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home of the spindly hounds

@imalayla / imalayla.tumblr.com

• This blog is dedicated to Layla, forever entwined in my atoms • Stoli born 1.12.22 • Bubbles born 4.4.21 • I follow back from nochoramet, please respect my privacy and don't follow my main without asking me first •
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an-na-ko

Lyra, my beloved cat of 13 years, passed away this year on Father's Day. She's been by my side through very difficult times and was my little rock of steady and unrelenting love. I struggled a lot drawing this, and struggled a lot posting it, but I know I would've wanted to read a comic like this that validated my grief for her when I lost her.

Wherever you are, Lyra my little summer star, I love you always! Thank you for being the best thing in my life.

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I think about it less nowadays but it still shatters my heart that I'll never have that bond again. The level of love and trust and devotion Layla and I had towards each other. She was the silkiest, softest, nicest smelling, well behaved, gentle, snuggly, intelligent creature ive ever met. I feel so empty without her. I love my current dogs but it'll never be the same and I can't seem to let down the wall around my heart to try and appreciate the differences. Because I don't WANT different. I want Layla back. I can't have more than 2 dogs so I can't get another in hopes of finding that connection. Feel free to judge, my grief is not beautiful and understanding and palatable. My dogs get love and enrichment and care regardless. but they are not her. And it does make life a lot more dull and uninteresting for me.

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This is forever and always my favorite picture of her... She looks so sweet and cuddly, like a stuffed animal. Like the Velveteen Rabbit. She's a little worn around the edges but the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. I wish I could get a stuffie made to look like this, although I know it would be impossible. I just want to reach through the screen and hug and kiss her. I can't believe she's gone.

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i just saw your post about your grief over loosing your dog, and i understand completely. Like i sont mean to say that lightly or try to be condesending, but its hard to get over a dog, or any pet really.

I lost my childhood dog two years ago, she was 16, i got her when i was 6. Its still hard, and i even have a new dog we rescued last year.

It may seem a bit weird but ive had like, dreams pf her? Like of things weve done? That may seem weird heh.

But uh, just wanted to say that i understand, and it might never go away completely, but it gets better :)

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i'm so sorry for taking forever to respond to this. I really really appreciate you saying this and i know you don't mean it condescendingly. It is hard when your pet is with you pretty much every day and night by your side, no conditions or anything.

I'm so sorry that you lost your childhood dog i can't even imagine how hard that must be to lose one that you've known basically all your life...

It isn't weird to have dreams like that. honestly i wish that i could have more dreams about layla. sometimes i wonder if i'm grieving "wrong" or something because i rarely dream about her, and some of them are actually nightmares which of course feels... REALLY BAD.

<3 thank you again and sorry for taking so long to respond. i really appreciate it <3

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feral-ballad

Rafael Guillén, tr. by Sandy McKinney, from I’m Speaking; “Splintering”

[Text ID: “You’re slipping away from me, down to death. / I grope / inside your empty places, / your woeful hollows, the nothing / where your beauty was. / I love you.”]
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i read CS Lewis’ A Grief Observed one time years ago and i’m still not recovered from it

A Grief Observed: part i-ii, C.S. Lewis x

I need y'all to understand that he wrote this famous passage in the middle of her brief remission -

'Do not let your happiness depend on something you may lose.' 'Don’t put your goods in a leaky vessel.' 'Don’t spend too much on a house you may be turned out of.' There is no man alive who responds more naturally than I to such canny maxims. I am a safety-first creature. Of all arguments against love none makes so strong an appeal to my nature as “Careful! This might lead you to suffering”. There is no safe investment. To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket — safe, dark, motionless, airless — it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.
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I must not look at Facebook memories. Facebook memories are the mind-killer. Facebook memories are the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my urge to look at Facebook memories. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the urge to look at Facebook memories has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.

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-Heidi Priebe, As Long As There Is Love, There Will Be Grief

[TEXT ID: The grief of time passing, of life moving on half-finished, of empty spaces that were once bursting with the laughter and energy of people we loved. As long as there is love there will be grief because grief is love's natural continuation. It shows up in the aisles of stores we once frequented, in the whiff of cologne we get two years after they've been gone. Grief is a giant neon sign, protruding through everything, pointing everywhere, broadcasting loudly, "LOVE WAS HERE". In the finer print, quietly, "LOVE STILL IS". END ID]
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hazelhound
"The good news is that you do not have to ever ‘get over’ the loss of your dog; you do not have to forget your dog. Mourning and processing your grief will allow you to change the relationship with the tangible dog of fur and drool to a relationship with a dog within your own heart and mind. Your dog will always be there, as will your love. The sharp and painful edges, however, will dull with a deliberate, mindful practice of mourning, and the joy in the connection will return."
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