Facing Death and Loss

Remember

Remember me when I am gone away,

Gone far away into the silent land;

When you can no more hold me by the hand,

Nor I half turn to go, yet turning stay.

Remember me when no more day by day

You tell me of our future that you plann’d:

Only remember me; you understand

It will be late to counsel then or pray.

Yet if you should forget me for a while

And afterwards remember, do not grieve:

For if the darkness and corruption leave

A vestige of the thoughts that once I had,

Better by far you should forget and smile

Than that you should remember and be sad.

From: Goblin Market, The Prince’s Progress and Other Poems. 

Christina Rosetti. London: Macmillan 1879.

      Today is a day of grief in our house -- last night Xander cried himself to sleep as indeed he did the night before. Halloween was a bust. He, his father and brother had gone out trick or treating and had been gone only the briefest time when suddenly he burst through the door, crying hysterically. I was startled, stunned, unable to understand what could have happened that could've set him off. Between sobs, he told me. 

            "They are putting Riley down on Friday. They are KILLING him!" and he burst into tears again, inconsolable.  

             Riley, an older dog, and one of the three dogs that make up the neighborhood 'Wolf Pack' as my sons call it, together with our doberman and Riley's sister, Sadie, had bone cancer. His people had tried everything to save him. They had looked into amputating the leg, into chemotherapy but were told that neither operation was feasible. They held onto him for months, unable and unwilling to surrender their sweetly smiling, amiable friend. It was clear that he was slowing down. He limped and slept a lot but his smiles never wavered and he was always delighted to be petted and talked to. But something happened... perhaps it became too difficult for him to get up. I do not know. But finally his people made the hard decision to let Riley go... and now his friends, among them my eight year old son, must come to the same place.

           How do you help someone through grief? I have no good answers. Every person's pain is his or her own, unique. How they express it, how they handle it depends entirely on them. For myself... I have lost many animal friends over the years as well as people whom I loved and I have never found it easier to handle. And the pain, it never actually goes away. There are times, moments when the pain will come back fresh and sharp as the first moment. So I cannot tell my child that it will be 'alright', that it will 'get better'. All I can do is hold him and cuddle him and tell him that I will miss Riley too. I can cry with him and tell him that it is okay to cry. And when he is ready, we can talk about what, if anything, he wants to do in honor of his friend.

________________________

Rest In Peace, Riley Sweet Face. You are missed.