Saying Goodbye to a Beloved Friend

I knew this day was coming. In fact, I’ve known this day was coming for at least eight months. This afternoon, we had to euthanise our beloved pure bred female black Labrador Retriever, Alex. (Kennel Name Alexandria Lexxus).

Our dog Alex suns herself of a warm day.

Alexandria Lexxus was the best dog I’ve ever had. Period.

She had cancer. The reality is, she was otherwise healthy. Her hips were good, she was as playful as ever, she was still the same goofball today as she was when we adopted her as a two-year-old pup in March of 1998. Unfortunately, the cancer caused too many complications that there wasn’t anything else we could do. It’s not without trying though.

About 18 months ago, she had a mastectomy to remove the cancer from her breast. We knew the Doctor might not be able to get all the cancer out. When another tumor appeared about eight or nine months ago, we knew that was the beginning of the end. About eight weeks ago that tumor broke the skin on her stomach and began weeping. Four weeks later when she couldn’t keep her food down we knew the end was near. I’ve always called her “Daddy’s girl.” Now Daddy’s girl was sick and we couldn’t do anything to help her.

While I knew I’d feel sad, I also feel somewhat guilty. There are some things I wish we would have done with her. In some ways I feel like we “wasted” a great dog.

The Blood of a Champion

Our last picture of Alex. October 12, 2008

She had great bloodlines. Both her father and mother were Field Champions. They had great hunting instincts and the love of the outdoors. Her parents were the best of the best. Regret number one is that we never pursued additional training to get Alex to that same point. Heck, I thought about taking up hunting just so Alex could be a “normal” field dog.

The cool thing was, you could see the instincts she had for the outdoors. She loved traipsing through the brush. She loved going to my parents lake home and spending the afternoon retrieving whatever was thrown in the water. Give her a tennis ball and someone to throw it, and you’d never find a happier dog.

In Her Element

Alex loved living in the country. So many smells to smell, so many animals to chase, to much land to cover. She was definitely living the dream. It’s easy to say that she made the transition from city life to country life much easier than I did!

Regret number two is that we never had her bred. Because she was AKC registered and had the bloodlines she did, her pups would have been the best of the best and in demand. Her chances of getting cancer would have greatly decreased as well.

We had good intentions of breeding her. In fact, we told the couple we adopted her from that was the plan. We even looked into it in 1999. Once my wife got pregnant, and subsequently gave birth to our oldest son, it would have been very difficult to make it work. Add to this the fact that we started construction of our new home at the time, and at that point breeding Alex became a missed opportunity. We always wanted another pure bred lab pup. Having one of Alex’s pups would have been a treat.

Alex shows her kindness to our newborn son number one. (2000)

Son number one get some snuggle time in with Alex (2005)

Alex gets attention from son number three (October, 2008)

Every safe dog needs a bike helmet. October, 2008

A Boy and His Dog

I feel most sad for my oldest son. He’s grown up and had Alex as “his” dog for almost nine years. As he’s grown, so have his responsibilities in caring for the dogs. It was easy to see how much he loved Alex that it was common to see him laying on her while he’s reading a book or watching a movie. A couple of times in the past weeks we’ve let the kids camp out on the living room floor so they could sleep with the dogs. We wanted to make sure that all three boys have good memories of her.

Kirby asks, You talking to me?

Alex was also a great traveler. Whenever we took the three-hour drive to my parents home, she always got excited because she knew we were going to the lake. We even took the dogs on a couple of longer vacations. While our lovable mutt Kirby is always a bit uncomfortable in a new place, Alex would take a few sniffs around and feel right at home.

A few days ago I called the family that we had adopted Alex and Kirby from. She was sad to know that we had to put her down, but very happy to know that Alex had been a great dog all these years.

Happy Times

The boys and I played ball with Alex recently and as usual she was running around like a little puppy. She even played fetch this afternoon like nothing was wrong. To the end she was still that playful little pup with that lovable cock of the head. She didn’t know she was sick and that’s what makes it hard.

It’s true that dogs often become part of the family, just as Alex was a very large part of ours.

I will miss her very much.