Monday was not a good day...

My grandmother always said the minute you get a pet, you open yourself up to heartache. But we keep doing it because it is so worth it....

This was not a good weekend at the house. Isis, Mike's 14 year old doberman, has been steadily declining for the last couple of months. We have tried a number of different things: dog aspirin, antibiotics, multivitamins with glucosamine, poached chicken and all natural dog food, and finally rimadyl. She would improve for a couple of days and then take several steps back. All the while she continued to play with her toys and eat well. Friday night, we noticed she was having problems with the front legs. Her back legs have been bad for years but she compensated well. This weekend, she couldn't walk more than a couple of feet without having to sit and her front legs kept sticking. She stopped eating her treats and spent the day sleeping. It just kept getting worse and Sunday night, Mike came to the conclusion that it was time to put her to sleep. I kept hoping she would fall asleep and go that way, but no.

We cried, ALOT. I said I would come back out Monday night and go to the vet with him. I got to the house first on Monday. She clearly had not moved all day and was just wiped out. Mike came home and got her outside and as her final push, she went jaunting across the front yard. I wish my camera had been charged because she ran out of steam and sat down, Mike walked over to her and she got a final burst of steam and jaunted over to him and sat there looking up at him, smiling. The camera was dead, I am unsure I would have been able to take the picture anyway, I was a little bleary eyed.

The vet was wonderful and examined her and found multiple weaknesses in the legs and her heart was not beating regularly. He gave Mike several options but pointed out that they all were essentially plugging the hole of a sinking ship. Mike and I were crying from the time we got her in the car and he choked out that he felt she was in pain and not having fun anymore... They gave her a tranquilizer shot and let it kick in, leaving us alone with her. After about five minutes, her legs gave out and she slipped down to the floor and laid her head on Mike's knee and fell asleep. They gave her the final injection and left us with her. To say that we were a mess is putting it mildly- I had snot pouring down my face, neither of us could breathe or see. But she is no longer in pain and she had her favorite person to rest her head on.

The house is empty without her. Her toys are on the living room floor and her food bowls are still in the kitchen. Neither of us can bear to move them. When I walk through the dark bedroom in the middle of the night, I still step over where she should be on her bed on the floor... We both walked in the house last night calling her name. Neither of us have slept well the last two nights, we both keep seeing her lying on the floor as we left the vet. They wouldn't take her away until we had left. I wish we had brought her blanket with us to be cremated with her...

I don't like dobermans but Isis was the exception to the rule. She was a love and will be missed, greatly. I shouldn't have typed this at work, I am a mess all over again...