Losing Remmy: What I learned about parenting from losing our family dog) Ep 269

It was a tough one. We lost one of our dogs this week. His name was Remington, a full-size Australian Shepherd, and he was the troublemaker of the pack in the best way. Dug holes next to the foundation, ripped screens, played defensive back against the German Shepherd whenever anyone threw a frisbee. He was a character.

About five months ago he started losing weight. Then more weight. By the end he was down to 30 pounds from 70. We did what we could, but eventually the vet told us it was time to think about helping him pass with dignity. So we had the vet come to the house, my neighbor dug a grave, and we all said goodbye together as a family.

My four kids are 19, 17, 14, and six felt it...hard. 

What I didn't expect was how much I'd learn watching them grieve. There's something that happens in hard moments that you just can't manufacture in the good ones. You find out how your kids care for each other. You find out who they are when things hurt. And if you slow down enough to be present, you teach them more in those moments than you could on any vacation or at any milestone.

I'm naturally task oriented. My default is to make a decision and execute. But I made myself slow down this time and just let things unfold. My wife has  years teaching me how to do that better over our almost 24 years of marriage. I grew up in a house where you moved through things, you didn't sit in them. That shaped who I am in ways I didn't always notice.

I think the people who spend their lives avoiding hard things or suppressing them end up carrying more damage than the ones who let themselves feel it. Grief isn't the problem. Avoiding grief is the problem.

We're still not through it. I recorded this the day after. My six year old came downstairs with a big frown and asked why Remmy had to die. I didn't have a perfect answer. But I do have hope. Hope that one day all the broken things get made right. That's what gets me through. That's what lets you move forward with love instead of just moving forward.

Grateful you're here. These things are happening in your life too. I hope you find hope like we did.

Pursue Clarity, Paul.

Connect with me at www.pauljdaly.com

Check out the More Than Cars Movement here. 

Transcript

Clarity Compressed —Episode 269 Transcript

Paul Daly [0:01]

So no intro this week. This is episode 269, of clarity, compressed and had a pretty somber moment over the week that I wanted to talk about. We lost one of our family dogs, and his name was Remy. So let me give you a little background. We have four family dogs, and our first one is a mini Australian Shepherd. He's probably like, I don't know, he's probably 11 12, years old right now he's getting up there. You have a German Shepherd. Maybe he's not 11 or 12. Maybe he is. We have a German Shepherd who's about, I'm gonna say, nine years old, big boy. And then we have a regular Australian shepherd who is seven almost eight. And then we have toy poodle, who is two and a half and very small. The first three live outside. They always have we have a few acres, and we have a one acre electric fence that they all just love to run around. And you know, they all kind of have a different role in a different thing that they do. But they love running around. They chase animals, they chase each other, they chase the kids. They bark at things. They love all the weather. They actually hate the heat. Those three dogs, mini Australian, German Shepherd and a full Aussie, full size Aussie. They're just kind of built to have a big undercoat in the wintertime, which is great because we live in Syracuse, New York, so it's it gets very cold and it snows, and they love it outside. When we bring them inside, in the wintertime, they can't wait to get outside. I've actually had my neighbor before. He He texts me, you know, the dogs are outside and they bark a little bit, or they were barking a little bit. But that's not a problem. Like the dogs bark. We have coyotes and stuff. They keep everything away. But he texts me, and he says, it's eight degrees out, bring your dogs in, Paul, and my neighbor and I, his name is Paul, too. You have a great relationship. But you know, he's like, bring the dogs in, and he's, he's, he's a bit older than me. He's retired, so he's like, little bit of like, would be same age as my dad. So he kind of, like, bring your dogs in. Paul is a little bit of a like, like you would talk to your son a little bit. And I told him, I was like, I really want to bring them in. They try to get out of the house as soon as I bring them in. I bought them igloos. They can go on the garage. They can do all these things, and I cannot get them to use the igloos that I bought them that would keep them warm. They never go in it. They like the outdoors that much the summertime, we need to brush them out, and they don't like the heat as much. But either way about I'm gonna say, about five months ago, we started to notice that Remington, who is our 30s, our full size, Aussie, between seven and eight years old, he he started, like, losing a little weight and starting a little, maybe a little less active. He was our punk man. This dog is the one that destroys everything. He's just like the little kid of the group. He would always, like, rip the screens with his claws. And he went under one of our little decks outside the house, and he dug next to the house so that when it rained, the water pulled up next to the foundation. We got water inside. You know, you always have to have that one. He's the troublemaker. He's also the sweetest boy. And so he started to lose some weight, then lost more. And then all of a sudden we realized, like, wow, he's looking really thin. Brought him into the vet, did some blood tests, did some scans, just like he's got super high red or low red blood cell count. He's probably nauseous. He stopped eating. We noticed, and lost he probably went down from, I don't know, 70 75 pounds, all the way down, like 45 like upper 40s. They gave us some anti inflammatories and medication, but they said, hey, look, there's, there's a likelihood that he's got some really serious issues that we're not going to be able to actually fix unless we did some really advanced imaging. And then, even then, you know, and you start to think about, like, what, what's actually happening, and what can you do to actually help a dog realistically, some time goes by, we try to take care of them. We try to, like, see if things are getting better. Months go by, doesn't get better, loses more weight, all the way down to 30 pounds. So our once super healthy, you know, dog who we love, super sweetheart, all of a sudden, is just lethargic. He lays around all the time. When he looks at you, he wants to get excited to see his tail wag, and he was always the one that would bounce right up. And he never would chase anything. Like our German Shepherd loves to chase frisbees and sticks, but the Australian shepherd would never chase the item. He more like played like a defensive back. All he would do is, when you would throw it, he would try to wipe out like, you know, when the police cruiser goes behind a car that's trying to chase and it like spins

