Dogs with Dignity

My sister Nicki’s dog, Sugar, may be dying, news which is rough to hear so soon after the loss of our last surviving cat, Fifi, and the death of one of her other long living dogs, Woola. Sugar’s mother, Clea, is also getting up there, and has been experiencing the numerous old-age problems that occur in convalesced mammals. Fifi had a flea problem over the last couple of seasons; Beth and I were wondering if the body’s aging doesn’t also affect the inner body, slowing down the immune response and whatnot, and if so, if the fleas and other bugs (including the microscopic variety) somehow know it.

With Clea being old and kind of pitiful, it’s still easy to think of Sugar as the “young dog,” even though she was probably less than a year old herself when she gave birth to him. So it’s tough for me to see him as a dog that’s had his day.

Anyways, what’s wrong with Sugar is an enlarged kidney (or is it liver?) and he has developed a growth inside his body which may or may not be cancerous. If it’s not, they might try to remove it, so he can live on a while longer. If it is, they’ll probably just skip the procedure, and take care of him, surrounding him with love, until he dies.

I know this because my sister has taken him to the emergency animal hospital for a biopsy. He’ll need a more invasive biopsy performed with anesthesia to determine the true extent of his illness. This is not an exact science -- and Sugar could die during the biopsy operation itself. She may prefer to not go that route, and bring him home to die at his own pace, where he can get the best quality of life care an old dog can get: the love and care of his human and other animal friends and family.

Beth and I did so with Morris and Fifi (Socks died unexpectedly). Morris had a stroke and was clearly out of his head, so we put him in a basket with blankets and laid him by our bed. We gave him water until he could take it no longer, then, after a while, he died. As I wrote in an earlier blog, we did the same with Fifi. We didn’t want the sometimes frightening feeling of the veterinarian’s office to be the backdrop for their last moments.

Even in this day and age, with veterinarians treating pets for cancer and other ailments, with all night emergency rooms for dogs and cats (we took Fifi to one once -- she was in diabetic shock, the vet cured her with some sugar water), advanced food formulas, medications specialized for their body types and breeds, designer toys, etc. etc., even now, nobody bats an eye at the idea of allowing the animal to die with dignity when his time is up.

So why is it we can treat our pets this way, and not ourselves? Why do we insist on getting the last breath out of people who will never awake again to experience it? Why do we send our elderly family members away to die, instead of keeping them home with us? Why do we pass legislation to prevent the pulling of plugs? Why do loved ones go to court to refuse the rights of people to seek out their own treatments, to eschew expensive and poisonous medications, and to choose the approximate time and place of their own expiration?

Is it because we love our animals less? Because they can’t engage legal representation? Twenty, fifty, a hundred years from now, will humans treat our own deaths more sensibly? Or will we be putting our pets on life support?

I don’t have a definitive answer to any of these questions. But it’s something to think about.

Nicki, kiss Sugar on the schnozz for me.