Last summer, our family dog, Odie, passed away of old age after 14 beautiful years together.
At the time, I was traveling in Melbourne - my family called me early in the morning saying that his health had declined a lot overnight and that there was nothing more the doctors were able to do for him. I began to pack my things and called my airline to catch the earliest flight back, but Odie’s health was getting worse and worse by the minute. The soonest I could’ve reached home was the following evening, but with his condition, he only had a few hours left. I wasn’t able to be there.
I spent the entire time up until his last moments with my family on FaceTime - I was thankful that even though I wasn’t able to be there physically, I could at least do this much.
When Odie was a few years old, I remember petting him while he was asleep next to me and declaring that no matter what happened I would be there holding him in his last moments. This was a declaration I came back to often over the years. A plea. One that I naively and so fully believed would come true.
Many of my friends and family told me I was lucky that I wasn’t able to be there since their passing can be so painful to witness in person. Although it was always well-intentioned, this never made it any more comforting or easy to swallow; if anything, it dug the dagger deeper. It was a time where I was just supposed to be there, to show up. Out of all the ways I could have been shown mercy in my life, not being there for a loved one in their last moments should never have been one of them.
Now, as I’ve been back in my family’s home for a few months, I still see signs of him everywhere. I can hear his barking as I come through the door, I see him in his usual napping spots. I expect to find him there waiting for me every time I turn a corner in our home.
What hurts the most is going out to our garden. When my sister and I moved back to our family’s home during quarantine a few years ago, Odie and I got into a little morning routine. Every morning, I would make a toast, a cup of matcha, and head outside with my journal, Odie trailing quietly behind me. I would position the patio chair so I would be sitting in the sun facing the garden, and would slowly eat my toast, sip on my matcha, and write in my journal, while Odie slowly worked his way through the garden. Every morning we would do this. Every morning he would reacquaint himself with every plant, every leaf, every flower, saying hi to every bird and every new bug he found along the way. Every now and then, I would look up from my journal to check on Odie, and every now and then Odie would look up from his explorations to check on me, and give a tiny wag with his tail before continuing on.
Sometimes I would join him - I would go and look at what plants Odie would be sniffing so intently, pointing out any bugs or parts of the plant he may have missed. Sometimes he would join me - he would come to my chair for some pets, his tail wagging, and then lay down beside me to sunbathe. His nose and ears constantly twitching, catching every smell, listening to every rustle of the leaves, watching the birds go from tree to tree.
Every morning was sweet and warm and full.
In the days and weeks following Odie’s passing, I saw him a lot in my meditations, and my family and I saw him a lot in our dreams. We joked saying it was like he was taking turns visiting each one of us, hopping into each one of our dreams. One day, over month later, all of that stopped. I could no longer find him in my meditation and we no longer saw him in our dreams. It felt like a second wave of loss - I could no longer feel him with us.
Where does the love we hold for others go when they are no longer here with us?
A line in The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy has stuck with me since I read it years ago, “But around her, the Air was sad, somehow. And behind the smile of her eyes, the Grief was fresh, shining blue. Because of a calamitous car crash. Because of a Joe-shaped hole in the Universe.” I always used to look at grief similarly - when we experience loss, there is a hole in our hearts and in the world in the shape of who we lost.
I’ve reached the point in my grieving where I am sitting in a sharp fear of forgetting our memories with him. I fear that I’ll forget how he looked, or felt, or smelled, or sounded like. That one day there will no longer be the odd hair or two stuck to old items or in corners of our house. That one day I’ll forget all of the warm memories and moments we shared.
But as they say, to have lost is to have loved. I keep trying to remind myself that even the fact that I have so many warm memories to look back on, to the point where I may have forgotten some, is such a gift in itself. It has all been a gift.
As the waves of grief become less debilitating over time, we slowly come back to the love we have for those we have lost, and the more we open ourselves up to this love the more we expand. Slowly, the pain and emptiness of their absence turns into the joy and celebration of the life they lived, as we continue on, always carrying them with us.
My sweet little Odie. I love you.
An Invitation
If you’re finding yourself in this space of grieving, I’m with you. I invite you to hold space for every stage of grief while remembering that the love you’ve shared will always stay with you.
Allow yourself to take full deep breaths and shift your awareness to your body - where in your body are you feeling this grief? Which memories are stored in which parts of your body?
As you move through this and check in with each part of your body, go easy on yourself. Allow what comes up to be. It’s okay if it’s too overwhelming - acknowledge it, return to your breathing, and take your time. It’s okay to move at your own pace, it’s okay to ask for help, and it’s okay to just rest for a while to catch your breath. Eventually all waves settle.
With love,
Amanda xx
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