I don't think people realize how much it hurts to have a pet in the family die. I don't think people understand how really crushing it is to have to put a pet to sleep, especially a pet you have loved endlessly for 80 percent of your life. You don't know a world without her paw prints. You don't know a time she wasn't there to hear you sing when no one was in the house, or the way she curled up with you when you were to scared to sleep alone.

I think people underestimate the fact that truly a part of who you are dies. That little girl who used to wheel her pet around in a toy carriage grew up, and with her so did her pet. She's not just a pet, she really is part of the family. She is unconditional love in its rarest form. She is someone who never judges. She is a life force - a small ray of light when it seems the rest of the world has died out.

I know to the outside it is easy to judge people who have lost their animals. Because it's not a human, yes, granted she could not talk as my brother does or sing like my dad, she was in all respects a small bit of my soul. A fragment of who I am, and now she is gone and I miss every chance I had to pet her or love her. The best we could do is hope we did the best we could do.

I'll miss my Comet forever. She really did mean the world to me, she watched me become who I am and she was there in a way another person cannot be, and for that I am forever grateful.