Farewell, Pepper

Natalie has been having a really tough time with this whole Pepper situation- we both have. But I can deal with it, suck it up, whatever. But she's just a kid and doesn't understand... Obviously, and as you can tell in the video below, she understands a lot- but I don't think she understands the "whys" of it. I think she would have been able to move on if she had died or something (I know that sounds horrible but you know what I mean... and thank goodness that is not the case!) but with the situation as it is, it puts her in more of  a limbo- knowing she is out there, but someone just won't let you see her- and it is seemingly harder for her to move on. It breaks my heart to see her sad over it. I was really hoping that after a little time went by, she would stop worrying over her so much. She hasn't. Some people think "I'm crazy for making a big deal out of it" but I was never making a big deal, I was dealing with a big deal that got thrown in my face- still dealing with it, in fact. I know some people will be like, "it's just a dog." I understand that totally. But Natalie is an only child who wanted a sibling more than anything- instead she got Pepper and loved her just as if we had brought her a new baby sister home. She took such good care of her. Anyway, I get it that she was just a dog. But try to understand that to Natalie, she was much, much more.

Even though we will miss Pepper terribly and don't want to "replace her", I'm starting to think that maybe having a new puppy will give her something happy to focus on. So we have just started looking. We plan on maybe getting one for her birthday (March 2nd) or for Valentine's Day- if we find the right one. We are pretty sure we want a Morkie (Maltese-Yorkie mix). But we really want to take our time looking for one because we have some pretty specific ideas of what we want.

Last night at bedtime, Natalie was a little down about Pepper and didn't feel good either so we talked about Pepper and about maybe getting a new dog too. Our intentions were to make a "Farewell, Pepper" video. I thought this would help Natalie maybe with some closure and that it would be a good way for her to remember how she felt when in a few years, the memories start to become fuzzy. Natalie kind of took the video in a different direction in parts... But we're still going to treat it as our farewell to Pepper.

Natalie likes to write notes on her dry-erase board and then put it somewhere that you will stumble upon it. May sound odd, but she's been doing it for years. This was in my desk chair a few days ago: