am I going to do with her if my girlfriend doesn’t want her anymore?
Then one day it changed! I don’t know what happened, but the next thing I knew my best friend was there everyday to greet me when I came home. We named her Sydney after the character on Melrose Place.
Now that I have this precious pup, I couldn’t imagine life without her. She was a HUGE part of my family. Actually she was my family. See my Mom and sister moved to California and it was just me left behind, by my choice. My dog Sydney became my child. I took her everywhere with me. I remember we took her camping in Cooperstown, NY and what was funny she didn’t know how to swim. Can you imagine a yellow lab not knowing how to swim? We threw her off the boat and she sank. I jumped in and grabbed her and we taught my sweet Sydney how to swim. Ever since then she couldn’t get enough water. We used to take her fishing with us all the time. At first she was great! She would sit there and watch us catch the fish. If you, and still to this day say “I got one”, she would get all excited and start to bark. After a couple of years of taking her on the boat with us, she started to get bold. When we would release the fish back into the water she would try to jump in to get the fish. The one time we were in the marina and she jumped out of the boat to chase the ducks, I freaked out because a sailboat was coming straight for her. We took the big fishing net and grabbed her. After that we didn’t take her with us so much. I do remember one time docking the boat at Hamburg beach and we would play in the sand with her. If we threw a rock in the water, she run after it and stick her head under the water to retrieve the rock, What a silly dog. She always knew how to make me laugh. My step dad used to grab her near the butt and make a noise and she would shoot off like a rocket, running around like a maniac. It was a funny sight to see. She used to like to embarrass us to, because when people would come over she would scoot on the floor. She seemed to do that to make people laugh and we would just turn red.
Her Nickname Doodles came from a song Little Jenny was writing for her music class. It was called Pupperdoodlebutts, After that we started to call her Doodles. My Doodles was very much a lady dog. She loved getting her hair blowed dried. In the morning when I would do my hair she would stand there waiting for me to do hers. She also like to wear clothes and necklaces. My sister Nancy made her a necklace and she wore that for a long time. I am not sure if she liked all this feminine stuff or she just liked the attention? She was a good dog, she never chewed apart her toys or any of the furniture in the house. She had a stuffed animal that was a pink cat that she got for Christmas one year. I have to say 10 years later and she still has that cat, a little chewed up but still in one piece. She carried that baby with her, it was her way of saying “hey I’m tired, time for bed” and she took her baby to bed with her every night. I slept last night with baby at the end of my bed in hoped my Doodles will come home. This dog seemed to survive everything! She ate a corn cob whole and it stayed in her system for a month and it finally came out. She ate a whole bag of Three Musketeer Bars and she survived but had psychedelic poo poo’s for a while, since she ate the wrappers and all. I remember the one night I was laying in bed and I went to pet her and felt something hard, I looked at her and she had a box of bones stuck and I mean stuck on her head. She made it up the stairs and into bed with this box stuck on her head. She just loved her bones! Another time I bought one of those huge economy size boxes of bones from Costco and when I came home from work she had a fat tummy. She ate what I thought was a whole box of bones. Well to my surprise for a month or so I would find bones in the cushions of my couch, under my bed, under my covers, in the closet, everywhere. I thought I found them all but nope, I would catch her munching on a bone. Can you believe she hid them throughout the house? She was a smart dog especially when it came to food. Ever since I got her I don’t think I ever burnt a meal. She would come and get me when my water would boil or about 30 second before the timer went off. She always knew when dinner would be done. I think in a past life she was a chef. She was one dog that could not get enough food. She would sit in the kitchen with a smile on her face waiting for me to drop a piece of something. I tried not to give her people food, but that was hard considering she would give me that please Mom look. You could say I kind of spoiled her. He he I couldn’t help it. My dog has been through it all! She has been on a plane, she drove cross country twice and was so good. She was always happy as long as she was with you.
When we bought our house in California she was happy because she had a pool and a place to run around. Most of my life I lived in an apartment, so I was happy to give her a yard to play in. She just loved the pool! She would jump in to get the ball and she liked to lay on the raft. Two days ago being sick and all she jumped on that raft and laid there. She wanted to swim, but I told her she was to weak to. I took her out of the pool and dried her off. She also loved to watch me plant. You know when they say “you need to stop and smell the roses”. Well that was my dog! She never ate my plants and she smelled everyone that I brought home. She loved flowers! I used to make soaps and when I would bring home new fragrances, I would ask her to smell. She would tell you which ones she liked. If she liked them, she would just stand there, but if she didn’t like the smell she would back up and shake her head no. Her favorite scents were Apple and Cucumber. She used to smell everything! When I would bring home clothes or anything from the store she would want me to show her. She would stick her head in the bag and look. She was like a girlfriend of mine. My Doodles just loved life. People tell me all the time that she is lucky and spoiled. I didn’t treat her like a dog but I treated her as my friend/child. I will miss coming home from work and looking in my front window. She had an ottoman that she would lay on, just waiting for you to come home. I would wave to her every time I would come home or leave. She was the reason I loved to be at home. I would grab her food dish and she would bounce down the hallway waiting for me to fill her dish. She was my little shadow! Everywhere I went she was there to and I wouldn’t of had it any other way. I could go on with stories about my precious Doodles for hours, but I won’t.
The past few months she was feeling ill, so my husband took her into the vet and we found out she had a blocked intestine. He said he could perform surgery on her, but made no guarantees. See last year she had surgery because she had several tumors that were cancer and we needed to remove them. That seemed so hard then, but not as hard as last nights decision was. I guess I should be thankful that God gave me another year with her. The past couple of weeks she was getting more and more sick. I had to make her chicken and rice for dinner and eventually she stopped eating all together. She was getting sick non-stop and all she did was rest. I took her a couple of weeks ago for a ride and it seemed to lift her spirits. I am glad I did that for her. When I looked into her eyes all I would see pain. She was a trooper for putting up for the pain as long as she did. My friend said she stayed around for me and I couldn’t handle that. I didn’t want her to suffer because of me. What kind of person/Mother would I be. I stayed home from work yesterday because I told her I would. My husband called me and told me it was time and I had to make an appointment for the vet. I did and at 4:20pm we had to put her to sleep. On the car ride down she asked me to scratch her chest and she gave me the softest kiss on the nose. See she would bow her head and I would kiss it and she would always kiss my nose. She was smiling on that ride down, I don’t know if she knew what was happening? We took her in and the vet asked are you sure you want to do this? I didn’t want to do this, but we did because it was only right. I held her head and kissed her non-stop until she was gone. I asked her to forgive me and that I love her more then anything. My Doodles had a good life and she was she was more then a dog, she was my life. Rest in Peace my sweet Doodles. I will always love you and I miss you terribly. I would give anything for you to come back to me. I love you!
Rest in Peace my Doodles – January 24, 1997 – September 23, 2009
I’m fighting tears right now. Thank you for sharing Doodles’s story with us! <3
Doodles looks so beautiful and happy, you can really see her smiling in those pictures, and you were an excellent fur-mommy to her! You did what you had to, to ease her pain. I'm sure that she's not angry with you, and she's smiling down on you with love. <3
Ahhh, Thank you so much! Your kind words made me feel better and meant a lot to me. Thank you! 🙂