I miss saying things I used to say to Max. I used to say these things daily for 9 years and now I don't. It's strange. I still talk to Maxie and tell him how much I love and miss him, but I can't say things like "Mommy's gonna get the baby!". He always knew this was cue for us to play and chase around the house. He would get down in his play stance and we would have a great time until one of us was worn out (usually me). Max had a favorite stuffed banana that he loved so much to play with. I would say "go get the nana!" and he would run and grab it and start shaking it all over the place. I can still talk to him, but I can't say THESE things anymore. "Mommy rub the baby's belly?".
Today has been 3 months. How I wish I could look into his beautiful eyes and talk to him and he would tilt his head like he was really listening to me. I miss snuggling my face into his warm fur. I want to hold him again so badly. I talked to him constantly. He was just so cute. Even doing a simple thing like him taking a drink of water and running over to me with his face all cold and wet and dripping, I would say "Maxie took a drink!" I can't say these things anymore.

Carol

My babies' favourite words:
"Do you want to play?"
"Time to go to work" (she'd come with me)
"Where is your birthday ball" (her favourite)

Dang. I miss her.

Dear Carol,

Your Max was just adorable. I'm so sorry for your loss.

Just the other day I was thinking about phrases I use to say to my Shiloh (it will be 9 weeks tomorrow that she's been gone). How I miss asking her where her baby is, or if she'd like a chew chew, or if she saw the cow cow, and our all time favorite...ummm, Shiloh, I was, uh, wondering...WOULD YOU LIKE TO GO FOR A WALK!!??

I know you must miss your Maxie...I sure miss my Shiloh.

Take care,
Kathleen

I know exactly what you mean. Tomorrow it will be 13 weeks since my Zoe passed and I miss her dearly.
They are all so special in their own way.
She always cuddled with me at night, sleepinig with her head on my shoulder.
She loved jumping and catching the foam disks shot from her "millenium falcon".

I'm so sorry for your loss, and am continually amazed at how hard this all is, even as life goes on.

Moose's was " shall we go" "where is your bear" "frisbee?"" and his favorite morning ritual of snuggling next to me and we sang "GOOD MORNING" I'm kind of chuckling to myself thinking of the way we talk to our furbabies. no wonder we miss them so. Pamela

Hi Carol,

I certainly know what you mean!
It's been 7 weeks now since I lost my sweet Rachael. I miss saying "Where's your ball?" She would get SO excited! I even taught her that in Spanish and she knew exactly what I was saying. I tried to teach my Rachael many things and teaching her commands in spanish became a favorite for both of us. No, I'm not Spanish, but I did learn some of the language from visiting Spain. She knew "Where's your ball?", "Want to go for a ride", "Sit", "Speak" and "Shake" in spanish and english. I taught her right paw and left paw for the shake command. She was SO smart!

Another "sound" I miss teasing her with, was to make a "buzz" sound. When she was a puppy she was stung on the nose by a bee. Poor girl, her whole snout area was swollen. Ever since that, she hated it when she heard an insect "buzzing" around her. If my husband or I made a buzz sound, she would leap up and bark at us.

Oh, there are so many other things I miss saying to her.
I even miss all the cute little pet names we called her. I am very careful to not call our Danny boy those names or slip and say them in front of him. I'm afraid he will start looking for Rachael again!

My gosh, I miss her SO, SO much!!!

Cheri

Carol,

I know what you mean it was three months in the 16th. I miss that too ... but what I miss the most is his smell. You know when your face is against his that unique smell each animal has. I miss that.

Stymy's Mom Vic

I can so relate to this too! It was five months ago yesterday that I lost Buster....now I find myself saying all of
the things I used to say to Buster I'm now saying to Max my other kitty. Max just doesn't react the same
way to the same things Buster did, but I think he's learning,lol! When you say the same things for 15 years it's
something you really miss when they are gone....Buster's fav's were, "wanna go bye-byes?", "want some cheese?",
"go get the bug!", and of course the best one "give momma some love" and he would give me a head bump..gosh,
there are soooo many different sayings!

