Dearest Mother, 

It is with aching hearts that we think fondly and frequently of our dear, darling mother. It is difficult being apart like this, not knowing where you are or when we will look upon your countenance again, but it warms our heart when we think of the many good times we were able to spend together.

We are doing well, you would be glad to know, though rations must be running thin as we have only had one meal today and it is already 8:30 in the morning. The homestead feels empty without you. Father is doing his best to look after us, but we are suffering from our loneliness and despairing over the distance between us and our most cherished mother. We are unable to sleep, both of us feeling a great obligation to keep vigil for your return.

You will be proud to know that we are being brave in your absence, showing the kind of courage we know you would expect from two good boys. Please return to us, dearest mother. It pains us to think that we may perish before ever gazing upon you again.

We remain devotedly yours, 

Spot and Charles

Postscript: Father has just informed us that it has been nigh twenty minutes since you left for errands and you are due back in the next hour. Please do hurry.

Callum moves to college next week.

I’m doing just as poorly as I had expected I’d be at this point. I wander the house moaning, “Why is this happening to me?” I cry all the time. Playing a game with Matthew? Quietly weeping. Petting a dog? Weeping. Making dinner? Weeping.

“What’s wrong with it?” Callum asks one night when he comes in the kitchen and I’m sniffling while getting out some fruit for dinner. “It,” of course, being one of the lovely ways he likes to refer to me.

“Nothing,” I say.

“It’s lying,” he says.

His college sends all of these emails helping parents and caregivers prepare for college. They kept reminding us that it’s okay to feel all the things, it’s okay to cry, but please save our meltdowns for a time other than in front of our already anxious children, who just need to be convinced that they’ve got this. And he probably does. I, however, do not.

I have bought everything I can possibly think of for him to take to his dorm. I have prepared a first aid kit ready for any calamity I can think (putting the ol’ anxiety disorder to work there). Have a cold? A cut? A headache? A pregnancy scare? Someone on your floor maybe overdosing? I’ve got things for all that. I made laminated cards (as my friend Seth said the other day while I was telling him all this, “Of course they’re laminated”) with information on the local clinic, how to get quarantine meals from campus dining, who to reach out to if misses classes. Will he ever even look at those things? I don’t know. It’s mostly for me to feel better, like I’ve prepared him for every scenario, though of course I also understand that there is no being really prepared for all of life.

Matthew finally said this is all hitting him the other day. I was like, “WELCOME TO MY WORLD! I’VE BEEN HERE FOR MONTHS! IT’S AWFUL! HE WILL LEAVE AND WE WILL NEVER SEE HIM OR TALK TO HIM AGAIN.”

Matthew, ever calm, said, “That’s not true.”

“THAT was a test!” I said. “If you can still think rationally like that, you’re not sad enough yet!”

I miss Edward. My empathetic canine husband was always attentive to me when I cried. Charlie just continues to endlessly lick his paws and Spot gives me a what’s wrong with it? look.

It’s like this. Imagine you’ve had a job for 18 years. You’re not sure you’ve done a good job at that job, but it’s been yours. And okay, maybe you’ve sometimes hated that job. And the job is around the clock, 7 days a week, and is relatively unrewarding. But it’s your job. And then you’re just let go from that job. So now what?

Did you get that I mean the job is parenting? And look, don’t talk to me about how he will still need parenting or other garbage like that. Again, I am not looking for rational thoughts. I am looking to weep and feel sorry for myself. I’m getting pretty good at it.

I am excited for him. I am happy for him. I know we will all adjust and it will be okay. But I am sad. I don’t like change. I don’t like feeling out of control. It’s all amazing and it all sucks.

So I guess I’ll keep cleaning my house (my favorite anxiety activity) and stress-baking (college care packages set for about four months) and listening to sad songs. This is what is supposed to happen. Raise a kid, do your best, launch them into the world. Seems like a bad system, but here we are.

And now, back to weeping.

