I read the following article and had to sit down and type this out. Turns out a vet was asked what the hardest part of the job was. He replied that it was when he had to put a pet down and the owners did not want to be in the room with them. In their last moments, the confused pet is looking around the room for his or her owner.
This is heartbreaking.
The woman who asked this question tweeted her vet’s answer and it went viral. I’d like to chime in for animal lovers everywhere.
I had the most wonderful cat in my childhood. His name was Holiness (it went from Stuff to Snowball to Holiness in his lifetime, but that’s another story). He was such a great companion to me. He was like a brother to me. He was very affectionate and was friendly to everyone he met.
I got him when I was 9 years old. Our family had moved from Florida to Texas and one of my sisters somehow talked our parents into getting a white Persian kitten when we moved. I think she actually bribed them with something like, “I’m not leaving my friends and Florida unless you get me a white Persian kitten” (Like she had a say in the matter). Anyway, after we settled in the Dallas area, we saw an ad in the paper and went to a home to look at the litter of kittens.
I came inside with my sister and mother while my dad stayed out in the car. When I saw the kittens, one in particular immediately approached me and licked me when I picked him up.
“Can I get one, too, Mom?” I asked.
“Go ask your father,” she said.
Seeing the look on my face, my dad later told me that he could hardly say no when I asked him. I fell in love with that little fur baby. My mom used to come into my room at bedtime to put both cats into our bathroom for the night. She had to practically pry my cat’s paws from my pajama collar, as he clung to my neck like a child to its mother. He was so sweet.
I have many fond memories of Holiness. He followed me to a friend’s house more than once and patiently waited on the front porch while I played poker for a few hours, and later walked home with me — about half a mile.
Other times he’d perch atop the boat dock post while I went sailing along Boggy Bayou in Niceville, Florida. It was a great joy for me to bring him to Austin with me after my freshman year, once I moved out of a dormitory and into an apartment. I remember once when a friend was extremely down one day and my cat approached him and licked him in the nose and curled up on his lap. Like many an animal, it’s as if they know our feelings sometimes.
Years later, it concerned me when a lump appeared between his shoulder blades. I took him to the vet and it was a tumor that they successfully removed. The vet told me it might grow back, saying they could just remove it again once it got so big. I remember making a cute video of him looking out the window on the way home from the surgery as we passed over the Colorado River on my way home.
I digress big-time. It’s hard not to reminisce when talking about a childhood pet.
It turns out that the tumor did grow back and I waited too long to bring him in. By the time I did, it had grown so big that it went down between his shoulder blades and they could not operate.
“How do you feel about euthanasia?” the vet asked me.
I wasn’t a cussing man, but I had a few choice words swirling in my head as I thought how to respond. There was no way I was going to put Holiness to sleep.
Putting an animal down is a tough subject. It’s hard for any pet owner. I’ve heard it said that people who don’t put their pets down are “being selfish — wanting their pets to stay around, but not caring about the pain their animal is going through.” I get that. My thought was that, “It’s also selfish to want to get rid of your animal once it becomes inconvenient for you — whether logistically or emotionally.”
I wouldn’t do it.
My beloved Holiness died in my arms when he was 20. It was a beautiful death, if such a thing can be said. The cancer had spread to his body so much by this time that it became hard for him to get around. He even lost his eyesight. I had placed him on a pallet I made for him at the foot of my bed — with a Hefty bag® underneath a towel for him to lay on. He was going to die and I knew it. I kept him as comfortable as possible and, since I worked out of my home, I could stay by him all the time.
On one particular September morning, I held him in my arms and was just giving thanks for him and petting him. He was purring.
I’ll stop there and say it again. He was purring.
That is profound to me. I knew he was experiencing the kind of joy we shared. I don’t know what an animal is capable of feeling, but pleasure seems to be a pretty logical conclusion to make by observation. Anyway, while cradled in my arms and on my lap, he “looked” up at me (even though he was blind) and he breathed his last and gently sat his head into the crook of my right arm.
I was broken. He was my childhood companion and now he was gone. I had to bury him later that day and it was hard. But I knew that he had experienced pleasure, joy and whatever emotions of security, comfort and love that an animal can have — even right up to his final moments.
My conclusion? That death is a part of life. It’s not easy. It’s painful, but it’s inevitable. I cannot imagine a more beautiful death for my beloved Holiness to experience.
Fast-forward 25 years and I had another tough decision to make. Mika was an adorable calico cat that my oldest daughter had given me. She had been a great companion and comfort as I struggled through a divorce. I loved her dearly and loved her playful and affectionate personality. About four years later her health went downhill. When I took her to the vet, she had a seizure while on my lap in the waiting room. I thought I had lost her right then and there, but as I comforted her, she came back relaxed.
It turns out that she had feline leukemia and her major organs were failing. The doctor recommended euthanasia. It made sense. She went through times where she was obviously not aware of where she was. Her body was giving out. I agreed with the vet and we proceeded.
He gave her a shot as I held her in my arms. She did not like the needle going into her skin and she almost playfully wrapped her teeth around my hand to bite me, but did not chomp down. She gracefully succumbed to the injection.
“This quickly numbs the brain,” he said, “and then the rest of the body.” It was like witnessing an animal slowly and restfully go to sleep. Mika laid her head down, closed her eyes and her body relaxed. It’s a very peaceful way to end a life.
“This sucks,” I told the vet.
“Yes, it does,” he agreed. I could tell that he had done this a lot and he felt a little bit of pain each and every time.
Now I’ve experienced both sides of dealing with a pet’s ailing health and wrestling with the decision about how to approach their death — compassionately “putting them out of their misery” or letting them die on nature’s terms, which can be harsh and painful. I’ve chosen both and I am glad I did. I prefer the latter, but I like to approach each big decision in my life on its own merits.
What else would I like to say about losing pets?
Besides the obvious desire to encourage pet owners to face the pain and be with their pets right up to the end — whether during a “natural” death or euthanasia in a vet’s office — I want to comfort believing pet owners with this:
God cares.
God created animals. He obviously loves His creation, but there’s a story in the Bible that seems to show profoundly how much so. It’s found in 2 Samuel and chronicles a series of crimes that the King of Israel had committed and had gotten away with for quite a while.
David looked out from his palace porch and saw a beautiful married woman bathing one night. Consumed with lust, he decided he must have her and he sent one of his servants to play the “rock star” and had her brought “backstage” to be with him. They had an affair and even conceived a child. He soon had her husband killed to cover it up. He had seemingly gotten away with the crimes, but Nathan the sacred prophet of God was divinely guided to confront the king.
This was not a comfortable thing for a religious figure to do with an acclaimed political leader, but he confronted him with a story about two men who had sheep — one poor and one rich. The poor man had made a pet out of one of his little lambs. It “became like a daughter to him,” eating and sleeping with him. One day the rich man came and took the poor man’s lamb from him. After Nathan told the king this story, David became enraged. Nathan told the king that he was that rich man that stole another man’s lamb (Bathsheba, the woman). This story leveled David and he confessed to his crimes and repented.
The moral of the story to me — at least one of them — was that God cares about the bond between a pet and its owner. If He did not care about this bond, why would He instruct His very esteemed prophet to use this story for this very important confrontation?
Our lives are sacred. Animals are sacred. The bond that can develop between a man and his animal is sacred as well. At least we can choose to live that way.
Comments