Letting a dog go with dignity - how do you do it right?

The feelings around the loss of a dog unites many of us together.  Grief is a very raw emotion and is so powerful that there are even stages associated with it - denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance.  Add to this that our beloved dogs generally live a decade, if not longer with us.  How does one lose a 12 to 15 year old child? The answer is - not well, not well at all.

Those who don't know this kind of love and connection may not understand.  But for those of us who live this life, we all relate.  What complicates and differentiates this process even more is that the owners have the responsibility to make the right decision - all the way up to the bitter end.  This responsibility creates its own wave of emotion ranging from anxiety in wondering when to make the decision, stoicism to not let the dog perceive any hint of sadness, fear of what is to come, depression that more can't be done, concern if they are in any pain, regrets of not spending more quality time together, and regrets of calling it too soon or too late.  It is the latter point I'd like to focus on here.

I have lost 2 dogs prior to Logan.  Those losses formed a benchmark for how this process unfolds.  However, with Logan I had to learn that each dog is different, and each goes their own way.  The first step of allowing your dog to pass on with dignity is to know what dignity is for them.  It is hard to have a predefined criteria like "when they stop eating" or "when they can't  use their back legs anymore." For my first dog Phineas, he was stoic - did things his way on his terms.  He died peacefully in his sleep at age 17.  He lived his last 1.5 years without any use of his legs- assisted swimming was his only pleasure.  Many approached us with words of inspiration, and many gave looks of disdain, judging we were holding on too long.  For the last couple months not only was he not walking, we had to assist all functions, including eating.  These actions did not follow any prescribed criteria, with the exception of making sure that he was not in pain and we were not doing harm.  We had the counsel of a  well-respected veterinarian who assured that he was not in pain and that with Phineas we'd have the rare gift of him passing peacefully on his own.  She was right, which brings me to my second step on how to let your dog die with dignity, to listen to the right voices, including your own.

People have opinions, and many offer them up and it is hard to sort out whether to listen, be offended, politely reject, or take heed to the advice.  The more in tune you are to the first step listed above, the more clear this answer is.  In fact, my purpose in writing this is that I hope my voice will help someone down the line - and respectfully, it may not help all. That same veterinarian mentioned above was the right voice to listen to for Noel.  She had advanced kidney cancer which was only discovered when her body went into shock and she was in the emergency hospital on IVs.  She recovered, and we brought her home, but she was never the same.  Yes, she could still walk, eat, and had a lot more function than Phineas, but she was depressed  in her state.  The veterinarian's voice said, "next time she goes into shock let her go." Two months later, that is exactly what we did.

With Logan, it was my inner voice that initiated the process, and being in touch with that internal voice proved to be critical footing when I ended up with a stranger making the last recommendations for what I should do.  On Saturday Logan took a downturn and for the first time I saw him have fear.  He was never a dog of fear.  He was still walking, eating, but swelling and dehydrated.  There were tools I knew we could still leverage to help, some Pepcid AC for the gas and pedialyte for dehydration.  Sunday morning he was improved.  I thought, yet again, that another miracle had happened like so many times before.  But, as the day progressed, all the previous night's symptoms returned, and I suspected the kidneys needed to be flushed and we'd need subQ fluids to do that at minimum.  I listened to my internal voice and we headed to Dogwood Emergency.

My voice was right, he did need fluids.  However, that wasn't the only problem.  The gas in his abdomen was only getting worse.  His liver was swollen.  Then the ringer, he had a heart murmur - grade 3.  It would be a delicate balance of how much subQ fluid to give and not trigger heart failure.  The emergency vet did a wonderful job. She knew we wished for him to pass at home as Phineas had done.  With empathy she asked, "is euthanasia something you are opposed to?"  Russ answered, "2 years ago they were wrong, and in March they were wrong.  I'm not saying you are wrong but I'm also not convinced."  Her statement was a wake-up call to myself that I was in denial, and I know why.  The denial was simply a matter of previous experience and that I've never "put down" a cognizant dog.  I asked some more specific questions about his condition, but when it was clear that two vital organs were failing - both the kidneys and the heart - it becomes quickly apparent that there aren't really any more levers to pull.  In addition, to let his body continue to crash would not likely be a peaceful exit as I had experienced with my previous dogs. 

I passed through the stages of grief in a matter of seconds, and although still stuck in depression, I had a glimpse of acceptance that prompted me to get Logan one last dinner from McDonald's. It had been 2 years since he was diagnosed and on a special diet, which did not include cheeseburgers or milkshakes.  But, that is exactly what I brought him back to eat.  The hardest part is that he ate it up ravenously, with so much life.  For a moment I doubted my acceptance that this was the end.  Yet there was a look in his eyes when he relaxed, a rolling back of the eyes into the sockets, that reminded me of Phineas, a signal that the light was getting dim.  I had a moment of peace in knowing that in his last moments he was happy as he enjoyed that last meal.

This brings me to my final third step - don't second guess your decision.  We aren't designed to have our emotions and reason be in exact alignment, especially during emotionally difficult times.  We often act on our emotions and try to reason it all out later. When the hard decision is made, there is no way to accurately put yourself back in that emotional moment to reason it all out and have it make sense.  When you truly have a choice (like Logan) and the dog hasn't made that choice for you (like Phineas), you have to trust your own gut and stick to it.  Then afterwards, as hard as it is, recognize what the process has taught you.  The real dignity in this process is opening yourself up to vulnerability, making that last decision with courage, and strengthening yourself and those around you in the process.  Our dogs already have dignity.  My belief is that at the end of their lives, they give the opportunity for us to learn what dignity is.  Developing our dignity, like anything else worth having in life, doesn't come easy.  The journey is hard and it is supposed to be because that is how real transformation of ourselves occurs.  With each experience we grow stronger and better and what an amazing gift our dogs give us - that gift of becoming the best person we can be - otherwise known as "becoming the person our dogs thinks we are!"

I now say farewell to my sweet boy Logan as this entry will be the last in his blog.  I am so grateful he was mine, and I was his, even if for just a brief time.


***here is a video of the last meal, and in this video there is the moment where I speak to that peace I just discussed.  It wasn't planned or reasoned, it was just pure emotion when I said, "this is the best thing we could have done."