STIFF AS A BOARD - LIGHT AS A FEATHER
Up in the middle of the night.
I came home yesterday to find my dog, a wonderful person, dead in her bed. Based on some research I did afterwards, I'm bothered that I may have had an urge to go home early and see her, take her somewhere, and that she may have died just about that time. A sense of guilt that maybe she had known and was waiting for me to do just that and I failed. Though it appeared to me that rigor mortis had set in, I didn't try to lift her from the bed. I suppose I was in shock.
That she died on one of her beds, made it all easier for me in the end. Her tail was still down around her backside and her eyes were closed. An hour or so later, I lifted her and thought she felt much more heavy than she felt living, bed and all, I put her in the tub, with fears of her bleeding out. Her tail jutted out stiffly too by then and a few fleas were abandoning her, so that indicates that her body had not cooled completely when I found her. I read later that I should have used gloves.
Maybe she got a private moment to die. Maybe this could have happened when I had her out somewhere.
As I'd touched her hair on her head and stroked her side, maybe still warm but maybe that was the room, I'd heard a little bit of air escape her lungs. It was a last breath out, not in.
DAILY PAWS : SIGNS A DOG IS DYING This is a good article, but perhaps it should be called Signs a Dog is Aging and Getting Closer to Dying.
I believe she died while sleeping, of heart failure, and that she spewed sputum as the process. As for sleeping, that was something she had been doing more of. I would joke with her that she was getting lazy and had to get up for the day, yet I also read to not wake a dog who was sleeping. Usually the smell of wet food would get her up. Lately I'd been thinking I might come home and find her sick or in significant pain or in trouble and face an emergency, of having to put her down. I had hoped that she would die in her sleep, that it would not be me forever struggling with the when to give her the shot of death, even as I have long believed that humans should have the Right to Die especially as we have been humiliated with the inhuman horrors and invasive nature of medical 'treatment' and unnatural death.
I started meeting people who told me that it had been the worst, though they had wanted to be there for that moment with their dogs. One friend is upset and guilty because his fourteen year old five pounder had seized for hours, but stopped when they got to the vets. He went ahead with the shot of death anyway. " I could tell he was afraid and he knew what was next and I betrayed him." (It was because of this five pounder who could bark at me forever, until I was invited inside, that I met this friend in the first place. When I dog-sat him, he would make his presences known, waking me up just by staring at me, and I would scoop him and have him sleep next to me.)
More than one person had told me they could never get another dog because it was all too hard when one died.
My dog was quite old and had outlived the expectation of her years. The times seven does not work exactly, but ancient. Seven times thirteen plus four. About 96 human years.
She was feeble. I was looking into ordering a hip support for her, had just last week spent some time on-line looking at various contraptions from the extremely expensive to the inexpensive, had notes about how to measure her. I'd been giving her more soft foods. She once pulled me down the street but now lagged behind me so I slowed to meet her step and took her out without a leash pulling on her neck, let her catch up with me, walked twenty feet away because I learned that was the best range for a dog's vision. I had made soft pull long leashes that allowed more flexibility. She had been going blind. I knew a surgery could fix the cataract but also didn't know if she should be put to sleep for any surgery.
We had stayed home over the three day holiday but I had taken her to a park where we sat under the trees and she slept on the grass earlier in the week, and twice the week before that. She walked, she slept, and then I put her in her carrier and wheeled her when it was clear she was fatigued. The ride was bumpy. Yet, she did want to go with me. She was up for treats. Sometimes she would look towards me as she realized we were at a grassy park and smile like she had for so many years.
I had started putting a small water bowl under the bed nearer her, a couple years ago so she wouldn't have to go the whole way into the kitchen if all she wanted was water.
I don't know if we do right by our dogs. I even question mandatory spaying and neutering. I'm not sure all breeders are horrible people. I'm horrified with what some people do to dogs and with dogs. I have reason to think that before me she was in a backyard breeding program. To be specific I think some Mexican-Americans with a back yard had bred her and sold off her puppies. I think there was a woman and children there, so probably a man too. I know the condition she came into the shelter with. Hair that was full of long rasta dreadlock type knots that pulled her skin, worms, and someone who refused to give their name or pay twenty dollars who the intake worker wrote in as "probable owner." The shelter had groomed her, cleaned her teeth, vaccinated her, and given her ten days instead of five to be adopted. A vet had written that she was a "sweet animal." She was also beautiful but near five years old. In a 'senior dog' kennel at the time, she had been bypassed.