From the days of kicking his Montessori teacher because he wanted to go home to middle school detentions and suspensions (ask me about THAT sometime) to figuring it all out, he made it. We made it. 

Banner week around here. Callum turned 18 on Wednesday. His gift from us was a collection of Norwegian black metal cassette tapes. Callum at 18 is me at 18 is Matthew at 18 is his very own self at 18. A mashup of two weirdos who found each other in a bookstore and made a new weirdo. The evening before his birthday I told him it was his last few hours as a child. That got a good eye roll. Okay, so maybe not technically a child anymore but definitely still a teen. Whew.

Then he graduated high school on Saturday. 

I didn’t know what to do with myself all day. It felt weird to do all the normal Saturday things. I kept busy cleaning to give my feelings something to do. I texted my BFF, whose kid was also graduating from C’s school, woohooing that we made it. I texted my neighbor to check in on her big feelings, happy to find she was also busy cleaning. Then Callum handed me a letter thanking us for all we’ve done for him. And thus began the Great Crying of 2024. Grateful it’s over. Grateful to have sat through graduation next to my best friend of 32 years (and her parents, including her mother, that same Montessori teacher he kicked at age 3). Grateful we all survived.

You know how Diane Court gives that valedictorian speech in Say Anything and says, “I’ve glimpsed our future and all I can say is… go back”? It only gets a laugh out of her dad. Callum’s attitude at the end of high school was very much “flick a match over his shoulder at that place and never look back.” Diane is wrong. I’ve glimpsed the future and all I can say is, go get it. High school? Go back? No way. Everything good and wild and unexpected is in that future. Go get it. 

Sunday he gets on an airplane to head west to meet up with a friend for a two week road trip. I will now spend two weeks cosplaying as someone without a debilitating anxiety disorder. Having lost my dad to a brutal car accident, I have huge anxiety about even just day-to-day driving. I hate when Callum is in a car with anyone other than us. He will have a wonderful adventure. I will probably double down on all my meds. 

Someone recently said to me that their therapist had once said that you could have a relationship with your child or you could be right. Right about whatever—the current argument, that your expectations are reasonable, that your way is the only way, that you know best. And I’ll tell you what. I’ve spent 18 years working hard to let go of my intense love of being right. I am stubborn and rigid and ruled by to-do lists and achievements. I fucking love to be right. But I love my kid more. I love our relationship more. And god knows when he leaves this fall there is so much I am going to want to be right about, so much of what I’d do or what I’d say that I’ll want to impose on him. And starting with this trip, this incredibly unplanned “we’ll go wherever and sleep wherever” trip, we are entering the golden age of me just shutting up and letting him live his life. Will I still offer far too much unsolicited advice? Sure. I’m still me. But do I need to work harder than ever to just zip it and watch his life unfold how he wants it to? Yep.

Good thing I love a project. 

So. 18. Graduated. Off on a road trip. Wonderful, terrifying times.

Let’s dance it out with Arcade Fire and “Unconditional I.” Because parenting has kicked my ass all over the place nearly every day of these 18 years, but my love for this headstrong, independent, clever kid? Unconditional. 

“A lifetime of skinned knees

And heartbreak comes so easily

But a life without you

Would be boring for someone like me.”

One of the worst possible jobs you can have while pregnant is being a children’s librarian doing multiple story times a week. Nothing but mothers who want to give you unsolicited advice about everything. Once it became obvious I was pregnant, lo those many years ago, they’d offer all kinds of tips. During my second trimester, a few moms who had babies MEGA early liked to coach me through just getting into trimester three and tell me survival rates and what nurse to ask for it if I had a premature baby. Thanks? 

Here we are again, 18 years later, focusing on getting through trimester two, this time of school. Survival rates? Not to be dramatic, but sometimes it feels slim. Come on, I think. One more trimester to go! 12 more weeks and then graduation! I keep a graduation countdown app on my phone and look at it often to remind myself that my baby just has 84 more days to go. It’s the opposite counting of what you do in gestational trimester two. Instead of noting how many weeks we are into things, I’m noting how many weeks there are to go. 

