https://i.imgur.com/7wkpx6U.jpg
Printable View
:lol: I love this thread..
NO WAIT! It's far too cutesy and I don't like pets :x
I could so totally watch this gif for hours. This is my Zen for the day.
:lol:
I hate those little fuckers.
I love the kiss before the dog tries it. "Ok kid, one last smooch in case this kills me" :lol:
Alice Wright for Metro.co.uk
https://i.imgur.com/B8HgMme.jpg
My dog died today. I knew he was going to, I’d booked the appointment the day before.
You get given the last appointment, the ‘death slot’, so as the vet waiting room empties out only you and your dog are left.
No one else to witness your loss.
I got dressed up, put on some make-up, some perfume.
I don’t know why but it seemed appropriate to have made an effort. But of course he didn’t know or care what I wore, just that I was there.
His name was Basil, he was a big bouncing boxer dog. He liked footballs, chicken and to sleep on our bed.
He’d been failing for a while, slowing down, losing weight, heart troubles, neurological damage.
But he’d hung on in there, every time we thought it was over he’d surprised us, another new drug, another new day.
He’d rallied so often we joked that in the past year he’d had more renaissances than a French king.
He was stubborn. I knew he didn’t want to die, he didn’t want to leave us.
The latest sudden downturn made us realise he wasn’t infallible.
Maybe he wouldn’t always be around, maybe it wasn’t fair letting him keep hanging on.
And so, yes, I booked the appointment because if you love your dog that’s what you do, right?
But as we clipped on his lead for that last time he seemed happy for another excursion, stronger, interested and excited. Trusting.
He enjoyed the walk, the sun on his face, took a roll in the grass.
‘Look,’ I said, ‘there’s still walks to be had, chicken to be eaten. He’s rallied again. The King rises.’
It was inconceivable we’d walk out of the vets again without him. Surely.
https://i.imgur.com/OtHkSv9.jpg
I thought of the occasions I had booked long overdue hairdresser appointments only to wake up that day with fabulous dreamy hair. Damn!
‘Typical,’ said the vet. Yes, typical.
‘But you still get your hair cut though, don’t you?’ suggested my husband.
‘We’re only heading in one direction,’ said the vet.
And so if not now, when? Now while he was still happy, still enjoying the sun?
Or the bitter, bitter end? A snapped leg, a cardiac event, a collapse in his own mess? ‘Of course not,’ I said.
And so it was today.
My husband held him in a bear hug, while I looked into his eyes and thanked him, told him how proud I was of him, that I loved him. I love you Basil.
Still trusting he didn’t struggle, he looked back into my eyes until his eyes didn’t see me any more.
The next half an hour is a blur. I didn’t want to see his body. That warm, sweet-smelling fur that no longer held our Basil.
Thank goodness there was no one else to witness our loss because there weren’t enough tears in the world at that moment.
‘A good death,’ said the vet. A good life, I hoped.
After sharing a home with him for over 12 years it feels unbelievable he won’t be on the sofa or in his bed now.
So familiar he was almost invisible, part of every day and every celebration, but his steady presence made our home what it was.
We trusted him. He looked after us, he wouldn’t go to bed until we were all tucked up, he wouldn’t eat until we were all home, he warned us of strangers outside.
He was the chosen night-time companion for insomnia, the go-to for a cuddle. A buffer for all arguments. He loved us utterly and completely.
While I grew frustrated with his ageing, his slowness, his mess, he would still limp into the kitchen to thank me for dinner, would still valiantly bark at would-be intruders, would still drag himself up and down the stairs to welcome us home or put us to bed. He was still being Basil.
And yet we’d airily discuss all the things we could do when Basil had gone, knowing that of course he would at some point be gone. Maybe a new carpet. A foreign holiday possibly?
But those stupid, ignorant discussions didn’t take into account the reality of Basil actually being gone.
And now he is I would give any new carpet or foreign holiday for him to still be here.
https://i.imgur.com/3F5QDBJ.jpg
Did he know that? Did I love him enough while he was still here? He looked after us, but did I look after him? And who is going to take care of us all now?
I am broken, in physical pain.
My husband is inconsolable in the kitchen at the loss of his best friend.
Our nine-year-old child – whose first word was an approximation of Basil and who has never lived a day without him – seemed to shrug off the news to reach for the iPad to look at some possible new puppies.
I’ve just found that same child crying strongly in their bedroom. The bedroom Basil used to check on his nightly rounds. But not anymore.
My dog died today. But it wasn’t just my dog that died today.
blahhh.. yuck!
Friend of mine from High School had to put down his dog. Had him for almost two decades. He cried telling us about it and I've never seen him cry either before or after the event. His longtime girlfriend moved out/broke up with him (he knew her since grade seven) and he wasn't as upset. He said he held his dog while the vet did his thing and he could feel his dog leaving him. :(
I was only 2 years old when this happened, so I don't remember this, but I do remember this as being a family story.
