Skeletal Pathos

This has happened twice in the past few weeks. Both times were pit bulls, coincidentally. Euthanasia, I feel, is the most important part of my job, hands down. Fortunately, we are a private shelter and not a pound, which means that when we are full, we have the luxury of saying so. The euthanasia of our own animals is not frequent and is soley based on physical or mental suffering or bite risk/liability. That explanation is for another day.

On any given afternoon, euthanasias generally are what we call DPOs, or "Down Per Owner", as opposed to DPS, "Down Per Shelter." I am it for euthanasia- the only one there now who can do it or prepare for it. I am the one who talks to the owner, if they want to be present. It varies, just like people's emotional displays vary. It can be draining, the counseling part. I explain, give the sedative, prepare them and their pet...and then our director, a former equine vet, comes in for the injection. That's just a formality. He'd be the first to tell you that I am the better shot. But it looks better to have the whole nurse/doctor thing going. If they drop-off (which I never understand), then it's all me. And in a way, it's better like that. It's a private thing, and other than the owner, I'd rather it just be me and the animal.

The reasons are generally warranted. Almost always illness and old age. End stage cancer. Sometimes aggression. Those are hard. That is a hard decision to come to. It is very courageous and responsible to step up and make this decision rather than dump a dog at a shelter without full disclosure and put not only other people and other animals at risk...but an entire shelter at risk for future liability...and the dog in question at risk for a life of misery. Sometimes we are wrangled into euthanasias that are seemingly more for convenience. The lines are blurry. Nothing is black and white. But, that is for another time.

Recently, though, have come two very upsetting situations involving pit bulls, spaced by a couple weeks. Both were very well-loved. Too loved, in fact. Both made it to a ridiculous age...16 and 17. Both would easily have been prosecutable cruelty cases had we come upon them in other circumstances...like if a concerned neighbor had called us. Both arrived comatose and absolutely, horrifically emaciated and dehydrated, attended by owners who were in such a state of hysteria that everyone was uncomfortable. Both were scheduled as "routine" DPOs....old dogs whose time had come. In each case, when the paperwork had been done, and the dog was brought into the exam room, jaws dropped. I have never seen anything so skeletal, alive. How to speak to the owners? You are, on one hand, so cognizant of the human-animal bond...I mean, it is our life's work. You can understand how people can love their pets and have difficulty letting them go. But on the other hand, here in front of you is blatant neglect in the fullest definition. "How long has he been like this?" "Did you take him to a vet?" Both situations yielded disturbing answers. If you love something so much that you are in hysterics...and mind you, this is not a traumatic, acute situation but a progressive one....how can you let things go so far?? A.) You've had several more years with this animal that most people get with theirs, since most dogs make it to 13 or 14, max. B.) You have to have seen the dog melting away like an ice cube for the past few weeks. It should not come as some insurmountable shock that death was near.
Perhaps I speak from a more pragmatic point of view, since this process of letting go is so familiar to me.
But I cannot fathom letting my animals or my loved ones get to the point of looking like Auchwitz victims in a coma and not doing something.
It's an odd point of balance in the moment, to gently make a point to the person about being more proactive in the future, yet still remain compassionate. They should know that this is not acceptable, yet they still deserve our kindness at this dark moment in their life.
These are hard. We have prosecuted people for allowing a dog to get even remotely to that state without intervention. The only difference is that the owners of these two pit bulls came to us, and we were not called out to them.

I can still feel the washboard of ribs under her dry coat, the hip bones like carved cups. Thick, yellow mucus filled her eye sockets under sunken, glazed eyes. She must've once weighed 50-something pounds but was now 20, according to the husband. Occasional breaths were the only clue that "life" was still within. It was horrible. For all they give us, we owe them a dignified end. To keep them medically comfortable when illness and age set in, and to let them go when suffering begins. This was not dignity. It was pathetic. The wife was outside having a breakdown. The husband left the room. My boss, one of the kennel girls, and I looked at each other, still incredulous and sickened. Then I set this poor dog free. I kissed her cheek as I injected. It was like kissing a bare skull.

I hope I never see a dog so thin ever again. Or if I do, it will be in "Evidence" photos.