I have the same kind of mixed feelings as I did when pregnant. Then, toward the end, I counted down the weeks, eventually hoping he’d be early (he was, missing the amazing due date of 6/6/06. When people would ask if we knew what we were having, I liked to say that gender is a social construct–what we’re really interested in is will the baby have horns or hooves.) but also terrified what would happen once he was out in the world. Now, graduation is 3 days after his 18th birthday, but instead of just bringing him home from the hospital, I’m setting him free into the world. Not one where I’m at home hovering over him and fretting over his every breath, but one where I have to adjust to not being able to see his every move (but, let’s be real, still fretting over his every breath). A friend asked recently if I’m just going to cry and cry when he leaves, and while I will be supremely sad (for all the agony parenting has caused me, he is a supremely cool kid who has always been my best buddy), it’s less that I’m concerned about the sadness as I am the anxiety. And that’s on me. 

The hardest things I’m feeling right now are that I CAN learn to let go a little and let him live his life. I want him to have amazing adventures. I want him to go to college, to be his own person, to learn to stretch and grow on his own. But a lifelong anxiety disorder makes that very challenging. The real challenge is to work on that on my own and not put it all on him. I did not enjoy being pregnant at all. There are a ton of reasons why we only had one child, and one of them is that growing a person was not for me. But, he was safe inside me. And, sure, he’s been safe outside of me all this time. Also, I’ve never had to let go like I will have to. I am not good at new things.

The other day we sat around our dining room table with my best college friends and spouses, reminiscing about a post-college road trip out west that involved everyone at the table, in some way or another. Callum was interested in some of the details because he’ll be setting off on his own road trip out west right after graduation. Sometimes it’s hard to believe I’m this old, that some of these stories were so very long ago, and yet we remember every detail. It’s so exciting that Cal is about to make his own memories like this, memories of freedom and adventure and unplanned detours. That’s growing up. I want that for him. 

But. 

Also.

We spend our recent day off of school watching a movie about Norwegian black metal. Thanks to Callum, I know all the ins and outs of this scene, all the major players. We keep pausing the movie to talk about what liberties it seems like the movie is taking with the real story, for him to tell me more details, for me to point out what all the bad choices every single person in that scene made (I may be an aging punk, but I’m also a responsible mother). I needed to be working on an article that afternoon, but when he asked me to hang out, of course I said yes. My time with him is limited. I mean, it always has been, but I can feel it now. 

It’s the turning point now. It all feels real. I’ve paid deposits for things at college. I’ve created graduation cards. I’ve booked him a plane ticket for the day after graduation. It’s real. It’s all been real. It’s always been real. But this? This feels bigger than I can understand. Trimester one, done. Trimester two, done. I’m so excited for him.

But.

Also.

For most of my life the word trimester has meant nothing of any significance. That is to say, it’s meant what it means–three months–without any weight or feeling attached to it. But, of course, for the duration of growing a baby Callum, trimesters meant a lot. And now, nearly 18 years later, trimesters mean everything again. 

Trimester one: Your baby is the size of a grown man.

***

I’m printing off Callum’s senior year schedule, double checking classes for each tri to make sure everything looks right. Three trimesters and high school is done. Three trimesters and he will turn 18. Three trimesters and he starts to put one foot out the door, college coming quickly thereafter. In three trimesters, he will be an adult (albeit one without a fully formed prefrontal cortex for many years) and I will need to learn how to let go. I’m not good at that. I keep thinking of that line from Everybody Loves Raymond where he says his mother, who wants to know everything happening in his life and his every thought, would ride a q-tip into his brain if she could. I say to Matthew, “I think I’m going to start crying, and then cry for the next 9 months, and then cry for the next four years, and then cry every day after that for the rest of my life.” 

“At least you have a plan,” Matthew says. 

