Our sweet boy is now at Rainbow Bridge.  Cueball, racing name Flying Eightball…. July 16, 2003 – January 20th, 2016.

We miss him tremendously.  He was Mitch’s heart dog.

 

It is never easy to say goodbye, but it is especially hard when you share such a strong bond.  Our hearts are broken.  Our home is sad.  It feels so very empty and it is so quiet without him.  He loved to roo and he would always bark when he needed to go out.  The girls are super quiet.  They are coping okay with the loss.  Pippi was depressed for a few days. She is doing better now.  Ziva did not seem to be depressed but she has not been rooing since he passed.  I hope at some point she will roo again. As they say, time heals your pain.  We are not there yet; it still hurts…. a lot.

His passing was sudden.  What we thought was LS turned out to be a tumor on his L4 vertebrae. He had a few good days since his diagnosis of LS and we thought the medicine regimen was working.  We were optimistic.  We had his pain under control and took him back in to the vet on Monday the 18th for his x-rays.  Things were looking up.  They did the x-rays with no sedation.  We thought we were heading in a good direction. It was a very fast progression from weakness and wobbling to inability to stand up or laydown/squat down on his own from that Monday to Wednesday morning.  He was in immense pain. By Wednesday mid-day, he could no longer walk and was crawling across the floor.  We were still awaiting the x-ray results, but new something was terribly wrong.  I called our vet immediately.  She gave me the heart wrenching news.  The radiologist had just notified her that there was a tumor on his vertebrae.  She said there was no need for a biopsy.  The radiologist had no hesitation in identifying it as a tumor, he was just unable to tell us if it was primary or metastatic.  Our options were very limited.  Radiation would kill vital tissue.  The tumor was not operable.  And his prognosis was very poor. With his diminishing health, we knew we had to make the awful decision. It was the best thing for him to let him go.

He went peacefully in Mitch’s arms on January 20th.

He was loved by so many and a very special greyhound.  This was evident by the number of people who expressed their deepest sympathies by email, text, phone calls, cards, facebook messages, flowers, and a very special decoupage piece of artwork that was sent to us from our dear friend Kerrie.  We had two paw prints made, the vet office did both. We were overwhelmed and touched by this. It was comforting in our time of deep sorrow. Mitch has his ID collar hanging on his rear view mirror in his truck.

He was such a good, sweet, goofy, handsome boy who will be loved and missed dearly by us.

 

He loved to go places and was well traveled. He traveled across the Country from VA to TX. He vacationed with us at the beach and the mountains, went to Florida to visit the adoption kennel he came from and to see family, went to multiple wineries, multiple greyhound events in Virginia, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Myrtle Beach. He loved fleece blankets, the beach, laying in the sun, a good romp in the yard and in the snow, roaching and rooing.  His brother Booyah was his best friend. His daddy had his heart and he had his daddy wrapped around his paw.  As he aged, he black ticking became more and more apparent.  We teased that this is the only way we could tell he was getting older.

 

 

He was an amazing ambassadog for the breed.  He was a kind soul and always a gracious host to the many, many hounds who came through our home through fostering, adoption days, hound sitting.  He attended many, many meet and greets, home visits and adoption days.  He was the first greyhound many people had ever met.  He had a wonderful personality and the best ears we have ever seen.

We were so very fortunate to have him as part of our family from September of 2007 till he passed. He was part of the lucky dozen greyhounds that Virginia Greyhound Adoption brought up to Virginia when a kennel in Florida closed.  An email went out announcing the need for homes for these 12 and when I saw his picture, I knew we had to adopt him.  Mitch was convinced pretty quickly once we met Cueball.  We will be forever grateful to VAGA for allowing us to love and care for him.  We could not have loved him any more deeply.

We are awaiting our custom greyhound memory box, but for now he is resting in peace in a beautiful wooden one.  He will always be Mitch’s heart dog. He will forever remain in our hearts and his legacy will live on.

Run pain free our sweet, beautiful boy.  We love you dearly and miss you tremendously.