We lost another at work today.....
The ones who stay a long time get under people's skin....or maybe it's a specialness of some sort that seems all the more special because Outsiders, the people coming in to browse, don't seem to detect it. You all know there is a gem sitting there, but because of age or breed or looks or not being a Yorkie puppy, it seems to go unrecognized.
I remember the day he came in....a nonchalant girl my age who was "moving" after having him his whole life. He was an eyesore. It looked like raging mange or at best just an infection from skin allergies. My immediate thought, with his age, his breed (Pit- historically unwanted by most adopters), his cropped ears, his hamburger skin, was to spare him right then. Just put him to sleep rather than have him sit and sit and sit and listen to "Ewwww!" from visitors. That skin looked chronic....longterm, likely to recur. Maybe even mange as a secondary to immunosuppression. A medical can of worms. But....with faithful baths by a devoted staff member and oral antibiotics, he cleared up amazingly and then turned out to be one of the best-tempered Pits we'd had in ages. Still he sat. His cork bobbed a bit in the waters of an off-site adoption event recently....some interest. Things were looking up and what seemed inevitable...me and a syringe and him and crying staff in the back room....seemed out of the picture. The fact that I had seemingly underestimated his projected progress gave me Hope. But then....
Today, suddenly, he collapsed after his bath. In a matter of an hour, even after some MASH-style treatment for shock, he became agonal. And what had seemed out of the picture again became inevitable....urgently. I kept thinking of the girl who brought him....would she care? If he was still with her, would she have done anything or would she have let him die in agony? If he was in a home where he was one of one or two instead of with us where he was one of 40 and always alone from 5pm to 8am, could something have been noticed earlier? He bled out in his abdomen from his spleen, likely cancer. There's little to be done, and whatever could be done would be a flimsy band-aid for a grave situation. I've seen the same thing, massive abdominal bleedout, happen to owned dogs in a clinic setting. It ends up the same. Thousands in diagnostics and critical care and a dead dog anyway.
I was sad, of course, but also pragmatic at the time....and I suppose I have too much practice at letting go. Seriously not sure anymore if that is an asset or a liability. But I see my coworkers and their pain and they haven't had as much practice yet, as much terrible practice with it....and I wish I could take some of it for them, or I worry that some may not get past it, and why am I not crying like that? Why didn't I want the collar....I generally don't get to really know the dogs like they do....if I did, I would need a storage unit for all the collars...and it's usually the one who really loved the dog the most who can lay claim to it. And if it was really a knife in a particular person's heart, then they get the ashes-because believe me, the previous "owner" has no right to them after they wipe their hands and drive away and go off to sleep easy at night and dream about a future new puppy. It's the dignity thing again.....at the very least, the animal's remains can be given the respect no one had for the animal in life. I hate to see people I care about grieve like this when the people who should've cared don't have to. And this time it was beyond us and this time there wasn't the pain of collectively having made the decision and carried out the act. But there was a different pain because no good dog, no good dog like him, should have to die in a health crisis, laying on ratty blankets on the concrete floor next to the freezers in the back of an animal shelter. It would've gone down the same or worse at the emergency clinic, were he owned and loved. But that would have been more dignified. Medical heroics would be hugely impractical in a shelter situation...very costly and very futile... but that and an owner would've lent dignity to the situation somehow.
He was valued more in 3 months that he was in 7 years previous. And his body decided...we didn't really, until he simply needed "help" to do what he was obviously trying to do. But it still felt like a failure somehow...like a lost chance. If there is any fairness at all, he's in a better place. And it gets tiring trying to find the positive in these situations..."better place", "he's safe now," "she's not suffering," like some little look-at-the-bright-side exercise. But, that's all you can do...and get up tomorrow and hope for less tragedy.
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Thursday, September 4, 2008
Two Situations
Two situations happened of late that give food for thought.
