Frankie’s Message from Heaven

Posted by Barbara Techel

Heaven is not up or down, it is all around.

Remember the morning I left for heaven and the wind picked up?  Remember how you saw what looked like a jet’s stream swirl around the tree, then around your garden, through the open window where you were sitting, and dance around you?

You were right, mama- that was me!  It was me!

Heaven is earth.  Did you know that?

It is. Heaven and earth are connected. Just like you and me, mama.  We are one. We are always connected.

When I danced around you, I was free.  I no longer needed my wheels.  I came to show you.  And you saw.

While I was on earth you made it heaven for me, getting my wheelchair so I could be free to be a dog.

I saw you at Bookworm Gardens with grandma yesterday.  I saw you bend down to pet the statue likeness of me, then look at my picture in my little doghouse.

I was with you, mama.  I felt your heart rise up in sadness again, wanting to release the pain.  I’m here mama every time you feel sad, reminding you I’m still with you. I’ll never leave your heart.

When you feel sad it is me beside you letting you know you can release the pain- let it go- be free to love another little doggie. You must. That is what heaven is, mama. To love another- to love more- to expand your heart.  Heaven is on earth- if only people could see that.

I’m here to remind you that heaven is all around you. Never fear we are one.

When you want to hold me once again, sit in the silence of your heart and remember how it felt.  It is there. I promise. I’m right there, snuggled on your lap, gazing into your eyes and loving you like I did while on earth.

Heaven is all around, not up or down.

You and me, we are one, our hearts intertwined for eternity.

Never doubt it mama, I am here.

Enter Your Dog in Our Photo Contest- To Celebrate & Support National Walk ‘N Roll Dog Day September 22, 2012

Posted by Barbara Techel

National Walk ‘N Roll Dog Day, founded by yours truly will celebrate it’s first year this Saturday, September 22!  I created this day to continue to bring a positive face to all dogs in wheelchairs and to help educate others that they can live long, quality lives with their wheels.  I also want to continue to help educate others that Intervertebral Disc Disease (IVDD)- like Frankie had- is not a death sentence.  Frankie zoomed around in her wheels for six years, never really realizing her back end was wheels- she just knew that she could be a dog again and that was all that mattered.

I’d love for you to join in the celebration!  Have a dog?  Got a camera?  Well, great then all you have to do is print out one of the signs below and have your dog pose with it.  If you have a dog in a wheelchair than print out the first one.  If you and your dog support all the furry wheelie dogs out there, then print out the second sign (save the image to your computer by right clicking and save image as- then find image on your computer and print out as 8.5 x 11).  Check out all the dogs who have already entered the contest on our Facebook page.  I’ll bet you’ll saw awwwww at least once!!   If you don’t have a dog, we’d love your support by simply stopping by the Facebook page and “liking” it.  To see the prizes we are giving away visit the photo contest detail page on our website.

 

Bliss. How Do We Get It and Keep It?

Posted by Barbara Techel

Photo courtesy of Flickr 

My yogi tea bag saying this morning says:  “Bliss is a constant state of mind, undisturbed by gain or loss.”   I love the sayings I find on my tea bag each morning.  They always make me think.

Bliss, like choices, yes, I do believe are a state of mind. We have a choice to live in bliss, no matter what may be going on in our lives. But how challenging that is at times, right?  I know for me, someone who for the past five years has really talked the talk of being positive with my wheelie side kick, Frankie, this is something I’ve tried hard to to not only talk, but also walk.

I’ll admit this summer was a bit of a challenge for me with being positive despite losing Frankie. I found myself swallowing the grief many times, continuing to put on my happy, blissful, positive face, even when I wanted to just lay down and cry. I didn’t want to be happy. I wanted to wallow in the depths of losing Frankie- the little being who filled my everyday with such amazing love and joy. I didn’t want to be in bliss.  I wanted to feel sorry for myself and crawl into a hole and never come out again. I wanted to feel sorry for what ended and not have hope for what might be. All I wanted was to have Frankie back again. Then my life would be complete once again.

But I knew I couldn’t stay there- and many days, even though I had days of wanting to just live in the pain and let it take me away, I also wanted to find my way back to my bliss.  I read a book a few weeks ago that talks about grief in one of the most honest ways I’ve ever read. The book is called, “This I know- notes on unraveling the heart”  by Susannah Conway. It is the book chosen for the Creative Book Salon I am in which writing coach, Cynthia Morris leads each month.  Susannah says in her book, “You don’t get over grief- you move through it as you learn to live with the loss. You have to learn to swim with it.”

So that is what I did this summer, I learned to move through it, to accept that yes, my life is now changed because Frankie is gone. I learned to swim.

Another thing she said which I found so profound was this, “Each person experiences grief in their own individual way. And though I have often thought that to lose a child would be the most devastating loss of all, there is no hierarchy to grief—only we can know the pain we feel and what we have lost.”  I can’t even begin to express what this meant to me to read this. Even though I know losing an animal is just as hard as losing a human for many, sometimes harder, I still can find myself not expressing my loss around those who may not understand for fear of judgement.  But I appreciated how Susannah seems to give permission to dealing with any type of loss and doing it in our own way.

This brings me full circle back to bliss- a state of mind.  Susannah lost the love of her life and she spiraled down to the deepest depths of her soul– only to come out finding a new bliss, trusting that it was there all along—that she would find her way back to it.  Bliss, always there, no matter what gain or loss we have– we just have to make the conscious choice to choose it.  And when our mind can’t even begin to grasp it during dark days–  we can trust that we can have bliss back in the simple act of choosing our thought to be just that.