hiitdogs
Cathlete
Oh, I know how you feel!! This is one of the toughest decisions to every make, I had seen our 10-year-old Labrador, Jake, deteriorate over the past 12 months and for the past 6 months I have been struggeling with the decision and asked myself the same question, how do I know when he can't handle it anymore. There were many days were I was hoping, I would just die in his sleep, so I don't have to make the decision - I know this is a terrible thing to say.
People kept telling me, you will see it in his eyes, he will let you know. I disagree! He didn't, it would have been so much easier if he did. I have just come to the realisation that I didn't want to wait until it was so bad that it was abundantly clear. I wanted him to go with dignity and I wanted him to be able to walk into the vet's office on one of his good days.
The time came the week before Thanksgiving, he had been struggeling for 4 days, not able to lift himself up and basically walking on his frontlegs dragging the butt on the floor, sometimes whimpering at night and when he thought I was gone. With triple the dose of medication he was able to walk again but only barely. That was the day that I called the vet for an appointment for the next day. We had to put him down the day before Thanksgiving. The vet actually said he was so ready to go because the first shot knocked him down immediately whereas it was supposed to take at least 5 minutes for him to fall asleep, he was down within less than 30 seconds.
The worst part is, you never know if you made the right decision. You will always question yourself, was it too early, did I wait too long, should I have just changed the medication? Now, 3 weeks later I am still struggeling with it. I guess what I am trying to say, you never know when it is the right time, I just had to go by my gut feeling and think about what is best for my dog, not for myself - because part of me wanted to hold on to him longer. There really is no advise that anyone can give you, your view of quality of live maybe very different than mine.
To me my dog's quality of live was gone because he no longer could do what dogs do, run and play. Of course he still had good days mostly due to higher doses of medication and those were the days where I thought, oh geeh, see, he is still ok. But the bad days were outnumbering the good days in the end. Looking at the pictures that we have taken of him over the past 3 months, he looks incredibly sad in all those pictures - the weird thing is, I didn't see it in the pictures when he was still around, probably because I didn't want to see it.
Noone can give you any advise as to when, you are the one who knows your dog best. Whatever you decide will be the right decision for your dog because it is made out of love and concern for your furry baby.
Good luck and many cyber hugs!
Carola
People kept telling me, you will see it in his eyes, he will let you know. I disagree! He didn't, it would have been so much easier if he did. I have just come to the realisation that I didn't want to wait until it was so bad that it was abundantly clear. I wanted him to go with dignity and I wanted him to be able to walk into the vet's office on one of his good days.
The time came the week before Thanksgiving, he had been struggeling for 4 days, not able to lift himself up and basically walking on his frontlegs dragging the butt on the floor, sometimes whimpering at night and when he thought I was gone. With triple the dose of medication he was able to walk again but only barely. That was the day that I called the vet for an appointment for the next day. We had to put him down the day before Thanksgiving. The vet actually said he was so ready to go because the first shot knocked him down immediately whereas it was supposed to take at least 5 minutes for him to fall asleep, he was down within less than 30 seconds.
The worst part is, you never know if you made the right decision. You will always question yourself, was it too early, did I wait too long, should I have just changed the medication? Now, 3 weeks later I am still struggeling with it. I guess what I am trying to say, you never know when it is the right time, I just had to go by my gut feeling and think about what is best for my dog, not for myself - because part of me wanted to hold on to him longer. There really is no advise that anyone can give you, your view of quality of live maybe very different than mine.
To me my dog's quality of live was gone because he no longer could do what dogs do, run and play. Of course he still had good days mostly due to higher doses of medication and those were the days where I thought, oh geeh, see, he is still ok. But the bad days were outnumbering the good days in the end. Looking at the pictures that we have taken of him over the past 3 months, he looks incredibly sad in all those pictures - the weird thing is, I didn't see it in the pictures when he was still around, probably because I didn't want to see it.
Noone can give you any advise as to when, you are the one who knows your dog best. Whatever you decide will be the right decision for your dog because it is made out of love and concern for your furry baby.
Good luck and many cyber hugs!
Carola
Particularly after he ate 3 (THREE) of my expensive down comforters within a week and ate all of my shoes in my closet - except of the Payless shoes - of course!
