Miss You, Cody Bear!

Hi.

I’m not going to lie, folks, this one is a hard one to write.

On Thursday May 12, 2016 at 10:55am our Cody, our beloved Golden Retriever / Yellow Lab, our kid-before-kids, checked in peacefully to the Doggie Resort in the Sky. After battling an aggressive Lymphoma since last August, the day was inevitable.

Lisa and I both took time writing some thoughts for this post and both sets are below (Lisa's is blue, mine is green),  plus some pics and a slideshow. Take whatever time you have to read, view, and reflect. We just wanted to capture and share a small percentage of this amazing dog with you. 

**Lisa's Post**

I always hoped Cody would live to be an old dog.  People say that for a big dog, 9 years was pretty good, and maybe it was, but if it weren’t for the lymphoma, I feel like he would have had several more good years left.  Reality is, it’s hard to say good-bye, no matter when you have to do it.  Of course I knew it was inevitable, but I always pushed it to the back of my mind.  It never seemed like we would be faced with this any time soon, until his diagnosis in August.  That’s when it became real.  That’s when I realized in the midst of all the craziness of raising two little kids, we had no choice but to slow down and take in each moment with him since we had no idea how much longer he’d be with us.

It was at that time when I started reflecting on Cody and the influence that he and Bailey have had on my life.  Even though we got them both on the same day (the day after we moved into our new house, I might add!), he was the one we were going to get first (before we realized there was a two for one deal).  He really was my first dog.  Ever.  That’s why I credit him with making me a dog person.  And for that I am forever grateful.  Before we got the boys, I liked dogs, but I never knew what it was to love a dog.  Cody forever left his print on my heart and brought out a whole different part of me that I didn’t even know was there.  It sounds cheesy, but it’s true.

I knew we would eventually own a dog, it was part of the deal, but I never realized I would become so attached.  I’m not even really sure when it happened.  I have a hard time believing that it was in the first year, when they ate holes in the walls and devoured the entire back seat of Bret’s jeep.  I distinctly recall telling Bret that dogs were SO much more work than kids would be.  He laughed and my response was, “Let’s see if our kids ever eat a hole in the wall!”  For the record, I’d prefer to leave that conversation behind me.  Even with all the destruction, I quickly grew accustomed to coming home from work and seeing them jumping up and down with excitement.  I will miss seeing Cody jump in full 360’s as he waited to be let inside, once he learned that jumping on the sliding glass door was not allowed.

Now I look back on those early years and I can’t believe what we did.  We had squirt bottles in every room and dog beds (two huge dog beds) at each end of the house.  The boys weren’t allowed to roam freely in the house.  They had to sit on their beds until given permission to walk to a different dog bed.  Bret would raise a squirt bottle and point it towards them and sternly say, “On your bed!” if either one tried to get up.  I knew nothing different, so I thought this was normal dog training behavior. On our walks, Cody always pulled the leash slightly.  Bret would coach me on how to get him to heel.  He told me to growl at him if I couldn’t speak sternly enough.  I tried.  Really hard.  I got better, but I’m still not a great dog growler.  Yet somehow, they still knew how I fit in and appreciated that we were all part of the same pack.  I’m guessing it wasn’t coincidence that they were two of the most well behaved dogs I’ve ever met.  Bret must have known what he was doing.

My relationship with Cody was different than Bret’s.  I was rarely seen lying on the floor, pressed up against him, wearing all black, and covered from head to toe in dog hair.  Up until the end, in fact, we still played the same game every morning.  The object was for me to maneuver through the house without allowing a dog to brush against my pant legs.  Their objective was to be as close as possible to directly underfoot, following me around from the moment I opened the bathroom door until I put them outside with their treat.  Needless to say, they always won.  What did people do before lint rollers?  I would be lying if I said I got used to the dog hair.  I complained about it more than I’d care to admit, but I love the fact that when our kids drop food on the floor, the first thing they ask is, “Does it have dog hair on it?”  And anytime I say that someone is coming over, they run out to the garage and grab the dust buster, “We’d better clean the dog hair!”  I wouldn’t trade a single tumbleweed for all the years we had with him, and dog hair aside, Cody and I still had a special closeness. 

Any time I was sad or emotional about anything, Cody was so concerned and right there to comfort me.  If one of us was sick, Cody would sit right by the couch or the bed or the bathroom door.  He just wanted to be there.  Bret nicknamed him Nurse Cody.  The dogs never slept in our bed (to my knowledge, except for maybe when Vanessa dog sat).  Cody always slept right by Bret’s side and Bret would reach down and pet him throughout the night.  There was one night in his last week where he was sitting up panting.  I knew if Bret hadn’t been away on business travel he would have had one hand on him the whole night.  I lifted him up and put him in Bret’s spot on our bed.  I slept with one hand on his back.

