5 ms·

A few years back, when our favorite family dog died, I wrote about it. As much as it hurt (and it was crushing), something that stood our for me was our choice

by beat 10y ago

A few years back, when our favorite family dog died, I wrote about it. As much as it hurt (and it was crushing), something that stood our for me was our choice to euthanize. We found a vet who had a specialist end-of-life practice. She offered hospice care for terminally ill animals, and in-home euthanasia services for when the time comes. She spent over an hour with us in our home, with Rubu, listening to our stories about him and helping us get ready. She then took him for cremation, and hand-delivered the ashes back to us. She was on a mission, a wonderful mission. And I keep thinking that's how I want to go... not in a hospital, wasting money on last-ditch efforts. I want to be at home, surrounded by the people who love me, listening to them tell each other stories about me. And when it's time, I want a doctor to deliver a painless injection to stop my heart and let me go in peace. There's something greatly fucked up about our society when we help our dogs die with more dignity than we do ourselves. (fwiw, Rubucac died of hemangiosarcoma, a dog-specific cancer. It attacks the cells lining the inside of blood vessels, causing them to grow random, structurally deficient ways. It usually starts in the spleen, and spreads very quickly. The new blood vessels rupture, causing internal bleeding. By the time it is discovered (usually due to weakness from the bleeding, or often, the dog just dying right on the spot), it has already spread throughout the body due to circulation. Dogs only last a few weeks at best before they die of internal bleeding, heart attack, or stroke, and treatment options are invasive and largely ineffective. I'm glad humans don't get it.)

arcanus 10y ago
Sorry for your loss. > There's something greatly fucked up about our society when we help our dogs die with more dignity than we do ourselves. And I agree! I've said it for years: our animals die more dignified deaths than many humans.
- kgwgk 10y ago
  Maybe the dogs would prefer to stay alive if they had a choice.
  - mybffisadog 10y ago
    Maybe the dogs owners, who think of the dog as family as per the article, would also prefer the dog to stay alive if they had a choice.
  - beat 10y ago
    When we got Rubu's diagnosis, we knew we only had weeks. He was going through bouts of suffering, but not in real pain, and was "himself". We were able to keep him for two weeks, before the attacks were coming too often and he was truly suffering. We could have kept him alive. He would have lived maybe hours, maybe weeks, but sooner or later, the cancer was going to kill him. We could have gone into "treatment"... removed his spleen (which might kill him then and there), followed by intensive chemotherapy. That might have gotten him months, but at the cost of great suffering. We did what was best for him, not for us. If I had my way, he'd be curled up on the couch next to me right now.
  - tunap 10y ago
    On that note, my gramma-in-law is pissed(& in agony) right now because her DNR was not respected. She is 95yo and suffered a stroke 2 weeks ago. She spent the last 9 months rehabbing a broken hip and said she would not choose to do it again. She is currently drugged to the gills, mostly paralyzed and still manages to cuss & plead for mercy. Dr Jack Kevorkian should have been lauded, instead he was given jail. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kevorkian https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kevorkian
- artacus 10y ago
  I would encourage you to take the time to just consider this in a different way. Animals that are loved are soulish, the incredible (but unfortunately not Catholic) Dr. Hugh Ross makes this easy to understand: http://www.reasons.org/articles/origin-of-soulish-animals http://www.reasons.org/articles/origin-of-soulish-animals. I would simply add that God allows us to form loving bonds with animals to provide a little heaven on earth --a loved [animal of your choice] is heaven on earth. But heaven being heaven, we won't need something as wonderful as our animal friends to make existence better. Now if the misguided Puritans didn't have their way everybody would be able to die with the amount of dignity they need to make it to the end of the race. Why, because God has provided us with all the tools we need to control pain, but the powers-that-be (really they are the pain-givers either intentionally or just out of ignorance) deny this to us --think about all the places that put people in jail for growing a plant, or otherwise prohibiting scientists to their jobs to make things better. My inner St Francis tells me that we euthanize animals at the correct time because of our love and respect for them, and there's no consequence for their souls. But for our fellow man, we provide care to its natural end so that we can all live forever. Frank T. McAndrew did a great job with this article. I think about this stuff all the time because for me it's infinitely interesting, but in my case, I put a Catholic spin on it.
