Crying Doesn’t Make You Weak

The look in my boys eyes when we came home without Zacky our 12 year old pit was devastating. How do we as parents make an 11 and 8 year old understand that their buddy that protected them has gone home to Jesus?

As a 12 year old girl I learned what it felt like to lose a very special person. My Grandma Teresa battled breast cancer and lost her battle 7/4/2006. To this day I remember the day we got the call. It was early morning and my mom is yelling at the phone “I will be right there!” and BAM the phone slams!!!!!! “get up and hurry up if my mom dies before we get there its your fault!” I remember those words so clearly spilling out of my mothers mouth! We (I had 3 brothers) put on what we could and jump in the car! We lived 3 blocks away and when we arrive Grandma is still breathing! Grandma smiles and touches my moms face and a single tear runs down Grandma’s cheek, and with a heavy sigh she took her last breath. My Mom, Grandpa,  Aunt, and Uncles all begin crying and immediately call 911. It all happened so fast….. and just like that the body was placed in a bag and taken away. As a child I want to know so much, Why? Where are they taking her? When will I see her? Was it my fault? Did I make mom late?

My mom was a single mom, 4 kids (one was only 3 months) and worked full time. She did the best she could raising us, but I think in the midst of her storm she kinda forgot that we may have emotions/feelings/confusion/questions. We were told she had passed and not coming back. I understood that, but didn’t understand why it hurt my heart so bad. I knew I couldn’t ask questions, I had to respect that my mom was grieving and I had to learn how to deal with my emotions kind of on my own.

Remember in my last post I said I had lost so many family members????? Here is a brief summary of my moms side of the family My uncle/Nino Fernando passed at the age of 28 to an aggressive colon cancer, My uncle Chuy was robbed and killed at gun point, My uncle George unfortunately committed suicide at 28 years old, My Uncle Humberto passed away due to complications with his diabetes, and 28 days later My Grandpa Felipe passed also due to diabetes complications (at least thats what they said, thats another story), in 2015 the most devastating loss was my Father to an aortic aneurysm and we didn’t find him for 3 days, 5 months later we lost my grandpa Valentine (my daddy’s dad) and the most recent was my cousin Leticia who was sadly murdered. It seems like it is never going to stop. This is definitely one of the reasons I feel I can be so cold and desensitized to pain/hurt/and emotions in general. There was so much that happened and I had to learn as a young girl to deal with it on my own. So my way was pretty shitty (led to cutting, pills and alcohol, and bad relationships) I wanted to find a way to feel disconnected/loved/wanted/or numb! Another reason I am a like fucked up in the head.

On 9/9/2018 after church my mother in law calls us and says Zacky is panting and won’t stop. We were at lunch and we wrap up lunch quickly. (Zacky was diagnosed with a malignant melanoma skin cancer 2 years prior to this, he was too old to undergo chemo so a wide excision was preformed, the doctor said he would live a year-ish) I immediately thought the worse but kept calm. When we got home Zacky was lying in his bed not moving and panting extremely hard. I knew we had to take him to the doggy ER. I had the boys love on him and I had them pray for Zacky. It was time to go. He wouldn’t move so my father in law and Alex pick up his whole bed and we ran to the car. I sat in the back with his lil head in my lap. My thought ran and ran and the knots in my throat and tummy made it hard to breath. I sat in the car praying God don’t take him. When we arrived at the hospital Alex ran in and asked for help and a man comes running out. He opened the door and feels his abdomen and checks his gums and tongue and say “he is bleeding, he doesn’t have much time!” and calls on his walkie talkie “This dog is critical we don’t have much time I need a gurney!” I froze and the man looks at Alex and says “do I have your verbal consent we need to get a catheter in him” Alex’s response was “of course, yea, anything” We run in and it hit me and I start crying, I ran to the bathroom, looked in the mirror and said “get it together girl, be strong for your husband!” We sat in the waiting room a few minutes and they took us into a room in the back. Within minutes the doctor comes in. Her name was Dr. Lee, she looks at us and starts with apologizing and explain that she can’t imagine the pain we are feeling. I started crying because I knew……….. he is sick….. really sick she goes over blood work, he is losing oxygen, and his blood percentage is under 20% (he was suppose to be at least 30%) I am looking at her like “ok I don’t know what the fuck the means is he ok????” She then says he is bleeding internally and shows us a syringe full of blood and she says they aspirated it out of his abdomen and that confirmation that he is bleeding internally, she couldn’t hear his heart because its surrounded with fluid. She said the ultrasound showed that he most likely his original cancer has spread to liver, lungs, heart and spleen. I ask whats the plan she says surgery or euthanizing (in a nicer way) she explained he is 12 and may not survive and if he did 3 months max is what he would live but would need intense chemo. We knew that wasn’t fair to him, we talked to the family (this is a family member to us 12 years is a long time) Everyone was in agreement we had to put him down, we can’t allow him to suffer. He gave us 12 beautiful years. This dog barked when Eli had an asthma attack and we were unaware, when I was being crazy, moved out and left my husband and kids for 3 weeks Zacky would open the baby gate to go into the boys room, Alex would find him and the entrance of their bedroom door guarding them! He was such a good boy. The doctor was amazing we spent about an hour with him in a comfort room. We waited for my sister in law to arrive she was his owner she brought him home a tiny pup. Everyone loved on him and talked to him. Then the time had come Dr. Lee came in and everyone left except my mother in law, Alex and I. I asked if we could pray 1st and I begged Jesus to make this smooth and to guide the doctors hands. As she injected medication I whispered in his ear “you were so loved, you are such a good boy, And thank you for taking such good care of our boys we love you so much!” and just like that he was gone.

We drove home in silence and walked into the living room where Eli and Julian were. They looked up when we walked in and I could only get 3 words out “I am sorry” Eli started crying “why mom, why” Julain immediately crawls into my lap and sobs. Julain didn’t say a word. I cried with them and told them I was sorry and we were so lucky to have Zacky as long as we did. I explained he was old and was sick and he went home with Jesus and Grandpa Robert. The boys cried for over an hour on and off, I kept asking do you have questions? What are you feeling? I kept explaining that crying was ok, it was healthy to have emotions because they loved him. I told them it would hurt and that was normal. I didn’t want them to suppress any emotions. I emailed teachers on Monday to let them know so they could comfort them. Every day I am asking how they are feeling and if they cry I hold them and kiss them and let them know its ok.

I was driving to work crying alone in my car and it hit me! I am breaking these chains! I am allowing EMOTION in me but most importantly in my CHILDREN!!!!!! This is huge!!!!! I realized in that moment I had to be strong for my mom usually, I didn’t want to burden her with my emotions because she had so much going on all the time. But today I was changing things I was allowing us as a family to go through emotions together.

Since Sunday we have all cried, felt sad, and each one of us picks the other one up the way a family should! Zacky was an amazing Dog one like no other. He showed unconditional love to us and he will forever have a place in our hearts! Until we meet again sweet angel! We love you! Rest in paradise best friend.