Losing a loved Pet
Has to be one of the hardest things in life and not dissimilar to when you lose a loved one.
My dog Alfie is 15, we got him from the dog recue when he was a year old, my little daughter chose him, although she’s now at Uni, as far back as she can remember Alfie is there, he’s been a fantastic little dog, intelligent, affectionate and a great little guard dog, he’s a house dog and participates in all aspects of family life and even comes on holiday with us which he always loves, in January I noticed he had a small lump in his neck and his lips were very red, so off to the Vet who thought he may have problems with his teeth and had picked up an infection so I agreed he have his teeth cleaned under anaesthetic and they took a biopsy of his lump, all went well and he was back to his happy self within 24 hours, the results of the biopsy were due the next day.
Vet called to say results were back and to bring the little fella in for a post op check, sadly the results were bad, he had Leukaemia and we were told he only had 3 or 4 months to live, longer if he had chemotherapy but unlikely to be more than 6 or 7 months, it was a huge shock considering he was there wagging his tail waiting for the treat the Vet always gave him, took a few days to sink in and we decided that he would not have chemo, its bad enough in humans.
For the first couple of months there was little change and I even thought maybe they had made a mistake but then again the lump was getting bigger and his lips were very red, in himself he was sleeping more and more and although still happy to chase his ball and go on long walks he was very quickly tired, he was also loosing weight and very quiet, on Monday this week he really deteriated and not eating very much and not really moving off his bed, although the tail was wagging whenever we came home from work or someone comes to the house, were only days away from that final trip to the Vet as this morning he has gone down hill further, im told I will know when the time is right and it will be a relief but it truly is one of the hardest things to do, Pets and particularly dogs bring us so much joy and happiness, give there love, affection and protection unconditionally, makes me think when people say that someone behaved like an animal or like a dog, how wrong that statement is.
Anyway not sure why I wanted to start a thread on it, maybe helps me but im sure there’s many out there who can relate to what im going through and have experienced a similar thing with there pets, in time we will get another dog I expect but maybe not for a while, had dogs all my life when I was a kid but maybe the fact this fella has been the only dog makes it harder as when I grew up we always 3 or 4 as my Mum would take the older dogs from the rescue that often no one wanted and give them a home for the last few years of there lives and remember we never had a bad one, all would come out of there shell and be charging round the fields were she lives in one big happy gang in no time, when they passed on it was sad but you knew they had come off death row and with the other dogs around seemed to ease the sadness, this little fella though will leave a big hole.