Paul Daly [4:36]

out the back end. That's what he would do. He would just play defensive back and want to make sure the German Shepherd couldn't get the item, which was really frustrating, annoying, but that was par for the course. So it turns out, keeps losing weight. Took him into the vet. They said, You know, you really want to think about what you're going to want to do to help help him pass and help ease his suffering. So, horrible news, terrible news. I. So we decided to have him euthanized at home, and just this past week was the date we tried to put it off. But you know, you have to be kind to the animal, too. And we have four kids, 19 years old, 17 14, and six years old, and we decided to have the vet come to the house. My neighbor, who's a farmer, dug us a little grave, and we picked the spot, and we all said our goodbyes, and we sat and we pet him, and yeah, he just it was time for him to go. So miles, my son, my 19 year old, and I went. Everybody else went inside, and we kind of went back to where the burial site was. And he breathed his last breaths, and we sat there, and he was at peace. And he was very peaceful as a beautiful day out he was laying there, and, you know, we're just petting him. And then when he passed on, we kind of got him in the grave and put a little layer of dirt over and everybody else came out, and we hand shoveled the hole full, and we made little, you know, a little little monument, and start explaining to our six year old, you know, we did it beforehand that he was very sick, and started walking through that as as a family. And those times, you never really know how they're going to hit. And I will say it hit. I expected it hit the girls or my teenage girls, but it also hit my older son and my younger son pretty hard. And you know, in times like that, when you're a parent, you get to teach your children more about things that they will be useful in life when it comes to emotion and dealing with struggle, and how you can come together, and how you can lean on one another, and how it's okay to be upset, how, how it's okay to have disappointment and tragedy and grief, and that's okay to express that you legitimately teach them more in those moments than you ever could on a vacation or in a great moment. And so I really just tried to lean into that. And I'm a pretty task oriented person in general. So when a decision has to be made or decision is made, you know, I'm pretty, pretty resolved to, like, all right, well, it's gonna do step 1 2 3, I made it a point to stop and just and like, be patient and allow things to unfold in the love space for things to unfold in a slower way than I usually would. And I learned a lot about a lot of a lot about my kids and their care for one another, and how they grieve and process. And we're still not I mean, literally, I'm recording this on Friday. This just happened yesterday, and so, you know, it's it was pretty sad. Still is pretty sad. My six year old comes down with a big frown on his face. He goes, Why did Remy have to die? And the things that people go through, not just kids, you really, they shape who we are and how we navigate them, and how we help one another navigate them shape who we will be in the future. Because life is always full of the parallel rails. It's the good things and it's the hard things you can never be immune from both and or from either. And I think the people that try to spend their life avoiding the tough things, or pretending they don't exist, or keeping moving along, I think that's actually what causes more trauma than anything else, because when you're forced to suppress and squash and be somebody that you're not, it creates so much damage emotionally. It doesn't allow us to connect with one another, but most importantly, it doesn't allow us to connect with our own feelings. I grew up in a household where we didn't really express much emotion or much feeling. Was very kind of like duty driven, and I was always it's kind of always the good kid. I just did what I needed to do, and starts to shape your identity in a way where you just move through things. And thankfully, my wife is the opposite. God bless our wives. God bless our spouses, who teach us. And usually, opposites attract is pretty accurate. And so she's really taught me how to

Paul Daly [9:14]

slow down. She's teaching me how to slow down, how to be in touch, how it's okay to feel, how it's okay to sit for a minute and process it. And this is one of those situations where I learned a lot going through it. I'm learning a lot going through it, because we're still not through it, and I'm super grateful for the way we as a family are bonding around the tragedy. And if the tragedy wasn't there, right, we'd be moving along from one thing to the next. We would be, you know, trying to do the next thing, climb the next mountain, get to the next marker, and in the end, you realize there's so much joy to be found in the hard times, because that is where you find out if you have hope and. You have hope in and where we are heading together, and how we can encourage each other in that. And that was, that was kind of my week, and so I felt like that's what I'm going to talk about today, and I'll leave you with this. The reality is, is, how do you get through a hard time. Well, there's principles, but there really is. There's something about hope. And what do you hope the future will be? What is your hope in? Personally, I don't believe my hope isn't anything that is my ability, or my hope is in anything that I can contrive, but I believe God created us for a reason. And I believe God has a plan for our lives. And I believe that one day all of the broken things in this world, including when we lose our pets, including when we lose businesses, including when we lose relationships, including when we lose our health, that one day God will make all these things right, and in that hope, we can move forward with joy. We can move forward with love and compassion for one another, and even when we lose a very close family pet, we can come together in those and say, You know what, we were so grateful and thankful that we have one another, that we have all the other blessings in this life, and we have the hope that one day, all things will be made, right? So thank you so much for listening. Thank you for being here. It's been, it's been a bit of a week, but have so much hope. I'm so excited for the future, and I'm glad that you're a part of this too, because I know if you're listening to this, you're human. These things are going on in your life as well, and I hope that you find hope In all things, that one day they'll be new you.