Some of my favorite memories with Cody were when I was nursing.  He would follow me to any room and rest his chin on my foot as I fed the baby.  I always knew he was there, even when my hands were too full to pet him.  In the last year or so, if I stayed up late, he would wait for me before going to bed.  Bret would call him to bed, but he wouldn’t go until I went. 

This behavior fit his sweet and loving nature.  We always called him the sweet one, and for the most part, he was.  In fact, between his long beautiful hair and his sweet face, strangers always thought he was a girl.  He was as loving as they come, however, I’ll never forget the time when I started to leave the house, but got distracted and hadn’t actually left.  I looked up through the back window and saw Cody outside of the dog run, romping through our yard, which is off limits.  He looked at me, I glared at him, and ran towards him, yelling at him to get back in his yard.  He headed in that direction, but at a much more leisurely pace than I would have expected from a good dog.  Then he stopped, and lifted his leg, while looking at me with the goofiest expression before proceeding back to the side yard.  I couldn’t believe it.  That’s when we realized he could jump 4-foot fences.  It’s also when it occurred to me that although he appeared innocent, he likely did more than his share when it came to eating walls and seats and digging holes.

The thing about Cody was that he wanted to be a good dog, but he just didn’t always know how.  His intentions were good.  He wanted to please, and he loved nothing more than his pets from Bret, every night, telling him what a good boy he was.  It was his absolute favorite.  I will never forget the strength that Bret had as he stroked Cody’s face and told him he was a good boy during his final breaths.  As hard as it was for all of us, he maintained such positivity in his voice and made sure Cody knew that he could rest in peace and we were all going to be okay.  I have never seen Bret have more confidence in anything than in raising a dog.  I was the one reading books, trying to figure out how to do it right, and for Bret it just came naturally.  He senses every dog’s energy and emotions and knows exactly how to respond. I truly believe that it was Cody who helped him realize that it was this same sense that would help him become an amazing father.  Cody gave him the confidence to enter that next chapter in life.  Cody really was our first ‘kid’.  He came into our lives and helped prepare us for what was to come.

It makes me sad to think about the fact that our kids may be too young to remember Cody.  I want them to recall how much love they felt for him and how sweet he was with them.  I’m so thankful for all the years we shared with him, for the fun adventures we went on before the kids were born, and for the everyday home life we had as a family with the kids and dogs together.  I know we gave Cody a good home with loving family and more off-leash experiences than most CA doggies get.  I hope he knows that he gave us more love and memories than I’d ever thought possible.

It’s crazy that just in the last ten days I’ve already noticed Bailey becoming more loving and affectionate.  There’s always been a gradual transition, with him displaying less independence over the years, but the change in the last few days has been drastic.  It’s like he’s embodying both personalities now.  He misses Cody probably more than any of us can understand.  And I’m sure Cody misses him, too.  Brothers forever.  We will take good care of him until they meet again.

**Bret's Post**

Cody's passing is one of the most painful moments of my life. However, there are so many things that make it more bearable for me.

First, is a story – no, I sincerely believe it to be a sign. A thread in my life that began in 2001 when we had to put my boyhood dog, Mandy, to rest after 17 years. On the way to the vet, we listened to the popular-of-the-time U2 album. “Beautiful Day” was the last song played before we made that long 20 foot walk into the clinic. In October, the same fate came of my parent’s 14-year-old Beau. On that drive too, I made sure “Beautiful Day” was the last song, finishing the final chords in the parking lot. 

With Cody, we spent most of the morning laying in the backyard on the cool pavers, just under the prolific Bon Bob Calendulas in our planter, passing the time doing his favorite activity: giving him & brother Bailey pets. Cody still (barely) had enough energy to walk – a second favorite pastime – and with the vet just a few hundred feet away, we decided to take the slow stroll over. Lisa and I took him and Bailey down the street as a foursome for the last time. It was a pleasant temperature, short-sleeves without being hot or needing a jacket. The sun poked through the clouds and promised even more warmth later. The neighborhood was quiet and peaceful. Besides the grim destination, it was perfect. 

We’d allowed 30 minutes, though made it in half of that. Early, Lisa volunteered to go in to take care of the payment / paperwork while I sat on a bench and pet “our boys.” This is the moment that I’ll never forget: I had a hand on each of the dogs, scratching the soft fur of their ears. Cody managed to give me his signature nose down / eyes up look (translation: more pets, please). Again, I was reminded how much I love the dog and how he deserved this amazing weather for a sendoff – the only thing that detracted from the experience was the beat-up black pickup waiting outside the laundromat, windows down and blasting it’s radio so loud that…

And I broke down into a blubbering mess.

