This board can be quite the cesspool sometimes, but one thing we do better than anything is support each other going through loss of a faithful companion. I sadly am asking for those prayers tonight.

I just found out my 3 year old lab, who only a month ago was kicking arse fetching ducks and loving life, only has a few weeks to live due to aggressive bone cancer in her pelvis. Can’t do surgery, radiation would kill her kidneys, and chemo would only make her feel like shite for her last days.

For as long as I can remember, I have wanted my own hunting lab. We had house labs growing up, but I wanted that rare combination of house dog and duck dog. Nellie is that and more. She has a true passion for ducks. She came running if she even heard the keypad on the gun safe. She absolutely lived for cold mornings in the duck blind. She also has been an incredible member of the family. She was my wedding present from my wife, and almost a year ago was standing at the front door to welcome our daughter home from the hospital. She has gone to work with me every day for the past two years, and people in my office are bummed when she isn’t there to walk around and check in on everyone around lunchtime each day.

She went from hunting her arse off all through Christmas, to all of a sudden limping on her back right leg and it swelling on that side of the hip. Took her in, they said it was either fungal infection or bone cancer. Testing ruled out fungal infection. I was hell bent on finding a way to fix this shite. I read everything I could find/understand about this cancer, and was on the phone with every vet oncologist I could find. Sadly, they are all inundated with patients, but I wasn’t giving up. Today, I drove straight into the vet school at Miss state and checked my girl in, knowing at some point I would get in front of someone that could truly tell me what the deal was. Miss state vet truly went above and beyond. The ER doc got the oncologist over to consult with us, and was completely honest and upfront with me on what the reality was. They could have easily shaken me down for whatever $ he wanted and he wouldn’t even recommend more than an X ray, which he didn’t even charge me for. It meant a ton to not be taken for a ride in a vulnerable situation and I really appreciate those guys for being very fair to me.

I feel like I have been hit by a freight train. I can remember even the day I picked her up that this day would one day come and it would be terrible, but I never would have imagined god would steal my girl away from me like this at such a young age. Sure doesn’t seem fair. Maybe god just needed a better bird dog.

I take comfort in a couple of things I read a few years ago and hopefully someone here will too.

1. Never miss a chance to pet your dog. Seems simple, but I kept that simple thought in my head for a long time and took it to heart, and I can say with a high degree of confidence that rarely did a chance to show my dog I love her go by.

2. Spend as much time as you can with them, right up to the end. I read an interview with a vet one time who told of the saddest thing they regularly experienced. It was people who had reached the point that they had to put their dog to sleep. They came to the vet office, and just handed their dog off to the vet to take it to a back room by itself. The dog, already on deaths door or otherwise in pain, was now by itself in a foreign place with no one it has known or loved, on a cold metal table. The vet talked about how sad these dogs seemed to be of spending their final moments alone with a stranger. Moral being, as hard as it will be, if you have the chance, stay with your dog until the end. They will at least pass on knowing you are there right next to them, the same way they have been since day one. I most certainly will be holding my girl close until the end.

Hug those pups tonight boys. You will not regret it.