Karen

I know what you all mean. I just keep hearing in my mind (and I scream it outloud at my worst of time) -- HAN NAH! HAN NAH! WHERE ARE YOU HAN NAH!!! God, this is just so sad for all of us. It just seems so cruel that we can hurt so very much! We all feel so much the same, think the same thoughts. It's unreal.

I know what you mean...I used to brush Kasha once a week (long hair...she HATED it) and when we were done I would say "Look at my beautiful girl!" and Kash would puff out her chest and prance around so I could admire her. When Dan came home from work on a "brushing day" she would glide into the kitchen as pretty as can be and would sit at his feet looking for more adoration. She wouldn't leave his side until he got down on his knees and told her she looked beautiful. Queen of the castle she was......

Also Kasha had very keen "tuna sense". She could tell the difference between a can of pasta sauce and a can of tuna being opened from rooms away. Every time I made anything with tuna Kasha was at my side the moment the blade pierced the can and she always got a little taste. The other night I made a tuna casserole and no one noticed when I opened the tuna....it was the first can of tuna opened in my home without a cat winding at my feet in 15 years.

It's the little things that keep comming back...I miss my girl.

Kristie

Ava had a lot of nick names... If someone asked what my dogs name was, I would always tell them 'Ava' but I rarely called her this myself. I usually referred to her simply as 'Dog'.

I used to call her 'verdammter hund' (German for damned dog). A friend of mine had spent many years in Germany (military brat) so he was fluent in german and I had always wanted to learn enough German that all her commands would be in german but that never happened. Of course the stuff my friend taught me to say in german would probably get me beat up or arrested if I tried using it in Germany (all the swear words of course) so I used some of them as nick names as well.

I had all sorts of nick names for her, silly dog, stupid dog, muttley, doggest etc. Some of them sound mean when I write them down but if you ever heard me cooing them to her, there was no malice in the words... just love and affection despite what the names/words meant. She'd always wag her tail and put her ears down like german shepherds do when they are being pet and adored. And of course the silly songs that I would make up the words to, based on some tune.

"Go for a ride" would always get her excited and she'd hop about and bark/whimper in anticipation.
"Go in the house" always meant that it was time to come into the house for visit times and again she would bark and jump up and down at the prospect.
'What's this?" she knew she was in trouble for something but it was usually new excavations in her open pit mines that I'd be upset about. She would skulk off to her dog house at that point.

The sounds of my recliner makes when I get out of it was always a trigger to Ava about something... she would usually get up from where she was lying and shake (dog tags jingling) and would head for the back door... either it was time to eat and her bowl was by the back door or it was time to go back outside. I still expect to hear her getting up and the jingling of the tags when she would shake when ever I get out of my chair.

Yes, I still miss her emensely and probably always will. I've been pretty good lately about not crying but just writing this has brought tears to my eyes again.

WOW! I never expected to get sooo many replies about missing words. We are all facing the exact same things. It was so nice to hear what everyone else said to their furbabies. I find myself saying some things to my husband that I used to say to Max. He had to have surgery and wasn't eating well after that. He eats now, and when I get to the hospital and I check his dinner plate, I find myself saying "Oh good boy! You ate all your lunch!" I guess old habits are hard to break!

Thank you Steph, Kathleen, Sharon, Pamela, Cheri, Vic, Karen, Marcia, Kristie and Gort for sharing your special phrases that you have said. They all made me smile because I could just picture how excited our babies where to hear the things we said.

Also, Gort, you reminded me about the tag noise. I still have Maxie's collar with the tags on it and sometimes I go and jingle them because I used to love hearing them all the time.

Thank you everyone. You are all so special to me.
Carol

bwhahahahaa, Carol, what does your husband do when you say that to him? That is too funny!!

I used to say to my Jake "you're such a good boy, yesshuuuare!" and then in the past year I had started saying "you've been a good boy all your life", which, while it is totally true, had I known the end was coming so soon I wouldn't have been saying that.

I'd also walk by him and say "doodle" and he'd snap his head around to look at me; same with "bug!" -- those were his two other names. I'd get right in his ear and say "getcha kisses" and then kiss the inside of his ear, because he didn't know how to *give* kisses, he just never got the hang of it, so I would give him one instead.

It's good to remember these things; nice topic carol