The song. I recognized the song.

“Beautiful Day”

I hadn’t even thought about the song in this whole experience. And yet it was perfect. And right. And a sign. It was time. 

We listened to the rest of it. A strange warm calmness engulfed me.  And as the DJ came on and the person turned off the beater truck, the three of us walked into the vet.

The next thing that helped me through all of this, is all the great care he received at SAGE Vet. Without them, this blog post would’ve happened last autumn. Between then and now, Cody had 97% good & normal days. We got to spend time with him doing the fun things: two road trips to Doggie Mountain Resort (aka my parents’ house in New Mexico), several times at Fort Funston, Camping at Arroyo Seco. And also the smaller things, pets at night while watching TV or reading, extra long walks, and just a general appreciation of this wonderful creature still in our lives. That time will be precious in my memories. An era of focus and love bubbling to the surface of an otherwise busy period filled with many other hard spots (deaths of GG, Uncle Steve, and Beau).

Also, I keep remembering all of the great things about Cody. Again, both big and small.

•  Our countless trips to New Mexico to romp in the forest or the snow. Pre-kids with Lisa and post-kids just me, my dogs, and 17 hours (each way) of open road. How it was the one time I let them sleep in bed with me.

•  The backpacking trips, off-leash in the desolation wilderness of Tahoe area.

•  Cody nearly flying, at full stretch and ears flapping, into the water of Lake Powell chasing a tennis ball.

• Also, the first time we went to the lake, we ended up each taking a dog to sleep with in different parts of the boat (not sure why it happened that way, but it did). Cody and I were paired and I don’t think he slept a wink. We were nose-to-nose and I think I woke every hour to find him quietly staring at me – like he was so excited to be sleeping next to his person that he didn’t want to miss a nanosecond.

•   How the “red devils” ate a hole in the dry wall of the dog room and demolished the backseat of my jeep in the first year.

• Cody picked my side of the bed to sleep next to. At first, we tried to get them to switch it up, but Cody kept coming back to be next to me. In the middle of the night, when I’d get up for the restroom or to help a kiddo, I’d often sneak a pet to Cody.

• How his tail would do a full 360, dubbed the helicopter tail, when we’d get home or pick up his bowl for a meal.

• When he wanted inside, sometimes he’d press his lips against the glass of the sliding door and let his lips pull up, making him look like some cute Cujo with a helicopter tail.

• He was a master of the nose down/eyes up look. And he’d use it with no abandon. If you failed to pet, it’d escalate to him nose-bumping your arm or hand – just to add extra clarification.

•  I have objective evidence that Cody was the sweetest dog of all time. My mom, who’s always been unabashedly biased to their dogs, Belle & Beau, declared Cody absolutely the sweetest. No arguments from me.

• There is NOTHING more sacred to me than seeing my kids hugging and petting the dogs. Literally, I can’t describe it in words. And to see it daily has made me…I dunno…it’s perfect and amazing.

• His favorite food was carrot sticks and he could hear the vegetable drawer in the refrigerator opening from the deepest slumber & across the entire house…with kids loudly playing.

• I loved his hair. The reddish brown locks were so unique, soft, and just beautiful. And it shed everywhere. All of the time. I figured it was the price to pay for having such a handsome dog.

• Every night, no matter what, I’d snuggle with him on his bed before climbing into my own. I’d give him his good night pets, constantly telling him that he was a good boy and that we loved him so much. I did the same when they were injecting him with that final sedative. I steeled myself against the pain and made sure the last thing he heard before his big sleep was “You’re a good boy. We love you so much.”

Ok, I have to stop there (and there are so so so many other things). Otherwise, all these things that have fueled my strength are going to make me Ugly-Cry at my keyboard.

We’re doing ok. We’re still trying to get Bailey used to being an only dog (for now). He’s fine when he’s with us, but we’re constantly worried about him when he’s alone. Cody wasn’t a loud dog at all, though the house feels quiet. Or maybe it’s like he’s in the next room or out in the dog run. And walks while only holding one leash makes me feel naked. And the kids are learning how to share the role of feeding Bailey (one gets to hold the bowl on the way TO the dog food, the other returns it full) versus each getting their own.

We’re adjusting to this new chapter of life. And while Cody might be missing in some ways, his paw prints have shaped the story that it’s impossible for him to be truly gone – always there to remind me that each day is a “Beautiful Day.”