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On Friday, I arrived home after one of those workdays which makes one wonder why exactly it is that one is not paid according to the amount of sheer annoyance leveraged upon one because ONE WOULD BE A MILLIONAIRE IN THAT CASE, and found my dog Flannery lying in a puddle of her own pee for the second time in two days, after a lag of several months. And more: since she hobbles all the time now, requires help to get up or to negotiate the stairs even on a good day, I didn't notice until after I'd cleaned her up a bit and she was trying to steady herself on her feet that one of her legs was horribly swollen and that she was doing her best not to walk on it at all.
I called the vet right away and made an appointment for the next morning, and then I spent the next hours trying to make her comfortable and worrying about what it could be. A broken leg? The vet said he thought not, but he hadn't seen her yet, and what if he was wrong, and it was broken somehow? She falls a lot. She pulls things down on top of herself.
Worse than that, she's sixteen now. Could I really put her through an ordeal like that knowing that her ability to get around would probably be permanently worsened? Could I really be so selfish as to keep her suffering just because I can't imagine my life without her? I decided, after tears and gingerly hugs and many sleepless hours, that I couldn't. That if it came down to a question of putting her in a cast, I would ask the vet to be realistic about her chances, and then let her go if I had to.
Well, her leg isn't broken, of course. She has an infection -- a little puncture wound she probably got in one of her falls -- aggravated, no doubt, by the chemical-laden no-bath wipes that I use to temporarily clean her up after one of these accidents. The vet drained her leg and gave me a big bottle of antibiotics, and I threw out the wipes and am giving her hot compresses and lots of pets and keeping Leory from pestering her, and every minute I am chest-tighteningly grateful for my reprieve, because honestly, as trying as life has become with her in the past couple of years, in her extreme old age, I love few human beings as much as I love my Flannery.
I called the vet right away and made an appointment for the next morning, and then I spent the next hours trying to make her comfortable and worrying about what it could be. A broken leg? The vet said he thought not, but he hadn't seen her yet, and what if he was wrong, and it was broken somehow? She falls a lot. She pulls things down on top of herself.
Worse than that, she's sixteen now. Could I really put her through an ordeal like that knowing that her ability to get around would probably be permanently worsened? Could I really be so selfish as to keep her suffering just because I can't imagine my life without her? I decided, after tears and gingerly hugs and many sleepless hours, that I couldn't. That if it came down to a question of putting her in a cast, I would ask the vet to be realistic about her chances, and then let her go if I had to.
Well, her leg isn't broken, of course. She has an infection -- a little puncture wound she probably got in one of her falls -- aggravated, no doubt, by the chemical-laden no-bath wipes that I use to temporarily clean her up after one of these accidents. The vet drained her leg and gave me a big bottle of antibiotics, and I threw out the wipes and am giving her hot compresses and lots of pets and keeping Leory from pestering her, and every minute I am chest-tighteningly grateful for my reprieve, because honestly, as trying as life has become with her in the past couple of years, in her extreme old age, I love few human beings as much as I love my Flannery.
