Where's Our Baby?

Our hearts are breaking.  Our baby "Mattie" is missing.

I'm going through the 'what-if's' now. 

• 'What if '.... I wouldn't have taken Mattie with us?  It was just supposed to be a short visit to see my cousin since he wasn't feeling well.
• 'What if '... I wouldn't have gotten so involved in our greeting that I didn't lose track of her?  I sat her on the driveway and told her to stay but then I got out of the car and walked to the house.  She never followed.
• 'What if '...I would have realized that she didn't come in the house with us sooner? We walked through the house talking and looking and it wasn't until I sat down that I realized she wasn't there.  She's usually under our feet and I never even realized she wasn't there until then.  I just assumed she walked in with us.

If only we have realized sooner.  It had been more than 20 minutes.  It was going on 9:30pm.  She was nowhere to be found.  We spent the next 2-1/2 hours looking for her.  Wandering the neighborhood in 3 directions.  Going to Walmart to buy a flashlight only to get it home and realize it didn't work and having to go back again.  More time missing.

It killed us to leave that side of town knowing there was nothing else we could do until daylight.  Feeling like we left our child who's  lost, missing all night.  Rescue mission on hold.

We got home and I went to the animal shelter websites to post missing notices.  Neil worked on making a flyer.  It was 6am before he could bandage my aching feet.  I had just had the stitches removed on Tues.  and now one cut was coming apart again and the they're swollen and hurting.  What bad timing.  I couldn't not look for her.  When she went missing all the foot pain went away - I was running on nervous adrenaline and didn't feel it. I was feeling it now.

Saturday it went up to 92 degrees and all I could think about is I hope someone is keeping her safe.  I hope she's cool, full and not scared.   Is she thinking "how could they abandon me like that"?   

The poor little thing is losing her eyesight and hearing.  She has allergies and itch's all the time if she doesn't have her medicine.  Will the people who picked her up just toss her back out when they tire of her scratching?

  She's over 12 years old, with heart worms.  We've had her since she was 8 weeks old.  I don't want her to not be with us in the end.  I miss my baby.

My cousin Greg, who we went to see because he wasn't feeling well spent the whole time Friday night helping us search despite how he was feeling.  Saturday he printed the flyers Neil designed, went to buy supplies with us and stayed out in the heat again all day posting them. 

Greg and I grew up more like brother and sister than cousins.  Only 2 months apart in birth and the children of 2 sisters, we spent a LOT of time together growing up.  Thank you Greg, for being there and  helping us, like you always do.

It's sad to think that out of these 3, Mattie's the only one who hasn't passed away.  Bugger our cat died about a year ago.  We had him for about 10 years.  Tess the black dog was the sweetest rescue dog that we had gotten when she was 6 months old.  We had her for about 17 years before she passed away.  She was blind by then and Mattie was her guide dog.  We miss them all. 

We still haven't heard from anyone saying they have our baby.  All that's left to do is PRAY.....