One was about three months ago. One Saturday, a classic "low-life" straggles in with a strange little hunchbacked, deformed gargoyle of a Chihuahua. His story was that the dog had belonged to his elderly neighbor, who had just gotten committed to a nursing home. He wanted to help, like a Good Samaritan, but couldn't keep the dog himself. So he brought her to us. I came in to her on Monday, as she'd been put in the clinic...no one knew what the deal was with her grotesque look. She turned out to have a huge cherry eye and obvious congenital skeletal deformities, disturbing to visitors...very "Awww!"-inducing. But she had a plucky spirit and would gamely crab-trot outside with me for potty breaks. Of course, staff started getting attached.
Next thing you know, she went out for cherry eye repair surgery, and after a few days, the same weird guy comes back with a very convoluted story, which I couldn't even follow...talking to our director. He now wanted to adopt the dog. It was all pretty fishy and long story short, he finally caved and confessed that the dog was his from the beginning.
Well, naturally, all the staff (including, at first, me) was mega-pissed that our director was going to give this man the dog back. I suppose everyone was feeding their big rescue, rags-to-riches fantasies about this weird little monster dog.
Our director agreed after a lot of discussion with the man (the "lowlife" who everyone had rolled their eyes about at least once) that it would be best for him and the dog if she went back to him.
And here's the punchline, which I still use as an example if a current situation warrants...
The dog had been a sweetie with us...agreeable, good eater, tolerant of affection.
But that was nothing compared with the way she lit up like a friggin' jackpot slot machine when her owner walked into the room to get her. He was crying, she was going nuts in happydance ecstasy. I am CERTAIN that she did not want us magnanimous shelter workers to "rescue" her from the "lowlife." It just goes to show how we let our twisted, overly cynical yet overly idealistic thinking cloud our vision in a situation like that.
Another similar one was just last week. Family member of a staffer called our law enforcement officer, all up at arms about the treatment of a dog in her deadbeat tenant's apartment. Eviction was in the process...landlord goes in to inspect apartment and finds a rat terrier in a wire crate inside the coat closet behind the front door. Supposedly no food and water. Well, with her Animal Planet sensibility, she calls in alarm...describes a situation that sounded awful. I mean, the words: abandoned apartment, no electricity, evicted, dark closet, etc. Sounds horrible, no?
I tagged along for that one. We get there and it's just a mildly messy apartment in moving-out stage. No electricity, but not that hot this time of year. No one home. Landlord lets us in. Dog in crate, barking her head off at us, perfectly healthy-looking. No laws are being broken here. For all we know, the guy (a college kid) just stepped out to do errands. But. Since it's a staff favor thing and we don't really know, we scoop the dog just for safekeeping. It was horrible. A balls-out fear-aggressive little female rat terrier. A snappy snare, some godawful screaming and fish-flopping, some heads peeking from adjoining apartment doors....and we finally got her out. I guarantee you that she would've chosen to stay in her crate in her closet if she could've. But....we had to do our noble duty, right?
She sat in the shelter, plastered against the back of her run, snarling at anyone who so much as looked at her in passing, for 3 days. Sweettalk got nowhere. An irate girlfriend (the dog's actual owner) was in touch with us, beside herself that we took her dog. After she got polite, and after we discovered that the boyfriend was slated to move out of state with the dog to be with the girlfriend within a matter of days, it ended up that we delivered the dog back to him at his apartment. That was even more of a horror show. She was the lovechild of a pirahna and a screeming banshee. Nasty. It took a while, a lot of drama and the sacrifice of a metal snappy snare via bolt cutters to finally get her into a carrier and into the car.
Bleedyhearty Animal Planetaholics might be appalled that we gave the dog back.
But I am here to tell you: she was in no way interested in being "rescued."
This was not a rescue to her....it was Hell on Earth.
She was completely intractable and completely suffering mentally. In no way adoptable unless you wanted your fingers amputated by your new dog. Thank the blue heavens that they wanted her back.
So I ask: what is better? Back to an "imperfect" (and in this case, objectively, merely transitory at the time) home or dead in our freezer?
I vote for the former.
Sometimes our superidealized version of a happy ending does not match up with the animal's. And who are we here for, anyway?