  - mrkgnao 10y ago
    > so that we can all live forever At what cost?
    - artacus 10y ago
      There's only one way to live forever, and I now know with certainty that commenting on Atheist Central will not get you there, more like lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate.
      - mrkgnao 10y ago
        You swapped a couple letters around there. Haven't seen that line in a long time.
  - 10y ago
leeoniya 10y ago
same experience with my cat, Pussum. we had to euthanize him last august after he started limping and it turned out to be aggressive fibrosarcoma in his leg that already progressed to his pelvis and would have required at least a hemipelvectomy with an uncertain recovery prognosis. we euthanized him at home 3 months after diagnosis (they told us he had only a couple weeks) when he became too weak and unable to urinate and poop. it was gut–wrenching to have him die before his time while i held him. i hate to think it was a shitty vaccine, since it started close to an injection site at some point after we took him to a slightly less expensive vaccination visit at a Petco. he was an indoor/outdoor cat, so he needed the full regimen. stupid stoic cats don't tell you what's wrong before it's too late. he was only 9 :(
- AIMunchkin 10y ago
  Same thing happened to my cat, I took it to the vet to have a bladder stone removed, and I left with a 2 month terminal cancer diagnosis for her. At least she got a month of life without the bladder stone before she wasted away. Stupid stoic cats indeed. The only way I could tell she had the bladder stone was when she started peeing outside the litter box. Miss her to this day.
  - DanHulton 10y ago
    Similar thing with my cat, Lancelot. When we adopted him, we were told he was about 7 years, but he had a really shitty mouth from living in the wild (and a sore above his tail and an eye infection), so we planned on getting his mouth fixed ASAP. We brought him in, dropped about $2k on dental work, but during prep for the surgery, they discovered he had a kidney disease that was only common in older cats, like 12-15. So he was around twice as old as we thought he was. So on to kidney-healthy food he went and we prepared to only have maybe a couple years with our wonderful boy, when during a routine check-up to see how the food was working, we discovered a large mass. Cancerous or not, it was right on his pancreas, and any operation would have left serious doubts of recovery, especially considering his state. We had him for about three months after fixing his mouth. He was a lot happier for it, and we don't begrudge the money and improvement of his lifestyle, but damn, to go from "we're fixing your mouth so you can have a long and healthy life" to euthanizing the poor guy four months later really fuckin' stung. If cats weren't so stoic we could maybe have done something about it while it was still small enough to safely operate.
justsomeguy01 10y ago
>There's something greatly fucked up about our society when we help our dogs die with more dignity than we do ourselves. When my Mom died (complications from cancer and trying to remove it), she was essentially allowed to suffocate over the course of 24 hours while we slowly delivered her pain meds. We could request more pain meds every certain number of times. I had to sit there watching my Mom suffocate so that everyone could have the plausible deniability of being the one that actually were the straw that broke the camel's back and caused her death. Everyone knew she was going to die, the decision was made not to go any further, and we let her endure another 24 hours of suffering. I had to put my dog down a few months earlier and the whole time staring at my Mom suffering, I thought exactly what you just said. It's a sad society when my dog has more dignity in death than my Mom.
blang 10y ago
There are some (5 maybe) death with dignity states, and the palliative care has been increasing in some states, but I agree that we do do better with animals than people in this case
Asooka 10y ago
Dogs are engineered for maximum adorableness and sympathy, after all. I don't think it's that surprising that the animal we made specifically to be the best companion possible is a better companion than a random untrained person.