Our dog Cindy, a black and tan German Shepherd was great and my dad said she was heroic but wouldn't really elaborate at first. I grew up with many pictures of the dog hanging on the walls and said "why can't I have a dog like her?" But my dad said he didn't have the heart to get another one. "Cindy was one in a million", I would be told many times. As I got older, he eventually told me stories of why she was so great. What she ended up doing ultimately shortened her life, but saved a little kid's life.
Some kids were horsing around on the train tracks near our place when all of a sudden a train was bearing down on them. Cindy ran out of our yard, knocked the boy over and managed to push him out of the way but had her side just grazed by the train, all witnessed by my dad. The train didn't really hit her full on, but it did do a number on the muscles of her hindquarters. My dad said he was some distance away so it looked like she was clear of the train, but something hanging off the train probably hit her.
They had perform an operation and had to shave her at the rear and after they'd seen to her wounds after coming home, if any company came she would bolt to the safety of the dining room table so that no one saw her rear - making sure only her front was visible.
She at first seemed to be healing OK but my dad noticed that she'd occasionally whimper and limp and was not her enthusiastic self. After about a month, this started happening all the time, and there was me to factor in there, toddling on the floor, so my dad took her to the vets and they said that there was nothing more they could do.
He brought her back home so that my Brothers and my Mom could have one last cuddle, one last stroke of her back and he drove the dog back to the vet the next day.
He stayed with Cindy as she passed and held it together OK. Then, as he turned on the car "Think it Over" by Buddy Holly came on the radio and he said he bawled his eyes out. This made-of-granite war veteran who seemed to the outside world fairly hard (his kids and wife knew different) just lost it.
Over the years I'd hear tales of how she'd taken a line drive of a baseball - Cindy had seen the ball coming right for my mom and walked in the way, so she'd take the hit instead of my mom and other stuff I've forgotten, as I wasn't there, only heard about her in stories after the fact.
Dogs are amazing beings.
by Arin Greenwood - The Today Show
https://i.imgur.com/qvOnZJPh.jpg
Hippo the dog came into the shelter as a stray with tumors all over his face, along with other indications of a rough life that was going to be ending very soon.
But Sophiane Nacer, the 19-year-old founder of Cayleb’s Kindred Senior Dog Rescue, was determined to make sure this sick and elderly dog would get the chance to enjoy this earth before his time here was done.
"Even if it was just for a day," Nacer told TODAY.
Hippo was found as a stray, in the middle of October. He was brought to the Adams County Animal Shelter in Colorado, where the shelter's vets found him to be "obviously in failing health with multiple tumors," Jim Siedlecki, the shelter's spokesperson, told TODAY.
Under state law Hippo was required to be held at the shelter for five days. Nacer, whose nonprofit specializes in helping old, ill dogs, got Hippo out Oct. 18 — as soon as that period was through.
Nacer wasn't sure Hippo would want to be touched; she thought it might be too painful for him given that his skin was in very bad shape. She also thought it was possible he'd be too sick and too worn out to embark on any adventure.
"We were kind of unsure if he was going to be receptive to anything," she said.
He was, though. Hippo began wagging his tail right away and set out with enthusiasm.
"He would approach you with everything he had," Nacer said.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FzRVjjVzzIg
There's no better way to say this: Hippo had a really, really wonderful time.
There were car rides, and going to Starbucks for a special puppuccino. He and Nacer went to a park, where Hippo eagerly made some friends, ate some delicious food — and decided he wanted to drink from a lake. (Nacer wouldn't ordinarily allow a dog to drink lake water; given Hippo's situation, he was allowed to do more or less what he wanted.)
https://i.imgur.com/HQdwKrx.jpg
Hippo's day included a Starbucks puppuccino, which he enjoyed a lot.
After about five hours, Hippo seemed very tired.
"You could tell that he had enjoyed the day but he was done," Nacer said. "It was time and he knew it."
Nacer brought Hippo home. A veterinarian who specializes in at-home euthanasia came over, bringing along some roast chicken.
"He gobbled it, then fell asleep," Nacer said. "He passed very peacefully."
https://i.imgur.com/ppc5F0M.jpg
Nacer hopes that Hippo's story will inspire others to do something good for a shelter dog
Siedlecki, the spokesperson for Adams County Animal Shelter, says he's thankful that Hippo was able to have this time with Nacer, even though it was brief.
“It’s always difficult when animals are in the condition that Hippo was in when he arrived at our shelter,” he told TODAY. “We’re grateful to have a good relationship with a community partner like Cayleb’s to work with in a unique case like Hippo’s.”
As hard as it is for Nacer to have had so little time with Hippo, the experience is more than worth it for her. She believes that every dog should have this opportunity: to leave this world knowing what it is like to be loved so well.
This is especially true for those like Hippo, who "probably hadn't had a good day in a very long time," Nacer said.
"We got a good day," she said. "He loved it."
:lol: