My turn to be sad

Lots of people post when they lose a pet, and today it’s my turn. Buster was part of our lives for 11 short years. He was the funniest little fellow around. He was always doing something goofy to make us laugh, and he was the most faithful little guy to my wife and I....well, mostly her, but that’s the way it oughta be! Buster was a Shi Tzu. He burst into our lives in early June of 2008. My wife and her sister went to a local flea market, and a guy had 2 little dogs there. Buster saw my wife, and ran up to her knocking his brother out of the way as if to say “ That’s MY new Mama, and you get away from her!” It was love at first sight for both of them, and he came home with her. I’ll fast forward thru 11 amazing years with that kind hearted, loving little boy that didn’t have a mean bone in his body. He went pretty much everywhere we did throughout his life, and added immeasurable joy to our lives. I called him my little navigator on trips. He would always lay on the armrest in my Dodge 2500, and watch where we were going. I’m gonna miss him laying his little chin on my arm as I rested my arm on the armrest beside him, with my hand on the gear stick. The little guy was never sick a day in his life, and got kind of down in the dumps on our last trip to our beach place a few weeks ago. We took him to the vet, and they did some blood work. Our vet was concerned that he had something serious wrong in his gastrointestinal tract, and wanted to send him for an ultrasound. We took him for that last Thursday, and found out he had an advanced case of stomach cancer. He hadn’t eaten in 2 days and the vet said his stomach was full because the cancer was blocking the exit from his stomach to his intestines. He couldn’t hold anything else in his stomach, and that’s why he wouldn’t eat. We knew what we had to do, but dreaded doing it. The decision as to how soon got taken out of our hands that very night, as he started having terrible acid reflux and it was choking him. We had already made an appointment with our vet to let him go, but had to take him to the animal emergency hospital to end his suffering. We are just heart broken, but we’ve been through it before and will have to again in the future. Our little boy Buster is waiting for us at The Rainbow Bridge, and we will see him again someday. R.I.P Buster West.....Mom and Dad love you.