The human mind is absolutely amazing… it pulls you through when you think you can't, and just when u start to think you’ve got it made, reality punches you in the face.

I lost my dog, my best friend ‘Zubic’ in January this year after a week long (losing) battle with renal failure. I saw the prancing impish dog I had loved for 13 years of my life aging in 2 days ; stop eating, being fed through IV's, having a seizure, becoming paralysed and possibly blind, go through so much of suffering and become a living corpse.

But somehow I never broke down. It killed me inside to see him everyday in the condition he was and inadvertently remembering what he used to be, but i remained steeled enough, for whose sake I do not know, my own perhaps!

I even faced a time when he was in tremendous pain and I realized I was so utterly helpless that I could do nothing for him and I prayed for him to die, even death was better than prolonged suffering.

And then one day when I was in college, he died. A sparkling flame of life snuffed out, just like that. And worse of all, I couldn’t even say goodbye. I expected myself to cry, but somehow I just made a silent prayer to the lord for granting him (and me) this mercy, not only of ending his suffering but keeping me from taking inevitable decisions about his ‘existence’ when I had no right to. I thanked his doctor for all his help and somehow I was strong enough even to arrange his burial, and witness it later.

For a month I felt myself anaestheised, unable to feel any pain. Just a keen sense of loss and loneliness. For a month I went about my life, unknowingly staying out for as long as i could, stopping to think about Zubic only when I came home and realized that his spot by my bed was empty.

I dont know what this period was- one of healing? Stabilization? Because soon afterwards, reality fully assaulted me. Till date there hasn’t been a single moment when I’m not reminded of his absence in my life. Eating reminds me of how he used to beg for morsels, scratching my arm and yowling at the top of his voice till he got what he wanted. Going for a walk brings back images of both of us enjoying quiet solitude together. Waking up in the morning makes me realize I'll never have him lick my face each morning till I woke up and gave him a good back rub. A moment of grief makes me remember how he could always sense if I was in a bad mood and lie in my lap till it went away and that I'll never have that comfort again. I went through my exams continually thinking of how he used to stay up with me till I was done with books for the day. My birthday cake made me think of how he was always the first one to get a piece. Every moment has his memory captured in it !

I’ve cried so much, because I loved him, because I miss him, because he has left a gaping hole in my life where a friend used to be, and that no one will be able to fill it up. And so I realise that the path to healing is through grief.

I just hope he’s happy wherever he is, and that he knew how much he meant to me and still does.

Though I wonder sometimes if I'll ever see him again...

Written by - Alankrita Sauhta from Mumbai