One was about three months ago. One Saturday, a classic "low-life" straggles in with a strange little hunchbacked, deformed gargoyle of a Chihuahua. His story was that the dog had belonged to his elderly neighbor, who had just gotten committed to a nursing home. He wanted to help, like a Good Samaritan, but couldn't keep the dog himself. So he brought her to us. I came in to her on Monday, as she'd been put in the clinic...no one knew what the deal was with her grotesque look. She turned out to have a huge cherry eye and obvious congenital skeletal deformities, disturbing to visitors...very "Awww!"-inducing. But she had a plucky spirit and would gamely crab-trot outside with me for potty breaks. Of course, staff started getting attached.
Next thing you know, she went out for cherry eye repair surgery, and after a few days, the same weird guy comes back with a very convoluted story, which I couldn't even follow...talking to our director. He now wanted to adopt the dog. It was all pretty fishy and long story short, he finally caved and confessed that the dog was his from the beginning.
Well, naturally, all the staff (including, at first, me) was mega-pissed that our director was going to give this man the dog back. I suppose everyone was feeding their big rescue, rags-to-riches fantasies about this weird little monster dog.
Our director agreed after a lot of discussion with the man (the "lowlife" who everyone had rolled their eyes about at least once) that it would be best for him and the dog if she went back to him.
And here's the punchline, which I still use as an example if a current situation warrants...
The dog had been a sweetie with us...agreeable, good eater, tolerant of affection.
But that was nothing compared with the way she lit up like a friggin' jackpot slot machine when her owner walked into the room to get her. He was crying, she was going nuts in happydance ecstasy. I am CERTAIN that she did not want us magnanimous shelter workers to "rescue" her from the "lowlife." It just goes to show how we let our twisted, overly cynical yet overly idealistic thinking cloud our vision in a situation like that.
Another similar one was just last week. Family member of a staffer called our law enforcement officer, all up at arms about the treatment of a dog in her deadbeat tenant's apartment. Eviction was in the process...landlord goes in to inspect apartment and finds a rat terrier in a wire crate inside the coat closet behind the front door. Supposedly no food and water. Well, with her Animal Planet sensibility, she calls in alarm...describes a situation that sounded awful. I mean, the words: abandoned apartment, no electricity, evicted, dark closet, etc. Sounds horrible, no?
I tagged along for that one. We get there and it's just a mildly messy apartment in moving-out stage. No electricity, but not that hot this time of year. No one home. Landlord lets us in. Dog in crate, barking her head off at us, perfectly healthy-looking. No laws are being broken here. For all we know, the guy (a college kid) just stepped out to do errands. But. Since it's a staff favor thing and we don't really know, we scoop the dog just for safekeeping. It was horrible. A balls-out fear-aggressive little female rat terrier. A snappy snare, some godawful screaming and fish-flopping, some heads peeking from adjoining apartment doors....and we finally got her out. I guarantee you that she would've chosen to stay in her crate in her closet if she could've. But....we had to do our noble duty, right?
She sat in the shelter, plastered against the back of her run, snarling at anyone who so much as looked at her in passing, for 3 days. Sweettalk got nowhere. An irate girlfriend (the dog's actual owner) was in touch with us, beside herself that we took her dog. After she got polite, and after we discovered that the boyfriend was slated to move out of state with the dog to be with the girlfriend within a matter of days, it ended up that we delivered the dog back to him at his apartment. That was even more of a horror show. She was the lovechild of a pirahna and a screeming banshee. Nasty. It took a while, a lot of drama and the sacrifice of a metal snappy snare via bolt cutters to finally get her into a carrier and into the car.
Bleedyhearty Animal Planetaholics might be appalled that we gave the dog back.
But I am here to tell you: she was in no way interested in being "rescued."
This was not a rescue to her....it was Hell on Earth.
She was completely intractable and completely suffering mentally. In no way adoptable unless you wanted your fingers amputated by your new dog. Thank the blue heavens that they wanted her back.
So I ask: what is better? Back to an "imperfect" (and in this case, objectively, merely transitory at the time) home or dead in our freezer?
I vote for the former.
Sometimes our superidealized version of a happy ending does not match up with the animal's. And who are we here for, anyway?
