My dog Dulce died on Saturday.
It was Wednesday, January 24, 2024, as I began to write this account. This moment is one of the most profound of my life, for a variety of reasons. One dimension of this time and place for me is the experience of my dog Dulce’s death. I made the choice to have a vet come and assist her in dying after she took a turn for the worse in her slow decline from a cancer that was going to kill her. The process of making that decision in full responsibility was nothing short of spiritual. The process, and ceremony, of Dulce’s death opened new portals and potentials for me, while showing me a new layer of depth and profundity to my own spiritual practice and understanding. I have been receiving information from my energetic guidance system all day, in connection with my higher self, and my intuition. I have remembered and celebrated Dulce with full and uninhibited joy – after taking several hours to mourn deeply and effectively. I have felt witnessed and held in my process by both those with me here on the physical plane and those beyond.
With Dulce, the universal flow supported and held me, and I felt that support in orchestrating the perfect way to say goodbye to my dear friend – with enough time and space for myself, and with deep honoring of the entire process, experience, and all my emotions. Through the synchronicity and universal symbolic language that I have learned to read, I received the message from my energetic guidance system that it was time to assist Dulce in dying.
I was in ceremony with Dulce for almost a full 24 hours before she died. There was an ice storm, which meant that, although I took Friday off and scheduled the vet for mid-afternoon, the vet could not make it with all the ice; so we rescheduled it to Saturday, late morning. I spent the afternoon and evening preparing myself for Dulce’s transition and preparing Dulce. We were in ceremony together. I made an altar for her. She needed assistance using the bathroom because she kept slipping over on the ice in the back yard and, in her condition, could not get up again. As a result, we had an intimate last 24 hours together. I slept next to her on the living room floor the two nights before her death day. I slept in the living room with her altar and central candle burning the following night as well. I let her know that, if she wanted, she could certainly stick around for the length of that flame after her death, but that after that I was requesting that she move on from this life and from me. That she allow herself to return fully to source.
I had this conversation with her in ceremony while she was still alive. And I thought she understood, at least on some level – a level that would help her with her process. I have had deep and profound experiences of communication with my dog companion over the years, and this felt like a new level. We rested together in a bubble of absolute compassion, love, and deep presence in those final moments together. It was easy for me to access full-body sensory memories of her during this time: from the feel of her fur, to the way her energy feels behind me when she is sleeping.
In the morning, remarkably, the vet was able to make it – even though it was still icy. It had been initially hard to accept the change in plans for me emotionally, but once I did, I thoroughly enjoyed and spent the time well. Dulce seemed relaxed, seemed ready to go. She didn’t eat that morning. Food had been on and off with her, and she had been slowly starving since October, or perhaps even a few months before.
I walked her to my partner Tori’s house for treats the day before her death. The morning of her death was all about her. Holding her, petting her, talking with her, and preparing the space energetically for her transition from life. I felt incredibly peaceful. I had cried a lot at different times leading up to this morning, but, for the most part, that morning I rested in the knowing that I had made the right decision for Dulce. And the time had been so very precious. And she would not have to suffer continuing to weaken and starving to death.
The vet arrived and consented to some energy field clearing before coming fully into the space. I had a nest on the floor in the middle of the room, where I had been sleeping, and I had my altar set up just behind us. I lit the central candle in preparation, about a half hour before the vet arrived, as I was instructed by my energetic guidance system. The process was peaceful. Dulce’s little dog, Gumbo sat nearby and was not scared at all by the vet or the process – and he seemed to want to be there. Dulce died with her head in my lap with me holding and petting her head and stroking her ears, and my partner Steph there petting her, and Gumbo standing watch. She knew she was loved. The vet was loving, compassionate, and gentle. She did not suffer, and she will not suffer anymore.
On Sunday, the day following her death, I painted Dulce. Painting her was an incredible process. Deeply sacred and spiritual for me. Her portrait simply flowed out of me. She is painted larger than life and prominently displayed in the center of our living room. She is on a painting of mine that had been hanging there for years, but always felt unfinished, and just a background for something… that day I knew it was for me to honor Dulce.
I experienced her presence and her energy so strongly as I painted. I asked that she be with me and move through my brush so that I would forever have a part of her with me once she fully moved on, which I was still encouraging her to do at the end of the central candle’s flame. The finished painting was amazing. It is one of my favorite paintings. And it really captures her energetic essence in a way that I am incredibly grateful for.
I noticed/remembered my joy and ease and talent for mixing and matching colors. I loved painting so BIG. It encouraged me to think more about creating a mural on my fence this year. And I felt the next morning like I had captured her so well: she was fully present in the painting. I cried so much. Knowing that I had released her, she would not feel so close for much longer.
I cried and enjoyed and felt my pain at our separation and my releasing fully of my attachment to her. My ceremony had been a lot about releasing attachments to beings in my life. And I also got a big message that attachment is healthy (if the attachment is lightly held, and we are ready to let go when the time comes). Attachment and cording are necessary, as are commitment. These come from love and are building blocks for a more healthy and self-organized, and naturally complex, human society.
