Cosmo by Josette

COSMO Unknown – December 16 2000

I write this my eyes filled with tears as I pay tribute to a little poodle we named Cosmo. We do not know what his name was before we named him we do not know his life before us and I have often wondered if he was loved as much as we loved him. We turned into a Petsmart store on December 1 1997 a Petsmart that we don’t normally visit. We wandered over to the Adoption section as I always did when I went to Petsmart. There in a cage was a very frigtened poodle. We asked about him and they said he was free as he was very old. I thought what a horrible place to have to die in a cold steel cage. We decided that we would adopt him there and then. He stunk of urine his ears were red and inflamed and dirty. The Petsmart groomer said that she would clean him up and we could go and pick him up later. We already had a cocker spaniel at home named Max. He was 3 years old. When we picked him up we noticed that he had cataracts. We took him to the vet the next day as he was coughing terribly. He had kennel cough. He lay on the sofa on a pillow with a warm sweater and that his where he stayed until he was better.

It wasn’t long before he started to brighten up and his true personality came out. He was very dominant and he certainly wasn’t afraid of letting Max know who was boss. Over the years his eyes became worse but it didn’t stop him from finding a ball when he wanted to play with it. There are so many memories of him that for me to share them with you would take forever. Unfortunately forever is not what we had this week.

On Monday December 11 2000 our dear sweet Cosmo had his first seizure. We had noticed over the past 4 months he was becoming more confused and a little disorientated. Needless to say we were frightened for him. When he came out of his siezure he was very weak and we would hold him. We took him to the vet the next day and they ran some bloodwork on him and they couldn’t find any reason why he would be having seizures. It was suspected to be a brain tumor. The vet prescribed anti seizure medication but he was walking into walls when you picked him up and accidently touched his head he would scream. We were always on the phone to the Vet we wanted reassurance that things would get better but he told me that this is a very hard time for us and we would have to make the decision as to what is best for Cosmo. That decision was made for us yesterday. We went to the Store and when we came back he mananged somehow to wait at the door for us like he always did but he was crying and totally confused. He wouldn’t stop crying it was like he was talking to us. We dropped everything rang the Vet and told him we cannot put him through this anymore. I wrapped him in my sweater on the way to the Vet he was still crying. When we arrived at the Vet I held him close he was calm and then I started to cry. The pain in my heart was so great that I had to put my precious furbaby to sleep. I had prayed every night of this week that he would die in his sleep but… that was not to be. We placed him on the table laying him on my sweater my husband held his head the Vet placed the needle into his leg and within seconds his head dropped back and he was gone. We both cried uncontrollably and we stayed with him for about 20 minutes. The worse part was having to leave him there. We are having him cremated and we will have an urn with his name a certificate with his paw print and fur.

My head is filled with all the memories of this fiesty little poodle and I hope that he knows how much we loved him. I will never ever forget him and even though my heart is aching for one last touch of his beautiful head I know this last week was spent comforting him and we are truly blessed to have known a poodle we called Cosmo.

Josette