It started last week Friday night with our dog, Zoey, getting sick in the middle of the night. Her sickness continued all weekend and we got more and more worried about her.

Sunday and Monday we had a major snow storm. Schools were closed, but the college I work for wasn’t, so I took Buddy and Buster to daycare and made my way into work. The roads continued to deteriorate because the temperature dropped to something like 9 degrees and everything froze. On my way to my truck at the end of the day, I fell on the concrete steps in the stairwell, hurting myself. Nothing was broken, but I was very sore.

At that same time, Jdaddy had Zoey at the vet and we were learning that she had pneumonia and another condition, megaesophagus, which caused her pneumonia. She was sick, but everyone was hopeful that the antibiotics would get the pneumonia under control and then we could try and figure out why she had sudden onset megaesophagus.

I stayed home from work on Tuesday, mostly because I was so sore. I had a softball sized (which is now about twice the size) bruise on the back of my right thigh that hurt like Hell when I would sit down and I knew sitting at my desk would be uncomfortable. I also stayed home to keep an eye on Zoey, and Buddy had another day off school, so he stayed home with me.

By Tuesday night, it was evident that Zoey needed to go back to the vet.

I went to work on Wednesday and my father-in-law picked Zoey up and took her to the vet. She was severely dehydrated and her pneumonia wasn’t any better, even with her taking antibiotics, so they hooked her up to an IV and pushed fluids and antibiotics.

On Thursday, Zoey wasn’t any better, but the vet assured me that she wasn’t, at that time, suffering. He explained several things to me and we discussed options. It was determined that since both Jdaddy and I had the day off on Friday, we would go and visit her and see if she would perk up enough to eat, which was another major concern. She hadn’t eaten since the previous Friday and if that continued, she would slowly starve.

Yesterday, we took the boys to school and daycare and then went to the vet. On Thursday night, I prayed that when we saw her we would know what to do. And we did. She didn’t even get up when we walked into the room. It was only after I walked into her cage that she tried to get up. Her breathing was so bad. It was so heartbreaking. That was not my Zoey girl. At that point, the vet told us that she had gotten worse over night and that she was now suffering. It was time. We said our goodbyes and held her as she passed away. I’m sure she’s now playing and running around with her sister, Sheba, who we lost in July of 2009.

After all of that, Jdaddy and I headed out to do some Christmas shopping. Not the best planning, but it was actually a good way to distract us. We finished most of our shopping and then had a nice evening at home with the boys.

Today I am meeting my BFF for lunch and to hopefully finish up all of our shopping. It’ll be another good distraction for me.

Next week has to be better. It just has to.