***

It’s MEA break and we’re going on a college visit. I am still hours away from being diagnosed with walking pneumonia and bronchitis at urgent care–I should be going to urgent care today instead of tomorrow–but there is no world where I miss this visit. We drive through a surreal fog, literally the densest fog any of us have experienced. I am so sick I can hardly think straight (don’t worry, Matthew is driving), but god damn it, I will fake it till I make it on this trip. We get settled at the school, Callum has a good conversation with the admissions director, and before we even leave the ballroom for the tour he gets a text that he’s been accepted. I joke to Callum that this school looks good–maybe I’ll apply and can be his roommate. I watch him take in all the sights and information and want to stamp my foot, jealous and angry. This isn’t fair. He’s going to leave me and experience all of this and have a life all his own? And while I am jealous, I’m not actually angry. I’m excited. 

Later, we drop him off at his best friend’s dorm. Instead of them staying there, he texts me in the evening saying they’re going back to Phoenix’s parents’ house in Eagan. Her car has a spare tire on it. They’re taking back roads, turning a 45 minute drive into a two hour journey. He texts me from a Taco Bell in Hastings. “Whoa, we’re halfway there. Whoooo-oooa driving on a spare.” 

I show it to Matthew, laughing. “I don’t get it,” he says. 

“Sing it to ‘Livin’ on a Prayer,’” I tell him. 

My brain is trying to process the events of the day–the tour, the details, the acceptance to college. I want him by me so I can ask him to tell me every thought he’s having about it all. I’m glad he’s having the adventures he should be having. But I wish they were headed back to our house, so I could eavesdrop on their laughing and know he’s tucked just downstairs from me. 

***

My brother is visiting. He and Callum are peas in a pod. After they go off on a comics mission in Uptown, they’re sitting in the living room. “Are you having a graduation party?” Ryan asks Cal. “He doesn’t even want to walk at graduation,” I say. Ryan tells Callum, who has adamantly told us he will not walk, that he should do it. 

“Look,” he says, “it’s stupid bullshit and your mom and I didn’t want to do it either, but we had no choice. It’s just one of those things you should do for the people in your life. Grandma would like it.” 

I pipe up, “I would like. I’ve worked hard to get you to this point.” 

Callum narrows his eyes at us and says, “Maybe I’ll do it. For Gran.”

***

I’m downstairs cleaning his lair while he’s gone and thinking of when he moves out. This space will not need cleaning. It will just always be clean. No infinite string cheese wrappers and Monster cans. It will be quiet. No metal music carrying up the stairs, no yelling into the mic as he plays video games. My god, I think. I’ll be able to open all the blinds–no more teenager cave! Then, just as quickly as I think of the upsides, I find I’m quietly singing to myself “It’s a Motherfucker.” My internal voice chides me for being so melodramatic. That song is about loss. But leaving is loss. Growing up is loss. Life is a series of loss, of letting go and hanging on, sometimes both at the same time, to varying degrees. This is how life goes. But I kind of hate it. 

***

It’s November and Callum and his new person are watching Heathers.

“Oh my god, I love this movie,” I say. 

“Oh, you’ve seen it?” 

God. Remember being a teenager and thinking YOU ALONE have discovered everything cool and interesting? 

“Only a million times,” I say, making myself go back upstairs rather than snuggle in next to them and reciting the entire movie out loud. 

***

The first trimester ends in early December. 

“One-third of the way through senior year,” I cheerfully tell Callum, trying to keep him motivated to continue having a great year. 

To myself I think, Fuck. One-third of the way through senior year. 

We have always been, at minimum, a two-dachshund family. Siblings Edward and Billy joined us in 2004, then rescue Oscar came along in 2017. Three dogs, while a lot of work, was the ideal number for me. I needed them. Then Billy died earlier this year. I was devastated, obviously, but eventually adjusted to “just” having two dogs. I could do that.

