Now We Needed A Dog Part 3

Our house is a split level. When the family was doing things in different rooms, Dana would perch herself at the dining room steps. From there, she could see someone watching TV in the family room, she could watch the boys schooling in the office, keep an eye out if someone was in the kitchen, and see if someone was at the front door. Always alert and protecting us. Even when she was napping, we could see those big radar ears perking up and pointing in the direction of a noise. Occasionally, especially when she got older and we would settle into the family room to watch TV, she would fall into a deep sleep and have doggie dreams. She would make this quiet semi-barking sound while her legs were “running” like she was chasing a squirrel or something in her dream. It was so cute and funny!

During her “heyday”, Dana was our friend, our protector, and our playmate. She was fun, loyal and loving. For the first few years we had her, I pretty much took care of her (of course) and although we had more of that pack leader/pack member relationship, I didn’t feel the same way about her as I did about our previous dog. However, as she got older, better trained, and calmer, we certainly had our own special relationship and she was a great family member. She loved us unconditionally, and we loved her back the same way.

She looked way more vicious than she was because she wasn’t vicious at all. The picture on part 1 of this series of entries was Dana down the basement hiding on the sofa next to Josh during a thunder storm. She would shake and cry and try to hide. Thunderstorms were her kryptonite and were the only times she would get up on the furniture so she could be close to one of us for protection. When we walked her people would say how big she was and ask if she was friendly. “She’ll probably lick you to death” I often responded. She was pretty awesome.

Not everything was peaches and cream as anyone with an older dog would know. I woke up one Christmas day and went downstairs to let her out. She’d been acting kind of funny the night before and would follow me around, I couldn’t figure out what was wrong. She didn’t come upstairs that night to sleep next to me either. On occasion as she aged she would stay on her bed in the family room at night, but most of the time she was right by my side. When I got to the dining/living room area, I noticed a few spots where she had spit up during the night. She was laying down leaning against the sofa panting heavily and when I looked in her eyes, they were moving quickly back and forth. Something was definitely wrong. I told her to get up so we could go out. She stood up and stumbled and then fell over. It looked like she was dizzy. I woke up my wife and told her something was going on with Dana. Since it was a holiday, our vet wasn’t open but there was a 24 hour animal hospital not too far away.

She rarely let me pick her up in my arms, and today was no different. The boys and I got Dana onto a blanket, and much to her disapproval, carried her out and laid her down in the back of my SUV. When we got to the animal hospital they had a very large vet tech come out. He asked me if she bites and I told him no. He promptly just swept her up into his arms and carried her into the building, no blanket, no muss, no fuss.

She had what they called Vestibular disease. Essentially in humans this is like vertigo and is apparently common in older dogs. There wasn’t really much they could do other than give her meds and fluids to keep her comfortable. They said she’d be fine but most of the time after these episodes, the dogs have a slight but permanent head tilt. It also seemed to affect her hind legs somewhat but that got a little better over time. They kept her overnight and called us the next day to come get her. One of the techs told me Dana almost ate another dog that morning. Ah, so she’s pretty much back to normal. The head tilt was actually kind of cute, like she was in a constant state of curiosity. She did make a full recovery but she was about 11 or 12 by that time which was pretty good for a shep, but we figured she was on borrowed time so we made sure to make the most out of any time she had left.

About a year and a half later she started acting funny again. She wouldn’t eat regularly, didn’t always want to go out and seemed to be lethargic. I took her to the vet. He said her gums were very white which indicates she was anemic. She was bleeding somewhere but it wasn’t obvious where so he wanted to take some x-rays. He called me back to his office, the news was not good. She had a splenic tumor and it looked like that’s where she was bleeding internally. He said we had a few options. We could go to another vet that would do an ultrasound and assess whether or not the tumor was operable. Even if it was, she was 13 and a half and not in the best of health, there was a good chance she wouldn’t make it through an operation. Our other choice, meds to help her gain some strength and keep her comfortable for whatever time she had left.

A difficult decision. Not only were the potential medical expenses prohibitive, but even if she survived the operation, we didn’t know how much longer she had or what her quality of life would be. We decided to take the meds and give her the most love and treats we could offer for the time she had left. We gave her everything. Extra love, eggs in her food, real people food most of the time, anything we could to let her know we loved her. She really rallied on the meds for the first week and was enjoying life with us.

During the second week we could see the decline again. She didn’t easily take the meds and you could tell she just wasn’t feeling well. It was a Saturday morning late in April 2015. Again, Dana was not feeling well the night before and didn’t come upstairs to sleep. It took all she had to go out and do her business that night. In the morning, she wasn’t very interested in taking her meds, eating, drinking, or even getting a treat. She was just lying in her bad panting but still wagging her tail when she saw us.

I took Josh and Seth to Budo (their Martial Arts school) because they were helping with the belt test that day. On my way home, my wife called me and said that Dana was not doing well. She pooped while lying in bed and had no interest in getting up. We feared the worst. I went back to Budo, told the boys what was going on and let them know that this was probably going to be it for Dana. We all left Budo together and went home.

We were all sitting around her trying to get her to eat or drink but generally just loving on her and crying. We knew the inevitable was at hand and I didn’t want her to suffer unnecessarily. She was most likely not going to make it through the day, I had to make the decision to call the vet. We made an appointment, we had a couple of hours more to spend with her before the ride.

When the time came, the boys and I put her on a blanket again and carried her out to the car. She didn’t struggle this time, almost like she knew what was going to happen and she was ready. She was the calmest of all of us. The vet’s office brought out a stretcher and wheeled her into the back. To add insult to injury, I had to stop at the desk and pay for them to do this. I know its part of the process, but you would think they could have billed me later. We were all a mess. Once they got her IV in and got some meds in her they told us to go back and spend as much time as we wanted.

We were just hugging her, kissing her, telling her how much we loved her and crying our eyes out. She was just looking at us like she was saying, “Its ok guys, I’m glad you’re all here and I love you too, but I’m ready.” Totally heartbreaking. I don’t know how long we were there with her, but we finally told the vet to go ahead. We stayed with her, hugging and kissing her til she stopped breathing, and then a little longer after that. Devastating. Our solace was that we were her last sight before she drifted off. It was our last act of love for her, the most humane and loving thing we could do to stop her suffering. She was 13 and a half years old, we had her for 11 of those years. We gave her as good a life as we could and she gave us unconditional love and loyalty back.

Just as we did with our first Shepard, we had Dana cremated. She came home about a week later and shares the shelf in our family room with Gretchen. Both our girls are home for good.

Now we’re definitely done with dogs! I don’t want to go through this yet again! I just can’t anymore! Ok, five months after Dana passed away, we adopted a little rescue Pitbull named Amos. Here we go again!