How do you know when it’s time to put your dog down? When she’s had enough? Dog owners walk a fine line between reason and compassion. The suffering and diminished quality of an old dog’s life is one thing. But rational thinking can be clouded by sweet memories and the moments when our dogs seemed to transcend their animal nature, responding uncannily to our needs, our thoughts, our human-ness.
Our dog, Lovey, has astonished us with her pure, spot-on responses to certain situations. Call me crazy. I don’t care. Lovey and I know the truth.
One night, sick in bed, unable to get warm, I thought how nice it would be to have Lovey up on the bed – normally forbidden territory. The thought of her warm, soft body close to mine circled around my feverish brain for a while when I heard her thumping up the stairs. With a determined leap she was on the bed and curled up, her back pressed against me. Her warmth seeped into my bones and I finally slept. Coincidence?
Another time while laid up following surgery she nudged my hand, dangling over the side of the bed. Jumping up and sniffing my incision, she seemed to be checking on me. A few evenings later Dan & I gingerly played her favorite game. Stationed on either end of the living room, we scooted a tennis ball back and forth across the carpet. On the fourth or fifth pass, we let her get it and then the game would become (for her) to keep it away from us at all costs. This time, though, she walked the ball to me, dropped it gently, sat and looked at me. We were stunned. Who was this dog? How did she know?
We never actually decided to get a dog. But my husband and I, having been raised with family dogs, knew how much they contributed to a family’s culture and it seemed a natural step for our family. We started going to the shelter “just to look.” Three months into our sporadic visits we spotted her, sitting at the back of her cage, calm as a monk amidst the barking and chaos. “Hello there.” She stood and walked towards us, zen-like and restrained in spite of her surroundings and her pitifully skeletal condition. When my husband squeezed his hand between the bars, she leaned into his palm, hungry for the physical affection that we soon learned was as important to her well being as food.
It took several baths to wash off the pound smell and dirt from time on the road. For the first few weeks, in the evenings, I sat on the floor, back braced against the couch, and Lovey would climb into my lap. I held her like a baby, heart to heart, her head on my shoulder, stroking her thin back for hours.
She went everywhere with me. Errands, social events, school (where she was the most popular kid on the playground). One friend suggested that we “just get it over with and have a commitment ceremony already.” But we didn’t need that. We didn’t need no piece of paper from the city hall keeping us tied and true. We were in it for the long haul, me and my dog.
She often rode in Dan’s truck as he did his rounds and even hung out on boats with him while he worked. The two of them wrestled every night as we watched and laughed at this side of her – the doggier side.
She was a furry sister to my daughters, sleeping with them, allowing them to dress her in costumes and do photo shoots, teaching her tricks. During slumber parties she would burrow into the middle of the pack, to the delight of the girls and their friends.
She developed a different – but equally strong - relationship with each one of us.
And here we are, 12 years later, facing the excruciating reality of her declining condition. She is mostly blind and deaf, has a tumor on her hip, struggles up stairs and even on short walks. It’s been a while since she has run across a field with her butt down and her ears back. She can no longer swim and fetch sticks. She falls periodically. Incontinence controlled by medication. But her tail still wags wildly and she yodels and grabs a toy when we get home and brings it to us. And she eats with amazing gusto.
I keep hoping she’ll die in her sleep. Or have a sudden seizure and die in my arms. But that is unlikely and so I think the time is coming. Or is here.
When a dog rolls over and opens her legs, it is a sign that she trusts you with her innermost being. With her most vulnerable spot. Her soft, unprotected belly. How do you walk such a creature into the vet for the last time without feeling like a traitor?
But – are you a traitor? Or are you honoring the trust she has put in you to take care of the things she cannot when the time is right? Are you returning her love and trust by exposing the your soft underside – your vulnerability – and doing what is right?
One of the hardest things for me is beginning to talk about her in the past. I don't like the sound of, "Lovey WAS the best dog.” How does time go by so quickly? How does what seems like an eternal "now" come to feel so suddenly over and done with?
But this is not about me. This is about Lovey. It’s about the responsibility we took on when we brought her home. It’s about the lessons that she continues to teach us.
We owe you this, Lovey. One last belly rub and then it’s time to go. Darn it.
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