Our precious Zoey

 

As most of you know by now, our sweet Zoey passed away unexpectedly Friday night. First thank you so much for everyone who has reached out and prayed for us, especially Alex. I have received the same couple questions from everyone I have talked to so I thought I would let everyone know what happened and where we go from here. Zoey came to us early in 2016 and was trained as a medical alert dog. Her job was to detect when Alex's cortisol was low and alert him him needed more meds. It is always hard to lose a "pet", but the relationship with a service dog is truly special and unique. Zoey was a lifeline for him. There is a high level trust and communication that occurs when you are counting on a dog to let you know something is wrong before you are in crisis. Zoey also Alex's best friend and constant companion. She was with him almost every minute for 7 years. She had even stayed with him in the hospital and accompanied him into the OR for certain procedures. All that to say this loss is very hard. Zoey would have turned 8 in December. Most people start looking into another dog around that age because it takes years to properly train a dog. It is also extremely costly. We had not begun that process yet. At this point, Alex does not even want to talk about another dog, but even if he did, it would be a minimum of two years before they were fully trained to detect levels and alert. If or when he decides that is what he wants we will begin that process. 

This was the first day they met!

Zoey's first day at home

So what happened...we have spoken to our vet, the emergency vet, a family friend who is a Veterinary clinical pathologist and our trainer and they have all come to the same conclusion. We believe Zoey had a tumor (likely on her liver) that ruptured and caused her rapid decline on Friday. While this is awful, it is also somewhat comforting as nothing we did or didn't do would have changed the outcome. 

We will miss Zoey every day. We are also so very grateful for the ways she blessed our lives. She was an amazing dog and protector. We are so glad she didn't suffer. Please pray for all of us, but particularly Alex as he allows his heart to heal. We are comforted to know that PopPop, Samuel, Hayley and Hershey were waiting to greet her.

Ali