In the early part of this summer, Oscar began to fade away. He was such a tough little doxie who survived so much. He was found tied up outside a shelter, having maybe spent some time living on the street, or was freshly abandoned there, or fell to earth from whatever planet grows toothless little weirdos with hearts of gold. An angry little man with lots of defensive walls built up, he was deemed unadoptable and set to be euthanized. Thankfully, a rescue group swooped in and saved him. He then spent 8 months going to weekly adoption events, snarling and snapping at everyone who tried to even look at him.

Meanwhile, I was at my house looking at dogs on the internet. Here’s a game my brain plays with me:

Brain: Psst. If you go online and look at old dogs who need homes, I’ll make a little serotonin for you, as a treat.

Me, every time: Okay. *looks, then starts sobbing at all the sweet old dogs needing homes*

Brain: Ha ha, you fell for it again! Now you’re even sadder than you were five minutes ago! *pauses* Oh my god! I have the best idea for us! Look up “disabled dogs that need homes!” No—it’ll be heartwarming! Just try it!

Me: *does it and sobs forever*

So that’s the state I’m in when Matthew finds me at my computer. I show him Oscar, weeping, telling him that that’s my dog. Somehow, MY dog is on the internet and needs a home. Matthew, who is kind and patient and understands how much I NEED this dog, simply says, “Let’s go get him.” So, we do. And you all know the rest of the story. Either you’ve read the blog posts. Or you’ve met him. Or you follow me on Twitter. But you know all about Oscar. His little act of  “I will KILL all of you” dropped the second he got in our car. He was, hands down, the very best boy a person could want.

So back to earlier this summer. He starts to get scrawny. We know he has a bad liver, a bad heart, and IVDD, the disc disease that so many dachshunds suffer from. Still, he slips and slides all around the house, his back legs no longer working, to follow me everywhere. He eats, monitors every thing that happens in the house, and, despite his weakened back half, has very few accidents. At some point, he loses the strength to constantly launch himself off the couch or wherever I’ve set him. He stops being able to use his strong front legs to haul himself around. He becomes nothing but bones. Petting him is traumatic—bump, bump, bump.

We buy him a little cart and see if we can help him get up and moving again. It doesn’t go well and, per use, becomes the most expensive thing we own. We keep him in his stroller, I sit and handfeed him his meals, he requires us to hold him to his water dish for drinks and to hold him outside to go potty. He can’t do anything on his own. Before we leave for vacation, I start to feel like I’m carrying around a dead dog. But I’m not ready. And, more importantly, he’s not ready. I know this.

We go to Colorado for the week and leave him in the capable hands of my mother. I beg him not to die while we’re gone. I will not be able to handle it, because of his actual death and because of the tsunami of trauma and grief it will trigger in me by stirring up all the other deaths I didn’t get a goodbye with. We come home and he’s alive! But he’s done. I know it.

The things happening are too grim to detail. I tell myself that I won’t make the call for a day or two. Maybe he can go on his own. But, like Billy, Henry, and Chester before him (god, has it been a shit year), he can’t. I come home from the gym on Sunday morning, and I know he’s done. He needs our help.

I call the vet, sobbing, and ask if our favorite vet tech is working. They put me on the phone with her and she sets us up. Oscar will be with her and our favorite vet, the two who were with Billy. A., our favorite vet tech, has the kindest heart. She loves our dogs so much. I know I’m making the right call. We spend the day holding Oscar, who barely opens his eyes. I cry and cry and cry. Like with Billy, Edward wants nothing to do with this stage. He keeps his distance, reluctantly giving Oscar one little lick when I force him to be close to him. I pet Oscar, his bony back, his poky hips, the deep ridges along his skull. There is nothing left. I keep one hand on his chest the whole time to make sure he’s still in there. He is, but he’s not. At the vet, sweet A. gets him set up with his IV and comes back after a bit with him, saying she took so long because she needed to snuggle him and was crying. I hold him the whole time, telling him he was the best little dog anyone could ever want. And then, he’s gone.

