10 Things I Learned Last Year

Five years ago, I posted a blog titled, "10 Things I Learned Last Year." I had forgotten what a good idea reflection is. January is usually all about resolutions and getting your shit together. But to me, resolutions and getting your shit together don't make any sense if you don't reflect a little first. I'm not talking about anything too deep here, just looking at the lessoned learned so I don't have to waste time relearning them in the new year.

What 10 Things I Learned in 2015:

1. Amazon Prime is the Devil. I love Amazon Prime. I love being able to order absolutely anything and have it shipped to me for free in two days. It's the best invention ever. But Amazon Prime is a blessing and a curse. When everything that you could ever want or need is just a click away--no entering your credit card information or taking a moment to consider if you really need it required--you suddenly find yourself spending a whole lot of damn money.
2. Pod casts are the bomb diggity. Discovering pod casts (this one and this one in particular) has made my life better. I have learned so, so, so much from listening. Listening while I put on makeup. Listening while I scrub toilets. Not to mention they make things that I hate to do, like putting on makeup and scrubbing toilets, much more enjoyable.
3. A little app called Voxer has saved my sanity. One of the hardest things about living in California has been that my closest friends live far away. But thanks to Voxer, we talk every day. I mean it. We talk every damn day. Some days we talk all day long. We are all busy, doing what we do, but we talk while we do it and it has saved me. Saved me from feeling distant and apart and lonely. God bless Voxer.
4. My opinion doesn't matter.  I used to think that I needed to express my opinion on everything. That I needed to correct anyone who I thought had it all wrong. This year I discovered that all of those heavy opinions are simply too much extra weight to be carrying around. It's not my job to fix people, to convince people, to make people think the same way that I think about the world. Someone can have a different opinion than me and that is totally fine. Who cares!
5. Never say never when it comes to a dying pet whom you love. I always said that if my dog ever got something horrible like cancer, I would never spend money on extensive and expensive treatment. And then my dog got sick with a disease that required extensive and expensive treatment and I found myself throwing my credit card at the vet while screaming, "I don't care how much it costs!" Never. Say. Never.
6. Pilates works. I never thought it would happen, but I actually found an exercise routine that I enjoy. Pigs are flying, people. I've been going to pilates for well over a year now but have faithfully been going for the last 4-5 months and I can tell a difference. When I zipped up some of my cute winter boots and my chubby skin didn't catch on the zipper, well, I was one happy lady.
7. You don't have to be some weird, voo-doo yogi priestess to enjoy the benefits of meditation. I really didn't think I'd ever be able to meditate for a variety of reasons. Sit quietly for 20 minutes without thinking of anything? Um, sure. Whatever. But I have discovered not only can I do it, but I actually enjoy doing it. To be blogged more about later...
8. You will never meet new people sitting by yourself at home. I made some new friends in 2015 that I have grown to adore. I met them by saying Yes. Yes, I will volunteer for VBS. Yes, I would love to join your small group. Yes, I will be there. We have always tended to be a family of No. No, we're busy. No, Derek is out of town. No, we can't. But we are learning to be Yes people, and even though it's slightly out of our comfort zone, we are happier for it.
9. My children are more capable of doing things than I think they are. A few months ago, shit got real. I realized that so much of the crap that keeps me busy and makes me crazy can be done by my children. My decision to have children is starting to make sense again.
10. I don't have to pay for things I can do myself. When deciding to redesign my blog, I toyed with the idea of paying someone to professionally do it for me. But then I thought better of it. When I very first started blogging, all the way back in 2005, I was completely self taught in all things blog related, including design. I even learned the very basics of HTML. My blog design is far from perfect. You can find plenty of flaws without looking too hard. But it's mine. All mine. And it's free. Which leaves more money for #1.

The Elf on the Shelf is dead.

It's the second day of December and I know what some of my friends are wondering, where the hell is Ornery? Ornery is our Elf on the Shelf.

Usually by this time Ornery has already made at least two appearances on my social media. You know what I'm talking about. That small stuffed toy that seemed like such a fun idea when you first started setting him out every night and then quickly grows into a huge pain in the butt.

Ornery made his first appearance at our house back in December 2010. He brought them a special LEGO Advent Calendar straight from the North Pole.

Ornery's first appearance, December 2010

We read the book, we named him Ornery, and we anticipated all of the shenanigans that would soon be a regular part of our Christmas season.

