Last Saturday Veronica and i took Tara and Pepe to the vet in Fremont. Tara has an ear infection, and Pepe's cough has been getting progressively worse. The vet managed to listen to Pepe's little heart after he calmed down and stopped coughing, and she heard a murmur. Originally he had been diagnosed with collapsing trachea, but the vet surmised he was now going into heart failure and recommended immediate medication for that, as well as kidney medication to prevent possible kidney failure associated with the heart problems and potentially the heart medication. We started him on that on Saturday, and noticed an immediate improvement. By Tuesday his cough was almost completely gone. However, that evening he vomited when we went to bed, and again twice more through the night. I called the vet the next morning and we agreed to take him off the medication immediately, and only begin again if his symptoms returned. Pepe however looked very ill, barely able to stand and walking very wobbly when he did get up. Veronica and i left him and Tara in the house and headed to work. I came home early that afternoon to see how he was doing, and found that he was gone. We guess that while the medicine helped his symptoms, he was too far along in his lung and heart problems. Our poor little pup.

We took him to get cremated that evening at the vet, and will probably spread his ashes around our yard when we get them back. We're happy that we were able to give him ten months of love, and that we got him out of the shelter for his final days. I'll miss the way he would crawl on my lap to be scratched, and how when i slacked off he would turn around and scratch my hand with his paw. We're not sure how Tara's going to respond now that her little friend is gone, but she was always relatively independent and we think she'll be okay. She has seemed a bit confused by his absence over the last few days. I've been confused too ... it's strange having Tara hopping excited at the door when i get home and not seeing Pepe rise from his bed to come say hello. Or not hearing his funny little bark and growl when i don't get the treats down from the cabinet fast enough for his liking.