I come home to just one dog. I’ve never had just one dog. I am a wreck. Callum puts the stroller and cart down in the storage room so I don’t have to look at them. Edward sniffs the blanket we had Oscar in, nosing around in it to look for him, like, “I know he was tiny, but good lord, where is he in here?” Edward side-eyes me, knowing I am the Dachshund Angel of Death, knowing in the past many months I have put four dachshunds in the car, gone to vet, and come home alone. I sob to the point that I think I’m going to throw up and eventually Edward takes pity on me and curls up with me.

Three, then two, now one. Each dog leaves and takes a little piece of me with him. I worry that soon there will be nothing left. I like dogs way more than I like people. The grief is the searing, uncomplicated kind that comes from losing someone who was only ever 100% loving, the uncomplicated kind that often cannot come with losing a person, because people have faults and dogs do not.

I’m writing this with Edward sleeping alone on his dog bed. He has never been alone. He has never been an only. We are in this new landscape together. And I have to say, I hate it here.

Thank you for four wonderful years, sweet Oscar, little space goblin, canine love of my life. I hope you’re back on your home planet now, able to run again, tongue flapping in the wind as you chase the other weird little goblins.

It’s New Year’s Eve and Billy is dying.

Someone nearby is setting off fireworks, each one making me wince. My head hurts from crying all day.

I am not ready for my sweet dog to die. I like dogs so, so, so much more than most people. I wish I could choose some human to die in his place. See ya, Mitch McConnell!

Billy’s skeletal at this point, frail in a way that leaves us marveling how he’s still mobile and coherent. And he is. He hasn’t eaten in ten days. He’s weaker, sure, and wobblier, but his eyes are still shiny. He still responds to his name. He’s the dog having the least accidents in the house. But it’s almost time.

I often find Edward pressed up against him, one paw on Billy, or his head resting on him. He knows.

When we went to choose our dachshund puppy, I wanted Edward because he was so big and strong. Matthew couldn’t bear the thought of leaving Billy, the runt, behind. So both dogs came home with us to our little Boston apartment. They’ve never been apart. Not even a night.

Callum, who has spent nearly every therapy appointment for 8 years bringing up the question of what will he do when one of our dogs dies is calm and accepting. I’m crying quietly to myself as I make him dinner. He comes and takes the food out of my hands and hugs me. My baby boy towers over me, at 6’1”, and holds me tight while I sob. Later he sits in bed with me, petting a sleeping Billy. “We’ve been crying over him all day,” I say. “Even dad?” Callum asks, amazed. “Of course,” I say. “Wow. He never cries.”

We keep poking Billy, lifting him, waking him. He’s probably quite annoyed. He’s spent years perfecting an existence that we’ve long called “undead.” He’s been a picky eater for years, often going a few days without eating. He has mastered some sort of breathing routine that makes him breathe half as much as real fully alive dogs. I place my hands on him and wait, my breath held, and think, this is it—he’s gone. Then he takes a big shuddering breath. Nervous Edward, the caretaker dog, the nanny dog, doesn’t know what to, so he just keeps nervously cleaning his dogs.

It’s New Year’s Day now and my dog is still dying. Did you know sometimes dying can take a long time? I spend the day reading a book written by one of my best friends. It’s comforting because I can hear her voice and feel her by me. I think about when my dad died and how she flew in to be with me. I keep thinking about my dad during this time with Billy and about my grandma. I didn’t get to say goodbye to either of them. I’m getting the world’s longest goodbye with Billy. I’m not sure it’s a better option. My Simmons gang keeps texting that they’re there for me, that they’re here with me. Twitter floods my feed with love for Billy and support for us. My best friend Kelly texts me every day to check in, but my report is always the same. We are waiting.

It’s January 2 and my dog is still dying. He’s on day 12 of no food. He is some kind of miracle, a stubborn little doxie who just won’t let go. I’d gotten up at 4 with him. He was panting and limp and I thought, so here we are. It’s happening.

It wasn’t happening.