For the last five years, Ornery has been quite the character. He has done all kinds of silly things. The first year I wasn't good about taking pictures of all of Ornery's escapades, but by 2011 I was flooding my social media with Ornery updates. With the first Ornery post of the Christmas season, friends and family were replying with messages like, "Yay! He's back!" and "I can't wait to see what kind of trouble Ornery gets into this year." The pressure I felt for Ornery to perform was real even though he wasn't.

My kids loved it. Loved waking up to see where Ornery was each morning. And our elf didn't just move to new locations. No, our elf moved to new locations and created havoc and chaos and fun wherever he was. And I was doing most of this pre-Pinterest, thank you very much. Here are a few of my favorites:

Using Mama's lipstick.

Elf golf.

Hugging on Baby Jesus.

Tape issues wrapping their Advent calendars.

That's a straw in the syrup. Because syrup is everyone's favorite. And For those of you wondering, yes, I misspelled sugar on purpose.

Elf movie love.

This one was a big hit.

Captured by Ugly Dolls.

Elf jokes.

Got into a special breakfast.

Bedlam with Purple Dinosaur.

Stuck trying to make himself a cocktail.

Pooping marshmallows. Side note: peppermints melt when left in the toilet overnight making it look like the elf might need to see a proctologist.

Minecraft elf.

Last year after Thanksgiving my husband asked me, "You aren't doing the whole elf again this year are you?"

What?!? Or course I was going to do the elf! Too many people would be disappointed if I didn't! My oldest had already given me the look that told me that he knew Ornery wasn't real. But his little brother seemed to believe. That was until this past summer when Palmer started to ask questions. Pressing questions about Santa and the elf.

Palmer: Mom, I know that the tooth fairy isn't real and the Easter Bunny isn't real. And leprechauns aren't real either. Santa is, right? But the elf. I really don't think the elf is real.

And I left it at that. I didn't respond. I didn't make a comment. Because even though it was June, I suddenly saw my out. I saw the possibility that I wouldn't have to spend 25 nights coming up with some elaborate elf creation. I wasn't going to ruin the moment by trying to convince him that he still needed to believe.

But how was I going to do it? Was the elf simply not going to show up? Just disappear forever? That didn't seem right. So what does a mom do when you are looking for these kinds of answers? You get on Pinterest. Unfortunately, Pinterest doesn't have anything about saying goodbye to an elf...forever. So I improvised.

Ornery arrived with a special LEGO Advent Calendar, so I decided he would go out the same way he came in. The boys are anxiously awaiting the new Star Wars movie (yes, we already have our tickets) so the LEGO Star Wars Advent Calendar seemed like the thing to do. Ornery has usually arrived with a letter and this year would be no different. I stayed up late writing a letter that I thought tied it all up nicely with a pretty little bow. Or so I thought.

Palmer: So his spirit is gone and his body is here?

Mom: That's right.

Palmer: Like when someone goes to Heaven. Their spirit is gone and there's just a dead body.

Mom: Well...yes...

Palmer: This is just a dead body.

(Bentley smirking the whole time, eye rolling included.)

Mom: He's not dead, he went to another family who needed some Christmas spirit.

Palmer: But his dead body is still here. So now we have a dead body in the house.

The next morning...

Palmer: I wonder what Ornery did!

Mom: Buddy, Ornery went to another family. Remember?

Palmer. Oh yeah. (Disappointed face.) The Fosters.

Mom: The Fosters? No...another foster family.

Palmer: What's a foster family? And who are the Fosters?

Oh good lord. All I wanted was for this damn thing to go away. This was much more involved than I wanted it to be. Now we had dead elf bodies in the house and a whole new discussion about foster families and adoption.

Later that morning as Palmer came down the stairs and passed the boys' Christmas tree...

Palmer: Mom, there's a dead body on the tree.

Mom: Yes, Palmer. Yes there is.

#GoldenBoyBleu

During my grief after losing Major,  I started searching for Golden Retriever breeders online. On the quiet drive home after saying goodbye to Major the first words I spoke to the boys were, "We'll get another Golden someday."

Through Major's illness, I learned a lot about the health of Golden Retrievers and what you wanted to look for when looking for breeders. My thought was that maybe I could find a breeder that was expecting a litter later in the summer. Maybe by then we'd be over our grieving and ready to welcome a new guy into our home.

