Spades

Pavlov and Reagan were our first children.  Pavlov, the 125 pound Rottweiler/Australian Shepard mix breed was my lap dog until his death last fall.  It wasn't a good death.  It caused great controversy and animosity in our house for months leading up to it but I basically insisted that my dog had gotten too old and slightly volital and had to be put to sleep after AJ3 was born.  It was hard on everyone but especially JJ and AJ1.

AJ1 still talks about missing his black dog and wants to know why he can't return.  Some of AJ1s first words were "Dog, Eat!!".  He was quite attached.

Fast forward nine months and we had to give Reagan up.  Reagan the cat is 17 years old.  She is in perfect health.  She is residing with my in-laws for the moment.

This week when we dropper her off, I unfortunately, didn't have a choice but to have all three AJs with me.  AJ1 went nuts!

He kicked, he screamed, he cried, he even got so upset as to gag!  He accused me of killing the dog (of course, I don't think he knows that I sanctioned the dogs demise but he doesn't seem to miss much that goes on at our house) and now of taking the cat into my in-laws house and killing it with my bare hands (he's 3 and not exposed to violence so I don't have a clue how he came up with that one).  He said that he didn't care if we couldn't go to New Zealand and be with JJ, he wanted his cat!

I was crushed and before AJ1 was finished, I was crying (this had been my pet for the last 15 years as well), AJs 2 & 3 were also a mess (I have to assume from the emotional stress, not leaving the cat) and not for the first time I thought about what this move was going to do to our children.   I grew up in a very disrupted world with my only constant being home.  I hope that I give my children a constant world with the only disruption being geography.   In the meantime, I've been worrying it.

I was having trouble sleeping tonight in my holding pattern of we should be in Auckland already but haven't actually purchased tickets yet.  I did the rounds on the internet, you know, email, news sites, Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter etc and finally came to the list of blogs that I normally save for Sunday morning (I am hoping to avoid being awake in the morning).  A good friend's blog made me feel so much better!

My friend Danielle grew up in a military family and is now married to a man devoted to medical training (pediatric cardiology).  Talk about someone who has to know how to roll with the punches.  She too is orchestrating a move this summer though hers is being done while nine months pregnant!  You can check her out here and read why I had restored confidence that I may not totally mess up my kids by moving them around.  If Danielle is the end product of moving and being away from family, then I'll take it in spades!