My beautiful 11 year old boy is struggling with end stage arthritis. It is heartbreaking. I spoke with my vet twice last week about scheduling in a ‘planned’ euthanasia at home, but he rallied so I decided to give it the weekend. As always happens, on Saturday night he was obviously struggling with his leg, he’s been up and down since and I’ve got a standby appt at emergency vet hospital and am sleeping downstairs with him just in case. Vet hospital said it seems fair enough get him through to tomorrow morning while he’s sleeping well etc, so my vet can come to the house.
He’s eating, drinking, and valiantly barking at the postman today, and has been out for a bimble - but has had a bit of an upset tum which is complicating things. He’s already on a huge cocktail of drugs and we’ve upped the doses to the sort of numbers he couldn’t survive on for long anyway, to keep him calm and comfortable overnight.
It’s just me and him. He’s got me through so much, been around the world with me, and I’m absolutely devastated already - and he’s still here. I’m taking endless photos and checking on him constantly and it just seems unbelievable and incomprehensible that tomorrow he’ll be gone.
But he’s struggling, we’re perilously close to the line where he has no dignity or his QOL is unacceptable, and I really want to avoid an emergency vet dash if he becomes unable to walk at all. So I’ll be calling tomorrow and he’ll be gone this time tomorrow. It’s so unreal. He’s so alive, even though he’s a shadow of the dog he used to be he’s still there. Please tell me in time this gets better - or maybe that there’ll even be some relief that he’s not in pain anymore.
I’m on edge and slept about 2hrs last night and had horrible nightmares about him, unrelated to the euthanasia but still. I know this is the kindest thing and that it is time to love him more than myself, but I’m railing against how unfair it is to die of joint failure when his system is otherwise ok, his mind is still alert etc. I will miss him an indescribable amount and simply cannot imagine an empty house.
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The doghouse
Know it’s time - tomorrow - and am heartbroken.
59 replies
Baybetterdays · 02/08/2020 18:13
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