After hours and hours spent looking, I found a breeder who checked off all of the boxes for all of the things we were looking for. She had an online questionnaire to complete for those interested in a puppy. I quickly filled it out, including the story of everything we had just gone through with Major. Yes, that's right. I was using the heart wrenching story of our dead dog to try to get a puppy.

Before I knew it, there was an email response from the breeder. She had read our application and was touched by our story. They actually just had a litter and had one male puppy left. She was going to keep him for herself, but after hearing our story knew that we would give him the loving home he deserved. He would be turning 8 weeks old the following week and after his next vet visit would be ready to come home with us. Then she attached this picture...

As if I'm going to open this picture and say, "Yeah, no thanks. I think we'll pass."

We took it as a sign. Of course, I immediately felt guilty. Like I was being disloyal to Major. But I also knew that this little guy would help us in our grieving process. Okay...he would help me in my grieving process. Truth is, I had woken up several nights in the middle of the night only to start crying a deep, ugly, it's dark and no one's looking, cry when I realized that Major wasn't in the room with us. Forget about the kids. I was the one who needed this little guy.

We made arrangements to pick him up on a Friday. We didn't tell the boys. We had surprised them with Major on Christmas, so we decided to continue the tradition minus the Christmas part. Driving down to Long Beach, I had butterflies in my stomach. It might have been March, but it felt like Christmas morning to me.

Our new puppy was ready and waiting for us, sitting on his blue blanket from the picture. We met the puppy's Mom and the Dad who weren't sure why we were holding their baby boy. He smelled like puppy shampoo, having just had a bath to meet his new parents. He whined as his mama strained to sniff him and I felt bad for them both. It suddenly seemed terrible that I was taking her baby away from her. She didn't know what a fantastic life this little boy was about to have.

With our puppy care package and new puppy wrapped up in his blue blanket, we pulled away to head home. He sat in my lap and snuggled me the whole way. I cherished the moment, knowing this puppy's time in my lap would be short lived. He looked just like his dad and his dad that weighed 90 pounds. The whole drive we talked about names. We were struggling. We wanted to honor Major in some way, but nothing was sounding right. We wanted to have some choices to give the boys, so they could feel like they were naming him. And also so we didn't end up with a horrible name like Vader or Lego.

By the time we got home, it was time to pick the boys up from school. Derek went to pick them up while I played with the new puppy in the backyard. When they got home, Derek would tell them to head to the backyard.

After the excitement died down and after vetoing the name Oswald (yes, that was one of the suggested names) we quickly decided to name him Bleu. Bleu the Golden. Very UCLA of us, blue and gold being UCLA's colors. But spelling it B-L-U-E was much too traditional for us. The boys thought the spelling B-L-E-U was much cooler. So it was settled. Bleu it was.

Bleu has been everything we needed to help us get over our loss. He is 8 months old now and is not so little any more. It was hard at first not to compare him to Major, but he has his own special personality. He loves swimming in our pool and often comes to the back door sopping wet. He sneaks up on our bed in the middle of the night and slowly snuggles up to us like a furry toddler. He loves to eat ice just like Major did, but doesn't carry around stuffed animals in his mouth like his big brother which actually makes me sad. Other than ripping out a patch of wool from my living room rug and eventually ripping holes in Purple Dinosaur, he has been a very good boy. 

This puppy's love has healed our hearts. We hope and pray he gets to live the long, healthy life that Major missed out on.

Goodbye Purple Dinosaur

Our #GoodBoyMajor with his beloved Purple Dinosaur

Purple Dinosaur is in pieces. Bleu and Bevie, our two puppies, had their way with him and now we must say goodbye. I know that he is just a stuffed dog toy, but having to put him in the trash was heartbreaking. Those of you who are my friends on social media, you have seen lots of pictures in the past of our sweet boy, Major, with his much loved Purple Dinosaur. Last March, after a long illness, we had to make the horrible decision to put him down.

I realize that some of you might still wonder what happened and how he got sick. There were times while it was happening that I considered blogging about the whole thing. I wasn't writing much of anything at the time. Emotionally I was too all over the place and my worry and concern for Major had zapped most of my creative juices.

It was a rough 8 months that started with a simple limp. Major had been limping for a couple of weeks and it only seemed to be getting worse. We headed to our vet who then referred us to a specialty vet. Little did we know we would get to know all of the doctors in multiple departments at Animal Speciality Group (ASG) very, very well.

