DF told me he shot his dog

[DickDarstedly]

I have just been visiting DF (90) in his care home. We were talking about the various pets we have had over the years. He said he had had a dog as a child and that he had shot it dead because it had been badly behaved. I said that is awful and asked if he was sad he had done it, I also asked what his parents had said about it. His response was to repeat that the dog was annoying, as if that explained everything.

I have never heard this story before and DF does have dementia, earlier in in the visit he told me his father had just died (he died 30 years ago). It’s just possible he is ‘remembering’ something he heard about or saw in a film. The thing is though, he has always lacked empathy and so I am inclined to think it is true.

I am still travelling home and don’t have anyone to share this with until I get back. I’d like to make sense of it. For context, DF has done many things over the years which show that he has no empathy or conscience, but I have tended to make excuses for him. But now I am wondering if I have been a bit naive. I know life was different in the 1940s/50s but to me this is sociopathic and it really changes how I think about him.

How would you feel if you heard this from a parent?

As he has dementia I would take it with a pinch of salt.

Did he have access to a gun (farm family maybe? ) or are you a Kray op?

I would take with a pinch of salt too

My FIL has dementia, and has said some things that we know are not true.
There’s no point stressing about something that might or might not be true 💐

Did he own a gun? Was he a 'countryman'?
i know rural people eho might have thought it was ok to so this if a dog had
turned vicious, or was very ill.
But not just because it was annoying.

I'd feel distraught.

however, if they had dementia I'd actively chose to think it's a mis memory.

my much much loved Ex grandfather, was terrified of toast coming out of the wardrobe in the hospital & taking over the ward. Could NOT understand why he couldn't drive his car home😫

Dementia patients have really good recall of events that happened years ago, my mum is like this and it’s always negative stories about her father. I’m sorry to say this probably did happen but hopefully the dog didn’t suffer. How didn’t your dad have access to a gun? I wouldn’t dwell too much on this OP horrible as it is in the distant past and animals are suffering every second somewhere on the planet. It really won’t help you to dwell on this. I am sorry and I understand you are upset though

People with Dementia say all sorts of things. They may be no truth in it whatsoever so I wouldn't take it too much to heart.

@Creepymanonagoatfarm that was the first question I asked him because I couldn’t understand why there was a gun in the house. His parents were the most respectable and mildest you can imagine. He said that everyone in the country had a gun in those days and I do know my grandfather had a gun when he was in the Home Guard, also vaguely remember talk of an air rifle.

OP, this is how farmers dealt with unacceptable behavior from dogs for a long time. Did your dad grow up on a farm?
Euthanising dogs still happens when they are uncontrollable - usually not shot by the farmer’s young kid anymore but it’s a reasonably humane way to do it. How ´naughty’ was the dog? - if it was worrying the sheep for example, or it bit someone, it was never going to be able to work safely.

If in the past/your childhood you observed him being kind to animals then I would put it down to dementia but if you witnessed him treating animals without respect, I’d say it was a possibility.

In the old days people did shoot their dogs. In cases where they were too aggressive etc.. some shot their dogs if they were not up to the job eg farm work. It was a different age. I find it horrifying but it was a normal in those times. Not now thankfully just let it pass. Thankfully it isn’t common now, we know better and is in the past.

My mum never forgot that her dad gave her pet rabbits to his brother and she saw their skins hanging up in the uncles shed and she hasn’t forgotten that now despite her memory loss. Some things are so upsetting I guess they stick in your mind. And the goose raised for Christmas dinner that none of them ate as the girls treated it like a pet for months. Life was cruel back then 😢

@TwoMonthsOff
Dementia patients have really good recall of events that happened years ago

You are simply wrong about this. Lots of them get as confused about the past as the present. They can also make stuff up and sound extremely convincing. It is not the case that recent memories disappear and new ones cannot be made while older ones are retained intact. That is not how it works.

Honestly I don’t think this would affect me. One, he has dementia. It mightn’t be true anyway, dementia patients can sound so very convincing even when it’s proven to be utter bollocks. Two, it was a different time. You’d not even recognise the world then. Three, it’s been and done (if true), long in the past.

@ClaudiusTheGod
please don’t say that I’ve been with mums psychiatrist several times she been in advanced dementia care for two years now so please -,with respect back off

Thank you for your responses everyone.

It wasn’t a farm dog but they did live in the country and ate their own chickens and rabbits so I guess animals were seen very differently then, even pets.

He has a history of nastiness generally but it is sensible to be reminded that it’s all a long time ago and his dementia might also be involved.

@TwoMonthsOff everyone is different. One person’s experience is not the same as everyone else’s.

Op, it could mean many things. It could be true but equally it could be complete nonsense. I’m sorry that you are going through this, it’s hard.

Try to forget about it. My Dad told me he'd had an affair and this was his punishment (being in a care home). He also had dementia. I've chosen not to dwell on it. Maybe it happened but it won't help anything now.

Please don't judge him harshly. Times and opinions change.
Instead of taking my dying pet rabbit to the vets to be put to sleep humanly, my DF got the local butcher to come to our house and ring its neck. Poor Peter 🐰

People with dementia dont tend to make up lies, they just repete memories regressing back further into their past.

Guns werent banned until the 90s, it not unbelievable that he owner or had access to one in childhood if hes elderly.

While I personally believe its barbaric these types of things where also completely common historically - people shot horses/dogs, drowned cats/dogs, drop heavy things on small animal like rabbits... it was their way of PTS back then. The animals didnt have too be sick just 'unwanted' and they even sometime ate them especially rabbits (pet or not).

People with dementia absolutely can have distorted “memories “. My father in law, who’d been a civil servant during the Cold War, was convinced he’d spent time evading the KGB in various bizarre situations which were certainly untrue, for example.
On the other hand, people certainly did (and sometimes still do) shoot dogs. It may be distressing to think about, but when done skilfully it’s very humane (I’m a vet). So while you will never know whether this is true, I don’t think the dog will have suffered if it did happen.

I think it's likely that he did this because it was pretty common years ago, particularly in the countryside.
I would feel devastated if I'm honest. Although I would say that your df's filtering has gone so you need to take this into consideration.

I wouldn’t visit him again after this. It would upset me too much and I’d worry about what else he would say.

But I love my pets way more than I love my parents so that’s just my own feelings on the matter.

I’d take some time to digest it and see how you feel about it. You didn’t do anything wrong as you weren’t there so if he has enough understanding maybe ask him not to talk about it if he brings it up again and try not to think about it.

My father in law said he'd killed Winston Churchill, which I'm fairly certain wasn't true...