She was going to be put down that morning when I walked in and inquired about her, if her owner had come and gotten her, if someone had adopted her. (And at the time I did not know that five days was the limit before the death shot.)
Morning of, I had fed her, walked with her a little. I had her up on my belly and stroked the length of her body and told her she was mummie's girl and so pretty. I had petted her, her side and her fluffy head, and told her I loved her three separate times as i got ready and as she lay in her bed ready to sleep, before I left at quarter to ten.
Could I have comforted her? Stopped it? Would she have heard me or understood if I talked her into or out of death? Or went on about how it was OK and she had been wonderful and how much I loved her?
When I found her dead, I stroked her side and she wasn't cold exactly, her ear flopped, she was solid and heavy, and her tail was still down near her butt. There was clear foamy sputum - a lot of it - but her eyes were closed, her position a little straight, yet still a posture that would indicate restful sleep until the moment. Her posture could have also indicated a spell of trying to breath. Could she have slept through it?
I do wonder if dogs have dog angels or ancestors or old friends or old lovers or children or grand-children or great-grandchildren who come to take them to their next phase.
About a month or so ago I house-and-dog sat and my dog and my friend's dog at one point appeared to be unified in looking up at something or someone invisible to the human eye. I felt there was a spirit in the house who was paying attention to them, maybe even giving them some instructions. I hoped it had nothing to do with me. They were unified and next to each other looking.
I knew I could not have her forever. I hoped she would die before I did. I feel pretty sure I cannot have another dog, that she was my one and only, at least not anytime in the realizable future. And my life was better with her. She enhanced my life. People can talk all they want about how now I have more freedom now, such as to travel, when I thought about how I might travel with her.
It was always good to have her along. Most often better too. There were places I went where I would have felt strange, even less safe, to be there without her, rather than alone. Because of her I met and talked to many a stranger, and mostly it was dog talk or small talk, but I was in place rather than out of it.
In these recent weeks I often wondered if it was best to leave her be yet when I took her to a park or out doing shoppimg, she did venture to go sniffing, she did watch birds - or saw movement. I think of one time when she was younger and got fixated on an oblivious squirrel and she began to pump her jaw in anticipation and saliva ran. One time she broke her leash when she bolted after one and was suddenly a park away, a man yelling at me to leash my dog, me holding the broken leash up in one hand and yelling "Grab her." Her running after one ball after another, holding the ball in her mouth and running towards me, time and time again, dropping the ball near but not in my hands. She was graceful and athletic. She earned the arthritis and hip displacia.
It was kind of like maybe she thought she should sleep the day away and yet once there on the grass under the trees, she was glad she had come. Kind of like how we sometimes feel when we go along with a friend because they want someone with them, yet the destination of their choice turns out to be fun. I had considered buying her special boots to steady her traction.
I'd promised to be her forever home and that promise was kept in that I never gave her up or up on her. As for 'home' I'm not sure I have ever actually had one or live in one; I suppose it depends on what comfort you feel living where you do. We have lived in one too many compromised situations: rotten greedy landlords, the kind of persons who you hope get run over by a steamroller (just flattened like in the cartoons) and some lousy neighbors too, the kind of people who you hope won't knock on your door, even a stalker-type who stole from the porch and looked into windows.
There has been some discussion about why dogs are better than people. A dog is rarely a son-of-a-bitch.
Though she had slept with me every night for years, in the last year or so I had feared she might fall out of the bed or step out of it while I slept, and had put her to bed in her own on the floor. I reasoned that dogs like their den and that she might like to be under the bed.
I often looked at her in her bed, looked to see if she was awake and hanging out or sleeping, gave her a rub, let her know I was around, talked to her. I loved to come home and see her waiting for me which she often, though not always did, by a gate between rooms with sight of the front door.
"Where's my little girl?"
Why do you call me a little girl mummy, when I am a mother, grandmother, great-grandmother?
Of course, by smell she knew I was around.
She had three beds and two were usually clean and available so she could find her comfort spots. One more cushiony, one more flat to the floor, one with a higher head rest but also a center pillow that moved around a lot. She died on the hot pink one that was cushiony and had been a gift. I'd throw a blanket in and she'd enjoy fixing her bed a bit. The day before she died she had at one point tried to make her bed more comfortable. I heard some vigorous pawing going on.