by beat 10y ago

arcanus 10y ago

Sorry for your loss. > There's something greatly fucked up about our society when we help our dogs die with more dignity than we do ourselves. And I agree! I've said it for years: our animals die more dignified deaths than many humans.

kgwgk 10y ago
Maybe the dogs would prefer to stay alive if they had a choice.
- mybffisadog 10y ago
  Maybe the dogs owners, who think of the dog as family as per the article, would also prefer the dog to stay alive if they had a choice.
- beat 10y ago
  When we got Rubu's diagnosis, we knew we only had weeks. He was going through bouts of suffering, but not in real pain, and was "himself". We were able to keep him for two weeks, before the attacks were coming too often and he was truly suffering. We could have kept him alive. He would have lived maybe hours, maybe weeks, but sooner or later, the cancer was going to kill him. We could have gone into "treatment"... removed his spleen (which might kill him then and there), followed by intensive chemotherapy. That might have gotten him months, but at the cost of great suffering. We did what was best for him, not for us. If I had my way, he'd be curled up on the couch next to me right now.
- tunap 10y ago
  On that note, my gramma-in-law is pissed(& in agony) right now because her DNR was not respected. She is 95yo and suffered a stroke 2 weeks ago. She spent the last 9 months rehabbing a broken hip and said she would not choose to do it again. She is currently drugged to the gills, mostly paralyzed and still manages to cuss & plead for mercy. Dr Jack Kevorkian should have been lauded, instead he was given jail. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kevorkian https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kevorkian
artacus 10y ago
I would encourage you to take the time to just consider this in a different way. Animals that are loved are soulish, the incredible (but unfortunately not Catholic) Dr. Hugh Ross makes this easy to understand: http://www.reasons.org/articles/origin-of-soulish-animals http://www.reasons.org/articles/origin-of-soulish-animals. I would simply add that God allows us to form loving bonds with animals to provide a little heaven on earth --a loved [animal of your choice] is heaven on earth. But heaven being heaven, we won't need something as wonderful as our animal friends to make existence better. Now if the misguided Puritans didn't have their way everybody would be able to die with the amount of dignity they need to make it to the end of the race. Why, because God has provided us with all the tools we need to control pain, but the powers-that-be (really they are the pain-givers either intentionally or just out of ignorance) deny this to us --think about all the places that put people in jail for growing a plant, or otherwise prohibiting scientists to their jobs to make things better. My inner St Francis tells me that we euthanize animals at the correct time because of our love and respect for them, and there's no consequence for their souls. But for our fellow man, we provide care to its natural end so that we can all live forever. Frank T. McAndrew did a great job with this article. I think about this stuff all the time because for me it's infinitely interesting, but in my case, I put a Catholic spin on it.
- mrkgnao 10y ago
  > so that we can all live forever At what cost?
  - artacus 10y ago
    There's only one way to live forever, and I now know with certainty that commenting on Atheist Central will not get you there, more like lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate.
    - mrkgnao 10y ago
      You swapped a couple letters around there. Haven't seen that line in a long time.
- 10y ago

leeoniya 10y ago

same experience with my cat, Pussum. we had to euthanize him last august after he started limping and it turned out to be aggressive fibrosarcoma in his leg that already progressed to his pelvis and would have required at least a hemipelvectomy with an uncertain recovery prognosis. we euthanized him at home 3 months after diagnosis (they told us he had only a couple weeks) when he became too weak and unable to urinate and poop. it was gut–wrenching to have him die before his time while i held him. i hate to think it was a shitty vaccine, since it started close to an injection site at some point after we took him to a slightly less expensive vaccination visit at a Petco. he was an indoor/outdoor cat, so he needed the full regimen. stupid stoic cats don't tell you what's wrong before it's too late. he was only 9 :(

AIMunchkin 10y ago
Same thing happened to my cat, I took it to the vet to have a bladder stone removed, and I left with a 2 month terminal cancer diagnosis for her. At least she got a month of life without the bladder stone before she wasted away. Stupid stoic cats indeed. The only way I could tell she had the bladder stone was when she started peeing outside the litter box. Miss her to this day.
- DanHulton 10y ago
  Similar thing with my cat, Lancelot. When we adopted him, we were told he was about 7 years, but he had a really shitty mouth from living in the wild (and a sore above his tail and an eye infection), so we planned on getting his mouth fixed ASAP. We brought him in, dropped about $2k on dental work, but during prep for the surgery, they discovered he had a kidney disease that was only common in older cats, like 12-15. So he was around twice as old as we thought he was. So on to kidney-healthy food he went and we prepared to only have maybe a couple years with our wonderful boy, when during a routine check-up to see how the food was working, we discovered a large mass. Cancerous or not, it was right on his pancreas, and any operation would have left serious doubts of recovery, especially considering his state. We had him for about three months after fixing his mouth. He was a lot happier for it, and we don't begrudge the money and improvement of his lifestyle, but damn, to go from "we're fixing your mouth so you can have a long and healthy life" to euthanizing the poor guy four months later really fuckin' stung. If cats weren't so stoic we could maybe have done something about it while it was still small enough to safely operate.

justsomeguy01 10y ago

>There's something greatly fucked up about our society when we help our dogs die with more dignity than we do ourselves. When my Mom died (complications from cancer and trying to remove it), she was essentially allowed to suffocate over the course of 24 hours while we slowly delivered her pain meds. We could request more pain meds every certain number of times. I had to sit there watching my Mom suffocate so that everyone could have the plausible deniability of being the one that actually were the straw that broke the camel's back and caused her death. Everyone knew she was going to die, the decision was made not to go any further, and we let her endure another 24 hours of suffering. I had to put my dog down a few months earlier and the whole time staring at my Mom suffering, I thought exactly what you just said. It's a sad society when my dog has more dignity in death than my Mom.

blang 10y ago

There are some (5 maybe) death with dignity states, and the palliative care has been increasing in some states, but I agree that we do do better with animals than people in this case

Asooka 10y ago

Dogs are engineered for maximum adorableness and sympathy, after all. I don't think it's that surprising that the animal we made specifically to be the best companion possible is a better companion than a random untrained person.