Thirty-six years ago at about this time, my mother was nearing the end of her pregnancy and commented to her best friend that she was going to buy her kid a puppy after she turned 2 or 3 years old. She was expecting a girl and had no plans for more kids and didn't want her kid to grow up alone. Then I came along and it was obvious my sister would not grow up alone, so mom forgot all about her puppy promise. By the time we hit 3, she'd acquired a third kid and had no plans for more stuff to deal with. Then, her BFF reminded her that her exact words pre-baby were, "Whatever comes outta there is getting a puppy". She made the comment in reference to her mom joking that she'd yet to give birth after her due date came and went and maybe she was carrying a non-human baby. Well...grandma wasn't wrong. And technically, mom still had a promise to keep. Fortunately, our household was quite large at the time so she decided a dog would have plenty of people to care for it besides her. We were 3 and our brother was 2 when our first pet, Lady, came into our lives. As we grew up, she became more mom's dog than ours and adored our grandmother, who claimed she couldn't stand her but secretly liked her. In fact, it was Lady who woke us up when grandma was in distress one night and had to be rushed to the hospital. Our companion wasn't even in the same room when she sensed something was wrong, she was three doors away. Sadly, that would be the last time Lady would see grandma because she passed away a week later in the hospital. For a month after her death, Lady sat near grandma's bedroom door and howled off and on. It was awful to listen to but helped everyone cope in a weird way. Like everyone was on the same page with how much we missed grandma.
Less than a decade later, a now greying Lady started to exhibit signs of not being well. We were all teenagers by then and so was she, we'd all grown up together. We gave it a few days to see if she would improve but she got worse and one day she started refusing to eat or drink. We went into panic mode and called the vet to see about getting her in on an emergency basis but they said those appointments cost mofo money, money that we didn't have. We pawned a bunch of stuff and came up with most of it and took her in. It turned out she had multiple tumors in her stomach and there was nothing they could do. That same afternoon, we decided we had to put her down. It was all so sudden, from waking up that morning with nothing being amiss to going to bed that night with her no longer around. I remember holding her in the backseat while we drove home and finding a box to put her in before we buried her in the yard. It was the worst feeling and, at the time, only the second significant loss of a loved one I'd ever experienced (ah, those were the days, huh?).
Less than a decade later, a now greying Lady started to exhibit signs of not being well. We were all teenagers by then and so was she, we'd all grown up together. We gave it a few days to see if she would improve but she got worse and one day she started refusing to eat or drink. We went into panic mode and called the vet to see about getting her in on an emergency basis but they said those appointments cost mofo money, money that we didn't have. We pawned a bunch of stuff and came up with most of it and took her in. It turned out she had multiple tumors in her stomach and there was nothing they could do. That same afternoon, we decided we had to put her down. It was all so sudden, from waking up that morning with nothing being amiss to going to bed that night with her no longer around. I remember holding her in the backseat while we drove home and finding a box to put her in before we buried her in the yard. It was the worst feeling and, at the time, only the second significant loss of a loved one I'd ever experienced (ah, those were the days, huh?).
As I start this post, it's 3:00 on a Wednesday and I'm grappling the fact that I'll have to put another beloved family pet down on Friday. And the circumstances could not be more different than they were with Lady. After she passed away, we didn't even consider another pet because so much else was going on. But a few years later, the summer before my senior year of high school, my sister and I decided to get another dog. Mom was somewhat against it since she hoped we'd both be leaving for college the following fall and she knew neither of us would be able to take a dog with us. But she saw what it meant to us to have another one so she relented. Bud was around four months old and full of personality when we got him. Very high strung, very needy in terms of always wanting be around people and play. And he got attention from everybody in the household as life ebbed and flowed, becoming more my dog for that first year and then living with my sister, her eventual husband and their newborn for part of the next year. Once I got past my freshman year of college, he came out to live with me and Y for the rest of our college days. Part of what made my choice to move to NY a difficult one was that I knew I wouldn't be able to bring him with me. My job at the time was all hours and I was never home, so I moved him back in with my sister. Her son was a toddler during that time and deaf in one ear and he and Bud had some issues, so he ended up back with mom and, in a similar situation to the one decades early with grandma and Lady, she claimed to not love him as her own when she actually did. She and Bud have remained together ever since, though he's also spent time at my sister's with the kids quite often (custody arrangements for animals are all the rage nowadays).
Bud has been mostly healthy his entire life, which is somewhat remarkable since he's a small dog and they can sometimes have a lot of issues and shorter lifespans. It wasn't until the last few years that he's had arthritis problems that affected his mobility. Still, his spirit was strong and he was still able to get around okay and eat and drink. But the last year he's slowly started to decline. Miss N and I see him and spend time with him every time we go home and he's always happy to see us and play with her. We noticed the signs of dementia late last year, but were working through it with him and having moderate success, as much as you can considering the circumstances. But I could tell he was changing. He seemed to no longer recognize us at times and was often unsure of where he was and frightened of his surroundings. He began to decline more as the year turned over, but not rapidly. It was not until last month that he began having sleep issues and his mobility became severely limited. He whimpers whenever he has to move too much and mostly sleeps without any real quality of life left. He can't move himself, shows no interest in playing anymore. There used to be some shades of his playful personality but now there's none of that. Unfortunately, the end is here for Bud.
We've lived with the fact that Bud was probably on his way out for months now but did not have to make that final decision until the last few days. Now that a date has been set and I know that the next few days will be his last, I'm finding it difficult to cope. There was no making and living with the decision with Lady, no countdown to doom. It had to be done in the moment and we knew it so we did it. This time...it kills, man. I know it's the right thing and I know he's had a long and very good life, certainly longer than anyone anticipated. But that doesn't make it any less difficult. I've spent much of the last 24 hours with him and it's been tough. I want to change my mind and say he's fine and let's not go through with it, but I know that's not an option. His quality of life is not good and no matter how many moments of apparent lucidity he has, it's all just illusion. Dogs are conditioned not to show pain and while I have a feeling he knows what's coming, and that he's ready for it, he's still as scared as we are.
Part of me wondered if I wasn't being overly emotional about this whole thing. Since the decision was made, I've had moments where I think of something involving him and I tear up. I know putting our first dog down was harder on mom than it was on us since the dog had become more hers than ours. But this time the roles are reversed. And Y pointed out another reason as to why I may be so emotional over it. It's the end of an era, in many ways. We grew up with Lady but we came of age with Bud. When we got Lady, I was a toddler and when we lost her, I was a teenager. When we got Bud, I was almost an adult and now I'm a father who's on the doorstep of turning 36. He and I have been through some major losses together. He predates the Dark Ages. He predates my memory issues. He's seen all the good and the bad. He's the last real tie to who I used to be. It's not just the loss of a pet or a loved one, it's the end of an entire time period. I can't imagine what it's going to be like when he's gone.
