Sadly, we had to say good-bye to our first family pet, Coco. She was 16 years old so clearly she lived a long life!
My 3 kids and I had driven to Home Depot for a few things while hubby was at work and across the way was a cat adoption. My kids BEGGED me to just go look….so we did. And amongst all these cats, was a dog…..a black puppy called Sadie. The kids immediately started playing with her — and well, the rest is history! We brought “Sadie” home but for some reason the kids didn’t like the name and wanted to name her Coco. That was a little hard for me since my nickname is Coco and I wondered how and why they thought Coco was the best fit for our dog! Wanting to make my kids happy, I agreed. You can only imagine the look on my husbands face as he walked in to see us all sitting around a little black pup. Thankfully he was very happy we picked up a new member for our family!
A couple of years ago, we saw Coco’s health deteriorating. It was so hard to see her limp across the room, struggle to get up and have listless tail swings. The vet wanted to put her on meds and run costly tests but knowing she about 14 years old, we opted to change her diet and let nature take its course. We pretty much fed her a paleo diet – though we also took chicken out of her diet due to skin irritations and we read that some dogs don’t tolerate chicken/chicken meal very well. Much to our surprise, Coco gained a new life! She didn’t limp, she didn’t struggle to sit/get up and her tail wagged high! We could still see that she was aging but she seemed to perk up, if you will. Within the last 6 months tho, she began slowly showing more signs of age – becoming deaf, losing hair and within the last month, losing bowel control.
With much thought and sadness, we decided to “lay her to rest”. It was the hardest decision we’ve ever had to make. Many tears were shed before, during and after. It’s very hard to walk in the house and not see her sitting there….or hear her clompy, clumsiness walk through out wood floors but I know time will heal and tears will soon turn into smiles and great memories.
I know many of you shared your stories with me on instagram comments and I thank you for commenting and showing concern and love! I feel for each one of you!!! And for those with pets — really consider what is in their diets. I truly believe we gave Coco the gift of ‘2 more years of life’ when we changed her diet. I only wish we had known to make that change earlier on. I’m sure our pets thrive on real nutrition, just as we do 