Evolution
I think it is critical in Life in general, and particularly in a line of work such as this, to allow the flow and evolution of your thinking. I look back even at things I have said in past blog entries and cringe a bit. This is all stream of consciousness. How I felt (and whatever I said) about Humanity at some point last Thursday, last August, in 2006...whenever...well, it changes. At my core, I know most people are good. Just call me Anne Frank, right?
It's a danger not to recognize that beliefs are nebulous....to consider things and modify as needed. I see several of my coworkers who seem to be stuck quite often. Being pissy one day is one thing. But to have decided, like, 2 years ago that People Suck and to not entertain any notion otherwise does a huge disservice to yourself, those who have to be around you...and most importantly at work, the animals.
I am constantly pondering these things. I think you must, or you'll wind up a stony old angry prune. If you can't accept that things are all shades of grey and that you must approach each individual situation, animal, relinquisher, adopter, visitor, volunteer, etc. individually....well, you are remiss.
Another, more pensive and optimistic coworker and I have been discussing this of late. One thing that makes for an interesting thought is this: If (name coworker) wanted to adopt an animal here and had to fill out an application, would it be approved? A lot of times, I'd say...NO. Not even by that person themself, were they the person deciding.
Where do we get off expecting perfection when we are not perfect?
Can you tell me that no one working here has ever had their cat declawed, particularly before they knew better? Are everyone's litterboxes spotless all the time? No one's dog has ever gotten loose and ended up getting scooped by AC?
We will deny someone for having "too many" other animals when the person doing the denying is a borderline hoarder themselves? I mean, where do we get off? When I am working in the garden, I tie my little spoiled brat of a housedog outside nearby...she'll run off otherwise. Well, hello...I am "tying my dog outside". Call the SPCA! Why is my "tying out" ok, but someone else's "tying out" is automatically on a rusty chain, 24/7, without food and water?
Bombshell: growing up, my family had a succession of cats. They all lived outdoors...would come in just to eat and hang around. I can think of at least 2 unneutered males we had, who invariably would come home beat up and eventually never come home again. They probably knocked up half the neighborhood. We didn't know any better. The cats seemed extremely content. Granted, that was decades ago, but still...does that mean I should be crucified, laughed at after I leave the room? My application for a kitten crumpled up and tossed into the wastebasket? The particulars of our home, when I grew up, would not have made us ideal adopters. Here's another bombshell: I'm pretty sure 2 of my cats are way overdue on their rabies right now. I keep forgetting. So where would I get off talking smack about someone bringing in their animal here who's not current? Especially when we employyes have the luxury of being able to get meds and labwork at cost...free exams from our volunteer vet. Even Frontline under retail. Most people do not get that. We forget that a simple annual visit for a "civilian" can wind up in the couple hundreds after vax, heartworm test, meds and Frontline. Yay for us. It's too easy to forget.
And again with shades of grey....
There is a definite issue in our shelter with adopting out a cat to someone if they say they might let it outside.
Newsflash: "outside", by definition, does not necessarily mean ignored, left out to get in fights in a busy urban area with lots of traffic and a pack of coyotes in the area. "Outside" can mean lots of things. There is a responsible form of "outside." Sometimes I even hear someone I know bitching about relinquishers when I know for a fact that they "got rid of" their rabbits a couple years ago.
We're human. I get angry, too. I feel I have the real right to be angry here, more than anyone else, considering that I am the sole executioner. But each situation is different, and coming at everything angry just creates another vicious circle. The people who are in this vicious circle don't see it...they just think that Humanity is constantly proving their anger justified. Where did it start in a given circumstance? Chicken or egg?
Rigidity has no place in Life at all, I don't think...and again, certainly no place in this line of work. Nothing is that simple. Would that it were.
Anthropomorphizing is such a convenient thing. If you want to make animals just like people, how about go all the way? To wit- are OUR lives perfect? Imagine nurses in the maternity ward refusing to let any babies leave the hospital without being able to be absolutely sure that their whole lives would go perfectly. The parents would have to be married, guaranteed forever. Everyone would be expected to live comfortable, pretty lives...with nothing bad ever happening in their childhood or beyond. No disease, no accidents, no upheaval, no tragedy, no big changes in life circumstances. Impossible, no? That's not Life. So why do we think we can appoint ourselves authority of the future, preferably Perfect Life of animals?