First diagnosis was bilateral hip dysplasia and cranial cruciate ligament tears (like an ACL tear in humans.) Both are common in Goldens and for Major his issues were with both of his hind legs. Surgery would be required. Multiple surgeries. We debated and worried. These surgeries would cost a small fortune. But Major was only 2 years old and these kind of issues were common and very fixable. The CCL issue was worse than the hip dysplasia, so we opted to go with that first. His first surgery was set for the end of August.

Surgery went well. I knew that the recovery of a 80 pound Golden Retriever wouldn't be easy, especially since once he recovered from the first it would be followed by a second. His recovery seemed to be going slow, but surely that was normal.

Then one Sunday night while we were eating dinner, I glanced over at Major laying on the living room rug. I noticed a big black spot on the carpet near his nose. I got up to check it out and sure enough, his nose was bleeding. I've owned dogs my entire life and this was a definite first. We couldn't get the bleeding to stop, so at 10PM I decided to head over to the 24 hour emergency vet.

Long story short, they couldn't find anything wrong. They shot a steroid up his nose to stop the bleeding and told us to come back if it started again. Went home somewhat relieved.

Two days later he was bleeding again. This time it was coming out of the other end. I panicked, not sure what was happening but knowing whatever it was, it wasn't good.

Long story even longer, we ended up back at ASG. Major was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease called Immune-mediated Thrombocytopedia (ITP). Basically, his immune system was attacking his platelets. If it isn't caught in time, dogs can bleed to death. Hopefully we had caught his in time. No one knows what causes ITP. It's just something that...happens. It had no relation to his knee and hip issues, by the way.

We battled his disease for months, traveling to ASG in Glendale (a 30 minute drive in L.A. without traffic, which of course in L.A. never happens) every other week for blood work and medication. It was getting extremely expensive and emotionally exhausting. At any minute, he could relapse and start to bleed again. And don't forget, we still had the hip and knee issues, but know with having an autoimmune disease he would never be able to have surgery. At least not easily. And we also discovered that the spot in his knee, where he had surgery, had not only developed an infection but the screw was actually in the wrong place. The whole thing was becoming a huge veterinary cluster you-know-what.

Side note: His surgery was not done at ASG, by the way. We opted for a cheaper surgeon, clearly a huge mistake on our part. A mistake that still hurts my heart to think about.

We were on such a daily up and down with his health. I had grown abnormally attached to this dog and his illness had only made that bond stronger. I was the one at every vet appointment. I was the only one who knew exactly what medications he needed and when. I have personally never fought a major illness, but I felt the responsibility to do all of the fighting for him. I was going to do whatever was needed to keep him alive so I spent a good amount of time researching online, trying to learn all I could about ITP. Really what I was searching for was hope.

Dogs can live a long life with ITP, but there would always be issues of one kind or another. We loved Major so much we would do anything for him and obviously we were. But there comes a time when you have to consider quality of life for everyone involved. And Major's quality of life and his future didn't look happy or healthy. He had a lot of different issues. I mean, a lot. Physically he was a total mess. It's hard on any dog to have hip dysplasia. Hip dysplasia and CCL is really rough. Hip dysplasia, CCL and ITP? Forget it. But like any Golden, you'd never know it. We had to ask ourselves the hard question if we were fighting to keep him alive for his sake or for ours.

He was only getting worse. He had aged so much and the illness was wearing on him. He was miserable even though he would never, ever let you know it. After much discussion and tears and heartache, we decided to say goodbye.

We all went to ASG to say our goodbyes. He was on some good pain meds that made him pretty loopy which actually made it better on all of us. If he had been his happy Golden self, I'm not sure we could've made it though the whole thing. We took our time loving on him. Bentley wanted to take pictures with him. Palmer wanted us to all hold hands so he could say a prayer. Then Derek and the boys left the room and I stayed with my Major until it was all over. It was horrible and gut wrenching and so incredibly peaceful. And that is all I'm going to say about that.

But that's not the end of the story.

To be continued...

Post Script: I have to take a minute and mention how wonderful the entire staff at ASG was during our 8 months there. Even though it wasn't the outcome we had hoped for, I will always be grateful to them. They loved Major almost as much as we did and it showed. They were professional and loving and took the time both on the phone and in person to answer all of questions and concerns. And after it was all over, through my tears I smiled and said, "I mean this in the best way possible, but I hope I never have to see you guys again." They laughed and hugged us goodbye one last time.