Neal dropped Woodstock off at the vet Thursday morning to get his teeth cleaned. Neal told them Woodstock had been acting somewhat lethargic, just not quite himself, ya know? They decided to examine him before first and called us right back to say he had a mass on his abdomen. It was a tumor on his spleen and we had to decide to either allow them to do surgery to remove it or to just have him put to sleep as a tumor on a dog's spleen will rupture sooner or later. That was not an option for us so they did the surgery and he removed a 3 1/2 pound tumor from my little Woodstock. I can't believe that huge thing was inside of him and we couldn't tell. He had just been there for his rabies shot in the fall and it wasn't there then, it must have grown very fast. He came through the surgery pretty good, although his heart did stop once during the operation, but he got it going again. We went to see him after he woke up, but he was still quite groggy. His ears were up and alert and his eyes were open, but he couldn't even lick us. He managed to lift his head once when I got closer to him. Neal is his buddy and pal, but I'm the mom which means I'm his security. We got to spend about 1/2 an hour with him and then we came back home. We left for Bible Study and this morning the vet called us and told us Woodstock had died about an hour after we left. He didn't want to leave that message on the answering machine of course. Neal and I are thanking the Lord for allowing us to see Woodstock before he died. Even the vet said it was like Woodstock waited for us and then he died. His body just couldn't handle it. He would have been 12 years old in July. We're grateful he didn't suffer a lot. Neal and I were able to leave work a little after 12:30 pm today for the rest of the day and just be together away from this place and talk and cry and laugh and just be together sharing the same feelings. The hardest part was coming home as Woodstock always came to greet us and wherever I was he was always no further than 3 feet away from me (or Neal). Since we live here at the flower shop Woodstock was with us all the time, day and night. It's going to take some adjusting to as Woodstock was our only "child". We neither had nor have any kids and Woodstock was treated like a king, just like many of you also do to your pets. I know some will not understand the loss, but for those of you who do, thank you so much for allowing me to share this with you.