Patience and discipline. Commitment to the highest good of the other and the self. Unconditionally, but not love without boundaries. Not love without choice and decisiveness. And not love unwilling to change – but rather a flexible love with a natural duration. Freedom to choose. Love.
The next day I tried going to work.
By Sunday night and into Monday, I had been feeling such an ecstasy in my experience that I had started to wonder if the pre-grieving I did for Dulce’s death might have moved the heaviest grief through already. I wondered if I was done. I didn’t even think about arranging not to work. Then, right before work, I walked my little dog Gumbo without Dulce for the first time. And the grief hit me. I felt the loss of Dulce’s embodied company – and I could still feel her with us, which was painful because I knew it was a transitionary step, and not something to hold on to. I felt Dulce with me, that she was witnessing me. So, I got to work and just could not stop crying. My whole body was shaking from so much grief flowing through me.
I have amazing coworkers, and one of them had already had the thought I may not really be ready to be back at work that day. Between the two of them, they were able to cover my shift, and I left to do what I knew I needed to do. I went home and prepared to head out to the Sandy River Delta (aka 1000-acre dog park), which had been Dulce’s favorite place to go for years and years of her life. She had not been out there in about three years, because as she aged it was just too much for her, and she would over do it and injure herself every time. There was no danger of that anymore. I invited her along with me and headed out.
The park was icy and snow-covered still, and there was barely anyone else about. I felt Dulce with me strongly as I set out. I decided to walk one of her old favorite routes: a long loop around some of the edges of the park, to a spot on the Columbia, and then to a spot in the channel cut through the tip of the land that extended out into the delta between the Columbia and the Sandy rivers. She was with me. And I cried. My heart and whole chest aching with how much I was going to miss her, and the pain of her separation. And yet, there was joy there as well – and deep gratitude. As I walked, at times I thought I saw her running in the field next to me, jumping back and forth over a fence that she had often crossed in her younger years.
As I continued through the forested sections of the park, I could feel her just up around the bend. I turned corner after corner and just expected to see her there, playing and running, and looking back at me – waiting for me to be close behind – then running up ahead again. Her presence was beyond words, and beyond any expectation I had for what her accepting my invitation with the candle might be like. I let myself cry and scream and let my whole body express every drop of grief and pain that I felt. The ice and the snow were so perfect. So beautiful and clean. And it felt so protective, sacred, like it had come just for Dulce and me so that we would truly have (and I would truly take) this precious time.
Monday night, I knew the candle was getting low. I felt it would go out during the night and moved it down into my room with my partner Steph because I really wanted to know. Really wanted to be there for that final moment, and, to the degree I could, to witness her go. I didn’t sleep well that night, and every time I woke the candle was there. In the early morning, I woke at about 5:30am, and saw the candle was just about out. I dozed again and entered a dream almost immediately. In the dream, Dulce was a ghost. I was staying at a big house, and my sister Julie was there. Julie noticed Dulce had injured herself on a spiky plant outside, and I went to inspect her paw. There was no blood. Then, I noticed that only Julie and I could see Dulce – others looked straight through her – she was in her disembodied spirit form – she was a ghost. It was a beautiful dream, and one I think I will never forget. When I woke, somehow, only about ten minutes had passed.
The candle was out. I no longer felt Dulce’s presence.
Tuesday I was on call for a twelve-hour volunteer shift with Trauma Intervention Program Northwest. I did not feel the need to change my shift, but I was given a lot of grace that day as well. With only one call, I had much time to process and be in my house. I spent most of the time clearing and re-arranging my living room – the physical changes to the space that would clearly signal no big dog lived here anymore. By Tuesday evening I was feeling almost like I could return to work the next day. I decided to take one more day – my energetic guidance system suggesting another day at the 1000-acre dog park.
On Wednesday, I returned to the park. On this day there was a substantial amount of rain, but also moments of sun and blue sky through the clouds. There were a few more people and dogs at the park, but still not many. I was greeted initially as I set out by two brown lab mix-looking dogs – very Dulce-like – and this made me smile. Although I no longer felt Dulce’s energy with me, her memory burns strong within me, and her essence is still present in the field. This day as I walked, I felt deep joy and gratitude for Dulce. For her life and all our time together, and, especially, for her bringing me into deep communion with this land. I know the area like the back of my hand, having spent many hundreds of hours there over the years, and having seen the land through almost a decade of seasons when Dulce and I would visit frequently. I laughed and walked and listened and felt and danced and played my way around the land that day. I barely interacted with any people or dogs, yet I danced and played and felt surrounded by loving connection the whole way.
Since then, and it is now February 17, 2024, as I finish this writing, I have spent some moments missing Dulce and feeling the sadness of her departing, and I have spent many more moments remembering the wonderful time we shared. I have deepened and leaned into my relationship with Dulce’s dog, Gumbo, who has now become my closest animal companion. I am grateful for Dulce’s life, but also for her death. I am in awe at the processes and movements of life – and excited to share the story of this process with those for whom it might resonate or inspire.
