I just woke up from a dream of you....we were at a small village with houses close together lining a stream and across the stream theree was a field and blue sky with puffy clouds. You were there curling around my feet... and jumped into my lap. We were alone but so happy. I'd forgotten that you used to curl around my feet when you were young. Is this the place you are now?....I've dreamed of that place before but I dont remember you there....but you are now...

I found pictures of you when you were about 12 years old....you looked so healthy and happy. Even the pictures of you a few years ago you still looked healthy. Thank you baby for staying with me as long as you could, and I'm sorry for your pain. If I had taken better care of you maybe we would have had more time together in this life.

I know you want me to remember you as in those younger pictures but the memory of how you felt in your last days is prescious to me and I dont want to let that go. I dont want to lose the vividness of how you felt to pick up and stroke and hold against my chest.... your little paws resting on my forearm.

Huggies, Huggies, Huggies my baby....

I love you .... daddy

I am sorry you are hurting so....but please know there was no way you could have taken better care of Pepe....you did everything you could and gave him such a good long good life.

Yes, I too have been looking at pictures of Cleo when we was younger and healthy. It was shocking to see how much weight he had lost at the end. I take comfort in the 18 yrs we did have together. His body just gave out. His spirit lives in my heart. And, allows me to reach out to a new furbaby.

You're both more courageous than I am - I can't even think of looking at pictures of my lost furkids, and I have no photos of
Groucho anyway, which ,when I think of it, hurts very much. I know that eventually I'll have the courage to face those photos, but not yet.

The dreams are always something which bring me comfort. I dream, or see in my dreams, most of my furry ones, the live ones, and the ones who've left. They've taken up so much of my life (the live ones) that I can't even go on the family vacation to Williamsburg this next week - I just don't want to leave any of them, including the bunnies, for that long. Sometimes the dreams are bittersweet, but more often I feel closer to the pets who've left when I wake up. I personally think the mind recognizes these traumatic events and tries to help us make sense of them. Whatever, I welcome the dreams and signs - they are sometimes the only optimistic events in my life.

I also believe that you, Pepe's Dad, couldn't have taken better care of Pepe, and there's not a doubt in my mind, even if there may be in yours, that you kept him going as long as he did. Please don't blame yourself, it's a vicious cycle, and one which only spirals you down. Pepe was a blessing to you, but you were an amazing blessing to him too. Considering the cruelty and coldness and violence in this world, you were just what Pepe needed, and you needed him too. If that's not a form of heroism, I don't know what is. Take care - Barbara