for Gigi

about 3 weeks ago we lost our sweet Maltese dog Gigi, and today would have been her 15th birthday! it was very hard to lose her especially since I've had her since I was 13. although she was a family Christmas present from my parents, I was the once that loved her the most and gave her the most attention. I worked hard to get her to love me more than my mom and eventually I won her over.

she had crazy colored hair way before the trend started! :) Brin and Steve colored her hair pink with kool-aid one day. 

 

 

Jason and I brought her to live with us about a year after we got married. she seemed really happy with us immediately and acted like she had always been with us. I pampered her immensely when we first got her and let her fur grow long and she looked more beautiful than she ever had. we loved her so much. Jason even gave her a personality with a raspy old lady voice which we thought was hilarious (even though other people that heard might have just thought we were crazy).

 she got to go to California with my family one year.

 she loved Halloween :)

 

when we got Tarley as a puppy I began giving more attention to her as Gigi aged and wasn't as energetic as she used to be. we still loved Gigi though and she and Tarley became good friends.  

 

the past year Gigi slowly went downhill and became more senile and began having more accidents. when we got back from our road trip Gigi had developed a really bad cough. we took her to the vet and they said she had heart failure. we didn't want to spend 1000's of dollars on additional testing just to get her meds since we knew she was old and probably wouldn't live much longer no matter what we did. we decided to give her some natural supplements and aspirin which seemed to help and her cough pretty much disappeared. she seemed more energetic and would even try to play with Tarley. it seemed to happen so fast that one day she started having a hard time breathing and she stopped eating. it was so hard seeing her that way and I decided to try again to get her some real meds. that night after Jason got home from work about midnight I carried her outside to go to the bathroom because she wouldn't go outside. I noticed as I was holding her how skinny and frail she had gotten. I put her on the ground and after she went pee she started walking crooked and then suddenly she fell over on her side. I picked her up and raced her inside yelling for Jason to help. I laid her on the living room floor and Jason said that this was it and that she wasn't going to make it. I started panicking, running around the house to look for my phone to call my parents to see what to do. I wanted to take her to the emergency vet but Jason said she wouldn't make it there. I had to go in the other room because it was too hard to watch. Jason called me back in and told me to stay with her and pet her. we both pet her over and over telling her we loved her and that she was a really good dog. Jason listened to her heart and it slowly stopped beating. Jason hugged me as I started bawling, it was so hard to lose her. after I calmed down we just looked at her and I thought I could see her breathing but Jason said it was the fan blowing her fur. the one thing I was grateful for though was that Jason was there with me when it happened because it would've been awful to have to go through that alone. it was almost like she waited for Jason to get home because it happened just 10 minutes after he got there. we buried her the next day in my parent's backyard and made a little grave for her. 

we were so sad to lose her but now she is at peace and isn't in pain anymore. I was really sad for a few days after and I missed her so much. I went through all of my pictures through the years and made a folder for all the pictures with her. although a lot of the pictures aren't the greatest quality and have bad flash lighting they still mean a lot to mean. it made me a little sadder to see the dog she was before her health started going downhill. I was only able to find one puppy picture of her has been bothering me because I know there are more. I hope eventually I can find them. Gigi was there for me all through my teens and for most of my 20's. she was a really good dog and we will always love and miss her. we will be having pizza day (the best day of the week according to her :) ) today in her memory!