His breathing returns to normal, he gets a drink of water, goes outside for potty, and goes back to sleep. I keep holding him and telling him it’s okay to go now. I don’t believe anything happens after we die, but I still tell him stories of all the family dachshunds that will be waiting for him. He will get to see Mitzi, Ludwig, Gus, and Henry. He just gives me his little doxie side-eye, irritated that I keep waking him and crying all over him.

The day seems good, then bad. We cry and cry, but also laugh over all the funny Billy stories from over his long life. After more than a week of not throwing up, and 12 days of not eating, he throws up black tar that smells like sewage. We plead with him to please just let go. We don’t want to do it for him. I put an air mattress on the main floor so I can sleep with Billy and so can his brothers. The last thing I want is to be cleaning puke from my bed or carpet. We leave the fire on for him—there’s nothing he likes better than toasting himself in front of the fire. Edward frets a bit about why a bed is on the main floor and why we’re not heading upstairs, but eventually settles in next to Billy on the big dog bed. Oscar doesn’t care what’s happening as long as I’m there.

I don’t sleep really. Oscar stays right next to me, something he usually doesn’t do when sleeping, and Edward stays on the dog bed with Billy. I read, scroll on my phone, watch some shows, and wait. Sometime around 3, Billy climbs from his bed onto mine. I hold him tight until we get up. He throws up again and all I can think is that I hate this SO MUCH.

I hate this. I HATE it.

I think about him as a tiny puppy, too scared to cross thresholds into rooms and needing a little lift. I think about him being best buds with my mom. I think about all the times he managed to get stuck in the arm of a sweatshirt that he found abandoned on a bed. I think about him playing his version of ball—grab the toy and never let go, but run like mad. I think about the long, good life he has had.

It’s January 3 and my god, my dog is still dying. He is the toughest little dachshund, the toughest runt, to ever live. We look online and find sites that are like, some dogs can live 3-5 days without food. Billy’s like, day 13, bitches! Billy does what Billy wants! Matthew and I discuss intervening and making a choice for Billy. But he doesn’t appear to be suffering. We want him to go on his own if he can. We try to figure out if we’re being selfish, if we’re doing the right things. And we wait. Even in the best case scenario, even with the most insignificant of things, I am terrible at waiting. I’m impatient. I’ve cleaned everything in my house. I can’t concentrate to read. I just pace, stop and stare to see if Billy is still breathing, and plead with him to stop being such a strong little guy. Dachshunds—stubborn to the end.

I set up my little bed area again on the main floor for the world’s saddest sleepover. Billy sleeps in front of the fire, wrapped in my precious baby blanket, and I sleep with my head up by him. Edward and Oscar sleep pressed against me. Billy gets up repeatedly in the night to do his little loop around the downstairs. I trail behind him in the dark, wondering how on earth this tiny guy has the energy to move like this. We wake up on Monday, January 4, day 14 of Billy not eating, and oh dear god, this dog is still alive. His eyes pop open when I move, and when I come in from taking the other two outside, he’s making his way to the door for his turn. He’s got to be down to 3 pounds or so.

THIS DOG.

In the afternoon, we are SURE the time is finally here. We all spend about 2 hours holding him, sobbing, telling him it’s okay to go. Eventually Callum, worn out, goes back downstairs. Even later, Matthew and I decide we need to eat something. We put Billy with his brothers in front of the fire. A few more hours pass. Billy wakes up, sits up, does his best Monty Python “I’m not dead yet!” and walks to his water. Soon after this I start laughing hysterically and then sob hysterically. I haven’t slept much for these past two weeks. I’m exhausted. If he’s not suffering, if he’s not out of it, we want him to go on his own time, at home. But when? Every day, every hour, nearly every minute, I think, maybe now, just be done. Billy has never liked being told what to do. Billy will do this when Billy is ready.

But Billy can’t do it on his own. We’re on day 15 now. He seems relatively okay, but cannot be. We make the hard choice. We make the call. We go, we do the horrible, hard thing. And just like that, it’s over. One minute here with us, then suddenly, gone.

Goodbye, sweet Billy. You were such a good boy.