I didn’t want to post about this while we were on our trip. I didn’t want to think about it any more than I already was.

And when we got home from our trip, I kinda fell into a little bit of a funk. Okay, maybe a big funk, but whatever. It’s taken me a while to drag myself out of said funk so I’m just now getting around to this… 

And get ready, because I’m about to be real with you. Like super vulnerable. Real, real. Got it?

Also, maybe I’ve been avoiding it. Because it hurts. It hurts so fucking much…  avoidance has always been my favorite behavior. (Obviously!)

………

While we were on our trip, our sweet little Max died. In case you’re new around here, Max was our Chiweenie that Chris and I got not long after we moved into our first apartment together…nearly 14 years ago!

The tragic part is that he escaped and got hit by a car and I found out from Facebook. A neighbor found him and posted in our neighborhood group about it. We are so very lucky to have amazing neighbors… who helped us ID him to ensure that it really was him. And then got his body and kept it for us until we arrived home so he could be buried here.

So, my heart is broken. That I didn’t get to say goodbye. That he died such a violent death. That maybe he escaped and ran away trying to find us. Ugh.

And I feel guilty that he didn’t get as much attention since the kids were born. That he had become an annoyance… something else for me to have to deal with day in and day out. I feel so incredibly guilty. 

He would have been 14 on his birthday. When we first got him, he fit in the palm of my hand. He was so tiny. 

The day after we got home we sat the kids down and told them what happened. They didn’t cry at first… they just had lots of questions as they processed it. We were very matter of fact and told them exactly what happened. They went with us to pick up his body. They wanted to see him, but after being in a deep freezer for nearly a week after being hit by a car…. I didn’t want them to remember him that way. 

We had a funeral. Logan helped Chris dig a hole out in our field under our big oak tree. Sarge (our 12 year old Pit) went to the funeral with us…. we tried to get him to smell the body so maybe he would know what was going on and where his little buddy was. Logan and I picked sunflowers from our garden to lay on his grave and we took turns talking about memories we had with Max. 

And that night, the tears came. Logan laid with us for an hour at bedtime and totally went through all the stages of grief. Oh, how I wish I could have taken his pain away. I’ve never seen him cry harder. It’s times like these that I wish we were religious–that we had some magical, happy story we could tell him about how Max is waiting for him with all the other pets we have lost in the past. 

Atticus has processed the death a bit differently. He has been very matter of fact about everything– and he talks about Max often with any one who will listen. As sad as it has been, it’s also been interesting to see how the boys have each processed things differently… probably due to their age difference. 

I am still working on processing through this loss and all of the crap it’s brought up for me. I’m having nightmares and horrible thoughts that I can’t make go away. Sometimes I wish I had a switch in my brain to shut the shit off. I am so very thankful for a husband and friends who have let me talk about it and work through all of it. <3

Rest in peace little buddy.