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blindsided too...

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19 Mar 2009
I'm over 45 years old, and we've had dogs all my life, so I know about putting them down when it's time but it was always fairly obvious in the past and not too much discussion about it... there were the exceptions - Casey who was "delivered via UPS" and the ones who very sweetly and mercifully died in their sleep.

My red chihuahua Belle was some 11 years old or so when she developed renal failure and I held her as the vet injected her, and she yelped - after the injection... I hated myself for what I'd done, and I still have issues about it - the renal failure was likely my fault for giving her a flea dip to begin with, and I wondered if I gave up too soon because of the cost of flushing her with IVs with no promise of a cure, etc. I think y'all know the drill.

So when Dutch my stoic red Boxer started having problems with her health a couple of years ago (cataracts, a seizure, gagging, etc), I ignored my (new) vet when he'd make noises about what a long and great life she had led and how old she was (as in "maybe it's time", that sort of thing)... I truly wanted her to die in her sleep, I didn't want her to be pushed. Every time something cropped up, we'd head to the vet and get some new med to treat the symptoms which would improve some, and we'd be fine for a while.

But two days ago the gagging cough for which she had been on Temeril got a lot worse, and she started coughing up stuff and couldn't keep anything down, not even extra Temeril. Her lung sounds were getting rattly and she truly didn't look well.

Up to this point, my benchmark had always been - as long as she enjoyed her food, she was well enough. Yesterday morning, she was not interested in eating. She was let out with the other two dogs to the back yard, walked out a little ways, and just stood there head down. She gagged and threw up a couple of times when she came back in the house. She looked miserable, and her breathing was bad. So rather than make her go through more of this, I drove her to the vet.

I still don't like that vet, I think he has a horrible bedside manner as far as people go... his older partner (not my chihuahua's vet, but a different one) is far kinder, but wasn't in yesterday. At any rate, I told him about my chihuahua and what I did *not* want Dutch to go through. He pretty much said she would just go to sleep, then had me sign the paper and got to work. I regret not taking more time with her now, but really she didn't seem to care at that point. Even on the ride there she wasn't looking around or sniffing the air.

At any rate, he was right. I held her head and scratched at the base of her tail where she liked it best while he found the vein and injected her, and eventually her head grew heavy in the crook of my arm, and she was gone. Her eyes never closed. I stayed with her for a bit, laid her head down softly, and left her there, looking for all the world like she was just watchfully waiting.

I am reasonably sure I did the right thing for Dutch... I know she was miserable; chances are good that she either had cancer or Cushing's disease, but whatever was going on she was so sick yesterday I could not make her wait in that condition any longer, no matter how badly I wanted to keep her with me.

I still have the two other dogs and they are okay, but they do not hold the same place in my heart that Dutch did, bad as that may sound. I am not certain, but I do not think I will feel *this* badly when it's their turn (Dutch was 13, the other Boxer is also 13, and the terrier is 16) if they do not die naturally... this is just a guess.

My goal now is to get through this grieving... I miss her an awful lot... these tear-fests are a little crazy and unpredictable, and I don't want to scare the family (two younger kids, a couple of older kids, husband).

I really do appreciate this website, as sad as its inspiration was. I feel very much understood here.
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