The Good, The Bad, The Ugly...

Along with all the good and happiness that comes with owning a dog (or dogs), there is always a bit of sorrow that will happen at one point or another. Any time your dog is sick or an injury occurs your heart just wants to break for them. I think it's almost as important to share those hard times as it is all the good time - who knows what someone else might learn or gain from your experience? Here's another one of my sad doggie tales...

In my early twenties I finally moved to a nice house with a yard (vs. an apartment) that came with an amazing landlord who simply said "I don't care how many pets you have, just take care of the house." Say what?! So even though I had my hands full with a toddler AND my first pitbull doggie, named Funky, I knew it was time for another dog. Enter Daisy the Rat Terrier:

While I'm totally a "big dog" girl, I decided to give this small pup a chance. One look and I knew she belonged with me regardless. Daisy and Funky became the very best of friends and did EVERYTHING together. It was totally cute and made you just want to say "Awww".

For 5 years Daisy had no health problems whatsoever. She was active, healthy and kept my pittie on her toes! One warm spring day, I took the dogs out back as usual. We have three stone steps that the pups have to go down from the door to the backyard. They had gone up and down those stairs a million times. Halfway down the steps little Daisy let out a big yelp! Nothing looked off that I could see, no injury per se, and she started walking around. Slowly for sure, but walking fine none the less. She even made it back up the steps with no sound so I just discarded the event from my mind.

Fast forward to dinner time that same day. Daisy starts yelping again out of nowhere. She was laying on her bed just whining. I slowly inspected her body with my hands gently and her yelping seemed to get worse in one area by her back/leg. Of course I called the vet right away. He didn't think it was an emergency (they were already closed) but perhaps she just tweaked her back the wrong way. I was told to come in first thing at 8am the next morning and they would check her out.

My baby Daisy yelped all night long - one of the longest nights of my life. I tried ice, I tried a heating pad, I tried gentle massage...nothing was helping her. I eventually caved and gave her half a tramadol (doggie pain meds) left over from my other pup. I am not about giving medications at all, and certainly not any that isn't prescribed directly to the dog but I was DESPERATE.

The next morning at the vet we found out what the issue really was. Somehow, when she was going down the stairs she took it a little sideways and did indeed tweak her back. Enough so that it cut off one of the main blood vessels to her rear back leg, she was losing feeling in her leg and it was turning purple. They said don't panic, we can help! The plan was to keep her there for a week for a bunch of treatments, including multiple cold laser therapy sessions to try and free up the circulation. I was optimistic...but it wasn't meant to be.

Despite all the multiple treatments they tried on her when she was there, nothing was working! She was so doped up on pain meds that she slept most of the time, but without them she was in agonizing pain. There was nothing else they could do. None of us wanted her to suffer any more, so the decision to send her over the rainbow was made. One of the hardest things I ever had to do, and have done again since but that's a different story...

But Miss Daisy was finally pain free, and for that I was thankful. It's always a hard choice to make, but I could feel it was the right one. And we all tried, to do everything we could. But it wasn't enough. Hug and kiss your doggies tonight, you never know what tomorrow will bring.