It all seems too much sometimes. It is difficult not to judge from past experience. To judge people. To judge situations. How can you not?
One common judgement I am struggling with right now is towards low income/disabled people. Most of us tend to not prefer adopting to those who we think (and again, who the hell are we?) don't have the financial means nor perhaps the common sense to "properly" care for an animal to our exacting (<---sarcasm, because again...show me your litterbox right now!) standards. But let me ask this. If you were a clingy little neurotic dog, would you rather have a rich, nuclear family, frou frou home with holistic food and a million toys...where you were in a crate alone 10 hours a day while everyone was at work, school, soccer, ballet...or would you rather have a poorer, rustic home with Ol' Roy and a Hartz flea collar but an owner who was there with you 24/7 doting on you every moment?
What would the dog choose?
Exactly.
And it should be our job, our REAL job, to help and educate the latter to be the best owner they can be.
Some of my coworkers can't seem to grasp this, but most people really want to do the best they can, only they don't know what it is...unless we tell them. And tell them in a polite, respectful way.
This is something that needs to be considered.
It's hard to change, and I sympathize with my stuck coworkers or others in the field. I read a lot about newer sheltering models...the no kill movement. We are pushing 90%, so I think we can be proud. It is hard not to beat yourself up about the 10% The 10% haunt each and every one of us, as do the failed adoptions. And that is the thing- we cannot let the smaller amount of bad overshadow the vastly larger amount of good. Letting that happen only turns you bitter, angry, judgemental. It is a loss of opportunity for a positive outcome for you, an animal, an adopter.
I dunno.....just rambling. All you can do is get up every morning and do the best you can and strive for even better tomorrow. We need to stop seeing the public as the Enemy. Maybe it makes things easier for us, psychologically. Us against Them, saving all the animals. Maybe it's the easier way to deal....the lazier way, since it takes less effort to refuse to engage meaningfully and openmindedly with someone who does not fit your paradigm of "Perfect Animal Owner." But the thing is, there's no such thing. It's not that simple. And I can see how the public can come to form judgements about shelter workers just as we come to form judgements about the public. Tit for tat.
It's a danger not to recognize that beliefs are nebulous....to consider things and modify as needed. I see several of my coworkers who seem to be stuck quite often. Being pissy one day is one thing. But to have decided, like, 2 years ago that People Suck and to not entertain any notion otherwise does a huge disservice to yourself, those who have to be around you...and most importantly at work, the animals.
I am constantly pondering these things. I think you must, or you'll wind up a stony old angry prune. If you can't accept that things are all shades of grey and that you must approach each individual situation, animal, relinquisher, adopter, visitor, volunteer, etc. individually....well, you are remiss.
Another, more pensive and optimistic coworker and I have been discussing this of late. One thing that makes for an interesting thought is this: If (name coworker) wanted to adopt an animal here and had to fill out an application, would it be approved? A lot of times, I'd say...NO. Not even by that person themself, were they the person deciding.
Where do we get off expecting perfection when we are not perfect?
Can you tell me that no one working here has ever had their cat declawed, particularly before they knew better? Are everyone's litterboxes spotless all the time? No one's dog has ever gotten loose and ended up getting scooped by AC?
We will deny someone for having "too many" other animals when the person doing the denying is a borderline hoarder themselves? I mean, where do we get off? When I am working in the garden, I tie my little spoiled brat of a housedog outside nearby...she'll run off otherwise. Well, hello...I am "tying my dog outside". Call the SPCA! Why is my "tying out" ok, but someone else's "tying out" is automatically on a rusty chain, 24/7, without food and water?
