Our Aspey Girl

I struggled with what to post today. As many of you know, we had to put Aspen down Friday afternoon. It was terrible and we are hurting, but we know she isn’t in pain anymore and that is why we did what we did. I want to share our last day with her with you. She was our baby and we won’t ever forget her, but I also don’t want to start your Monday off with sadness. While our hearts are broken about Aspen, we know she is up in Heaven running wild on every trail she can find and THAT is what we will focus on. She’s the best girl and I am so thankful to Jake for letting me be her Momma. She definitely changed our lives.

Friday was a hard day. Aspen woke us up having a seizure around 2:30 am. She had another one after Jake left for work a little after 7. We just knew she was suffering and we couldn’t watch her like that. I called the vet right after her second seizure and they were able to get me in immediately. Aspen hadn’t been able to jump up onto anything in almost a month, so once we got to the vet, I sat down on the floor with her. You can just see below that she was miserable.

To rewind a little – about a week and a half ago, we got a call that Aspen could have lymphoma or a fungal disease. The diagnosis was leaning more toward lymphoma, but the vet wanted to run one more test to make sure. The results from that test can take up to a month to get back (which we didn’t know at the time). Aspen started getting worse and worse. When I finally took her into the vet Friday morning, after they saw Aspen, they knew it was lymphoma and that it was aggressive. I cannot say enough good things about Galloway Vet. The vet sat on the floor with me while we talked about options. It became clear what we had to do. I sat on the floor and sobbed while cuddling Aspen and our vet sobbed right along with me. She assured me we were making the right decision, but that didn’t make it any easier. Jake couldn’t leave work until around lunch time, but we had already talked about what we would do if Aspen didn’t get better. We made the heart-breaking decision to put her down.

This is us at the vet. Aspen was ready. You can see one of her tumors here. She was getting covered in them. They would start out small and then grow pretty quickly. This one was biopsied, which is why it has the huge scab in the middle. She couldn’t stop messing with it, though, so it wasn’t healing.

After I talked to Jake and our vet, I took Aspen home so we could relax and have some friends come over to see her before her appointment. We sat on the floor and cuddled all morning.

Jake got home around lunch time. We had originally made Aspen’s appointment for 3 because I wanted Jake to have some time with her, but after he saw her and saw how miserable she was, we called the vet and changed the appointment to 1. Ladies, you know how sometimes you wonder if a man will be a good Dad? I’ve never wondered that about Jake. His love for Aspen was and still is some of the best love I’ve ever seen. They were 100% best friends. She was so happy to see him.

Everything at the vet went as well as could be expected. It was awful, but they took such good care of us and let us spend all the time we wanted to Aspen. Thank you, Galloway Vet, for comforting us on the hardest day.

We have some really great friends. I have these texts saved. <3 (Jake has been calling Lu uncle Louis since we started dating. She’s a GIRL, but he thinks it’s hilarious. It just kind of stuck.)

We went home after the vet, but decided that we needed to get out of the house for a little bit. We also realized we hadn’t eaten, so we went to Cherry Pickers for lunch. It was delicious, as always.

Lu was (and still is) pretty confused. She misses her sister.

Our friend, Scottie, had a birthday party Friday night, so we went to that and had a blast seeing all of our friends. Jake’s old flip flops (that I’ve been trying to secretly get rid of for years) finally broke. Thank goodness! Our friend, Dan, fixed it for the night, but I am happy to report that those dang flip flops are in the TRASH!

Our friends all loved Aspen, so it was nice to be around people who missed her, too.

Saturday morning, we slept in. Once we got up, we headed to Aviary for breakfast. We shared the brussels for an appetizers. SO. Good.

I wanted some bacon, so I got some on my croissant and Jake had a crepe.

We are getting ready to do some remodeling, so we walked around a few stores. I LOVED both of these, especially the heart one.

We picked up Jake’s truck from Scottie and Brandi’s, and we would try to outdo each other with music and dancing at each stoplight we came to on the way home. Jake won. Eye-roll.

We came home to these beautiful flowers. We had no idea who sent them – turns out it was our vet. They wrote us a super sweet and loving note, too. It made our day.

We also came home to this…we had been sitting at this table with the umbrella up while drinking our coffee Saturday morning. We didn’t put the umbrella down when we left and it was super windy. Whoops!

Jake and I both needed to run Saturday. We were NOT feeling it. I think we were just emotionally drained. But, we knew we needed to at least try to run. Jake is a million times tougher than me, so he ran outside while I went to my parents’ and ran on their treadmill. I took Lu to my parents’ with me. They were out of town, but she loves going over there.

My Dad plays fetch with her for hours, so she was sad he wasn’t home. She kept bringing me her tennis ball. Luckily the treadmill was stopped when she put her ball on it…that could’ve been bad.

I love the beat of this song – check it out!

I needed to do 9 miles. I just couldn’t. I did a 3 mile warm-up, took a bathroom break, started looking at peoples’ comments about Aspen on my social media posts and just broke down. So, I sat on the floor and played fetch with Lu instead of running.

We went to dinner with Jake’s family Saturday night. Chelsea, his sister, I, both used our matching purses.

We had sushi and it was amazing. The dressing at Mijuri is hands-down my favorite.

Jake and I shared all of this deliciousness.

After dinner, we went home and played with Lulu. Jake likes to trick her. She’s learning and doesn’t fall for his tricks every time. You can kind of see her hiding in the shadow of the door in the second picture. She also loves to hide under our bed.

Then we all relaxed on the couch and watched Gilmore Girls.

We slept in a little again on Sunday, then laid around trying to get motivation to go run.

We made ourselves run. We got 9 miles in, then we headed to B2 for breakfast and coffee.

We love their breakfast burrito, so we shared one. It’s AMAZING.

Lu and I sat in Aspen’s chair for awhile and missed her. Aspen would’ve been trying to get onto my lap the whole time.

Then Jake and I ran some errands. I wore my Altra Olympus trail shoes to break them in a little. I’m ready to get on some trail soon!

We grabbed lunch at Prima’s. They’re Baja taco salad with shrimp is outstanding.

Then it was back home to play with Lu, relax, and get ready for the week.

My first time making homemade salsa. I used THIS recipe…kinda. You know how I am with recipes…I can’t follow one exactly!

It’s really good!

We also made kabobs for dinner – all the scallops and veggies. MMM.

While Jake was grilling the kabobs, I made his lunches for the week. Mexican rice and veggie bowls.

DINNER. Mmmm.

Guys, this is big. Jake and I NEVER used Sriracha with dinner. What?! That has NEVER happened.

We got ready to go on a walk after dinner and I came out to this…HA! Poor Lu.

Lu was excited.

Skratch and Altra = essentials.

It was a beautiful night. It was getting dark, so the pictures aren’t the best, but we enjoyed our walk.

Here are some of my favorite Aspen pictures. I hope she got an awesome trail run in this morning. <3

Thank you for letting me share my heart with you.

​Don’t forget about checking out EverlyWell’s tests! You can use the code CHELSEAK to get 15% off your test! I did a review of my Food Sensitivity Test HERE.

It’s my Grandma’s Birthday, so I’m going to lunch with her and my Momma later. Then I’m playing catch up on some work. I hope your weekend was great!

 

Happy Monday, friends!