Outside A Dog

We lost Puppy on Friday.

The house is now too quiet, and I can barely bring myself to walk downstairs into what was her domain. Saturday afternoon I could have sworn that I heard her sit up on her couch to peer over the back as I made my way down the steps. She wasn’t there, though.

Thursday morning she had one of her weekly checkups with the girls at the vet. It kind of went as expected: she was coming out of remission, due [in my mind] to the fact that during the previous chemo session she couldn’t have the ‘good’ drug, having reached her lifetime limit on it — it’s one of those drugs that can wreck havoc if given more than six times over the course of a dog’s life — and the substitute drug just wasn’t up to snuff. So the doctor went over the [dwindling] treatment options, and sent everyone on their merry way with an appointment scheduled for Tuesday.

Thursday night during dinner Puppy had a couple of very brief spasm-y, seizure-y things. Brief, but worrisome — but otherwise, she seemed fine. A little more quiet than usual, maybe, if anything. She laid with us in the living room as we watched the hockey game, and afterward took up her favorite position on the landing at the bottom of the stairs. As I sat in the living room watching whatever after-game program was on, I heard her stand up and take a few steps up the stairs. I leaned over to look down the stairs at her just in time to see another seizure send her backwards and her head hit off the wall, and I flew down. We sat on the landing for a while with her head in my lap, and then when I got up for something-or-other, she moved to a cozier spot behind our bar. I resumed my duty as headrest, and we stayed there until my mom came down. I couldn’t shake my bad feelings, and as we laid there, I begged Puppy in a whisper to make it through the night.

Friday morning I woke up to a terrible look on my mom’s face. The seizures had gotten worse overnight, becoming more frequent and more severe. Puppy was laying under a desk in our game room, and didn’t even thump her tail in recognition when I went to see her. My mom was on the phone with the vet, and we opted to take her in for emergency services instead of waiting for a late-morning oncology appointment. Normally hyper-enthusiastic about trips to the vet and any car-related adventures, we had to lift her up and carry her out to the truck, and halfway there, she seized in my arms.

Three hours later, my sisters, parents and I have gathered in a back room, waiting for the techs to bring Puppy in so we can say goodbye. The cancer had spread to her brain, the doctors think, and there was very little to be done. As we sat there, we exchanged stories, and we came to realize that somehow, the day before, we’d given Puppy all of her favorite things. She’d laid outside in the sunshine with my sister during the day, and she’d had a variety of her favorite treats. Thursday night, I took Puppy outside and we chased a rabbit all around the house, sat in the yard, and I fed her a few choice blades of grass. We had pizza for dinner that night, and she feasted on pizza bones [the crusts] and had an imitation ice cream treat for dessert.

One of our favorite girls at the vet game in with a clipboard and some forms, and being both closest to her and used to filling out the paperwork, I automatically reached for it. Turns out it was the authorization for euthanasia. I have never wanted to sign my name less in my life.

They brought her in and we began our goodbyes, and I was relieved to see her pick up her head in recognition at our voices. I selfishly wanted to delay the inevitable as long as possible, but when another seizure took her — the worst that I’d seen so far — I knew we’d have to let her go before yet another one hit. Saying goodbye was the hardest thing that I’ve ever done.

I keep looking for her. But she’s not there to greet me when I walk in the house after work, and she’s not scratching on the bathroom door when I’m getting ready in the morning, and she’s not jumping on my bed to bark at the neighbors and get her fur all over my work clothes.

Puppy never judged me, was never disappointed when I didn’t go to grad school, never questioned my bad decisions. She seemed to love me unconditionally, and I can only hope that she knew how much I loved her. How much we all loved her. How much we’re going to miss her.

In loving memory
September 2004 — May 2009