I love everything you’ve said here bc it’s all so true. My parents are not like that at all and it makes it harder to get through grief when they say you’re overreacting and ‘can’t just fall to pieces’ when things are sad. It definitely helps everyone to go through it all together and be able to grieve the way that helps them the best and be supported.
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Sorry for your loss.
Back in Sept 2020, first trip during Covid. I arrived in Orlando. Get a phone call from my mom - she’s at Emergency Vet with me dog 
He was 13, had dog equivalent of COPD. He was fine the morning I left, it was my younger dog I was worried about because he had diarrhea the night before - so getting a call about my other dog came out of left field.
We had stopped for groceries before going to timeshare, so while my friends went into the store, in the Publix parking lot closest to Animal Kingdom, I had to tell the vet it was OK to put my dog down 
(my mom would not let them do anything without me making the decision)
I will never forget that moment, and it haunts me a little each time we go to that Publix now. I was certainly sad and had a good cry, but the trip went on. A day later, my mom had to take my other dog to the vet for his gastro issues. He was fine after meds.
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Oh wow. I’m so sorry!!! Is your younger pup with you still? How traumatic- I was pretty worried about having to make that decision while we were away. That would definitely be extremely hard.
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Did you do a trip report? I think I remember reading this.
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Yes, the younger one was fine. He was only 3 at the time. Still has gastro issues on occasion, including when he was boarded during my January WDW trip this year 
You never want to get a phone call saying saying hey your dog may need to go to the vet.
I probably did post about it back in 2020. Other than the sad start to the trip, we enjoyed WDW because it was post Covid without a lot of people in the parks.
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I thought I’d do a quick follow up. We had such a lovely trip overall- it was really cathartic to travel with my kids, as we’d all just been through this loss of our dog together and we were all feeling so ambivalent about the trip. Once we left, though, and were on the way, of course DL magic really took over. It had been since pre-COVID since we’d been, so there was a fresh and new feeling about going to DL.
Some silver lining- I had a LOT of guilt about leaving my husband at home with our other dog. She was so tightly bonded to the dog we lost- he was the alpha for sure. She never got on well with my husband, either, as she really preferred… everyone else in our family lol. Our old dog was the one who mostly bonded with my husband. They were best buds. Anyway, when we left, it sort of pushed those two together, and they became much better friends. She still prefers the rest of us to my husband, but she wags her tail when he comes home at least!! And she doesn’t run away from him when he tries to take her on a walk!! 
Beyond that, she did really well at home, and seems at peace here even without our other dog.
On the trip, the kids and I were able to just reminisce about our dog in a setting away from home, which made it easier. We could really remember him with more happiness than with sorrow. When I got home, it was hard to go into our house because I just miss him everywhere (just today I was looking for him as the dump truck came by, and that was always a pretty exciting event in his life-- I didn’t catch myself until I looked at “his spot” to check if he was going to go crazy about the truck!!). But having that time at DL was so helpful, overall. I really needed that escape.
Thanks all for your comments and stories through this!
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