Bombshell: growing up, my family had a succession of cats. They all lived outdoors...would come in just to eat and hang around. I can think of at least 2 unneutered males we had, who invariably would come home beat up and eventually never come home again. They probably knocked up half the neighborhood. We didn't know any better. The cats seemed extremely content. Granted, that was decades ago, but still...does that mean I should be crucified, laughed at after I leave the room? My application for a kitten crumpled up and tossed into the wastebasket? The particulars of our home, when I grew up, would not have made us ideal adopters. Here's another bombshell: I'm pretty sure 2 of my cats are way overdue on their rabies right now. I keep forgetting. So where would I get off talking smack about someone bringing in their animal here who's not current? Especially when we employyes have the luxury of being able to get meds and labwork at cost...free exams from our volunteer vet. Even Frontline under retail. Most people do not get that. We forget that a simple annual visit for a "civilian" can wind up in the couple hundreds after vax, heartworm test, meds and Frontline. Yay for us. It's too easy to forget.
And again with shades of grey....
There is a definite issue in our shelter with adopting out a cat to someone if they say they might let it outside.
Newsflash: "outside", by definition, does not necessarily mean ignored, left out to get in fights in a busy urban area with lots of traffic and a pack of coyotes in the area. "Outside" can mean lots of things. There is a responsible form of "outside." Sometimes I even hear someone I know bitching about relinquishers when I know for a fact that they "got rid of" their rabbits a couple years ago.
We're human. I get angry, too. I feel I have the real right to be angry here, more than anyone else, considering that I am the sole executioner. But each situation is different, and coming at everything angry just creates another vicious circle. The people who are in this vicious circle don't see it...they just think that Humanity is constantly proving their anger justified. Where did it start in a given circumstance? Chicken or egg?
Rigidity has no place in Life at all, I don't think...and again, certainly no place in this line of work. Nothing is that simple. Would that it were.
Anthropomorphizing is such a convenient thing. If you want to make animals just like people, how about go all the way? To wit- are OUR lives perfect? Imagine nurses in the maternity ward refusing to let any babies leave the hospital without being able to be absolutely sure that their whole lives would go perfectly. The parents would have to be married, guaranteed forever. Everyone would be expected to live comfortable, pretty lives...with nothing bad ever happening in their childhood or beyond. No disease, no accidents, no upheaval, no tragedy, no big changes in life circumstances. Impossible, no? That's not Life. So why do we think we can appoint ourselves authority of the future, preferably Perfect Life of animals?
It all seems too much sometimes. It is difficult not to judge from past experience. To judge people. To judge situations. How can you not?
One common judgement I am struggling with right now is towards low income/disabled people. Most of us tend to not prefer adopting to those who we think (and again, who the hell are we?) don't have the financial means nor perhaps the common sense to "properly" care for an animal to our exacting (<---sarcasm, because again...show me your litterbox right now!) standards. But let me ask this. If you were a clingy little neurotic dog, would you rather have a rich, nuclear family, frou frou home with holistic food and a million toys...where you were in a crate alone 10 hours a day while everyone was at work, school, soccer, ballet...or would you rather have a poorer, rustic home with Ol' Roy and a Hartz flea collar but an owner who was there with you 24/7 doting on you every moment?
What would the dog choose?
Exactly.
And it should be our job, our REAL job, to help and educate the latter to be the best owner they can be.
Some of my coworkers can't seem to grasp this, but most people really want to do the best they can, only they don't know what it is...unless we tell them. And tell them in a polite, respectful way.
This is something that needs to be considered.
It's hard to change, and I sympathize with my stuck coworkers or others in the field. I read a lot about newer sheltering models...the no kill movement. We are pushing 90%, so I think we can be proud. It is hard not to beat yourself up about the 10% The 10% haunt each and every one of us, as do the failed adoptions. And that is the thing- we cannot let the smaller amount of bad overshadow the vastly larger amount of good. Letting that happen only turns you bitter, angry, judgemental. It is a loss of opportunity for a positive outcome for you, an animal, an adopter.
I dunno.....just rambling. All you can do is get up every morning and do the best you can and strive for even better tomorrow. We need to stop seeing the public as the Enemy. Maybe it makes things easier for us, psychologically. Us against Them, saving all the animals. Maybe it's the easier way to deal....the lazier way, since it takes less effort to refuse to engage meaningfully and openmindedly with someone who does not fit your paradigm of "Perfect Animal Owner." But the thing is, there's no such thing. It's not that simple. And I can see how the public can come to form judgements about shelter workers just as we come to form judgements about the public. Tit for tat.
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