I did my best for her. Someone else might have done more.
With me she was never abused.
I got lucky with her in so many ways.
Do we know if dogs have memories rather than just instincts?
One of my friends says "They never forget."
She never forgot she had been abandoned before. She never forgot that she liked children and would let them pet her. She never forgot that someone had hurt her clipping her nails.
Most people were nice, or nuetral, yet we had encountered some bitches, one who went in and complained to management at a grocer and had management calling me out on a loud speaker over it, and the bitch threatening to call the cops. My dog had only been outside, tied on a long leash away from the doors there, a few minutes. She informed me that it was not legal to tie a dog up. (She was wrong. The tie up laws are about those dogs who are for hours or forever chained, even in their own yards.) While dog theft is always possible where criminals live, and there are so many people who steal not only dogs but laptops, hotspots, your hat, so many things stolen from me over the years - even a bag of groceries I left on a community shuttle and intellectual properties and my image, taken without permission. I, at the time, was not willing to challenge a store's rules about dogs who come in with owners having to be service animals. (Now I go into a grocer and I see people with dogs all over the store.)
I recall how I managed to verbally insult this woman back when I got outside and found her standing there, saying "She is my dog. You go ahead and call the cops and see how this comes down. You're a business-minding trouble - making bitch, you're probably mentally ill, and I can bet you do not even have a dog yourself. Get the hell away from us." (Don't get me started on left-to-the-left and right-to-the-right nut cases.)
Then I went back into the store and complained to the manager and called corporate.
This is not all defense this is the truth:
My dog was kept clean and groomed by me. I had stopped taking her to one dog park because there was so much filth there that I'd have to bathe her each and every time we got home. It wasn't just time consuming. It was a trade off between her getting some exercise and over-bathing and compromising her skin. Also I had seen one owner allow their dog to attack another, draw blood, and walk away there.
She got exercise, some years more often than other years. In the years in which she walked well and pulled me or kept pace, we sometimes walked miles, down sidewalks. She lived a citified life with me, then a bit more suburban one. She seemed to prefer pavements over grass, because she could go faster. But in recent times I sometimes carried her to grass, because I thought this was easier on her hips.
I varied her diet, she never over-ate, she had a steady weight. Give me credit for not making her fat and hurting her joints that way. She was taking natural medicine treats for arthritis and joints and to keep her senior bladder well. I never used the doggie medical mj I bought, wish I had, but felt unsure.
Her hair continued to grow at fast pace, though she had some balding spots.
Only twice in many years was she mysteriously ill for a couple days where she would not eat. Only a few times did she throw up. Only a couple times did she do a poop that made me wonder, since she had been regularly pooing when we went out. One time she did so when a man we did not like came over. Had she stored all that, just to make a point?
The morning of, a male dog about her size sniffed her and she sniffed him and I told the owner of that dog, as I had been telling others, that she was going to be fifteen. I wonder as she and this male dog communicate? Did she know or did the other dog know she was dying?
Sometimes I would hold her up in a mirror and say "Whose that doggie with mummy? Is that you?"
They say a dog is too dumb to know. They say a dog is not as smart as a chimp because a chimp can direct. They say the smartest dogs are as smart as a three year old human.
One time a plumber was coming and because she liked to get underfoot, I tied her to the refrigerator door. He came and went and I ran out to do an errand. When I got back there she was. She looked in my eyes, smiled, and then looked towards the fridge door. Three times. That's directing, I followed her movement and saw that she needed to be untied, that she was directing me to the tie up.
It was clear that she never had toys or training, other than being housebroken, wherever she had before. She had no interest in anything rubber or chewy, ringy-dingy or squeeky. A one dollar cloth yellow dog with bulgy eyes was the only toy she would run and save from the vacuum cleaner. At one point she had a little basket and she would show me how she put the cloth dog and balls in the basket. She also liked to prove she had been playing with toys while I was gone by showing me when I entered, but I knew the toy had been right there in the same spot all day. I thought this was like working only when the boss was around. (A bit of "The Secret Life of Pets.)
One time I stayed at a friend's to care for his dogs and had her with me. We stayed in a bedroom with floor length mirrors. I saw that she was facing the mirror and staring into it for hours. Did she look in to her own eyes in the mirror and know that she was seeing herself? I tend to think something was going on in her head about this. But maybe she just thought she and another dog were having a stare down.
Her eyesight had dimmed and so had her hearing, though I don't know how much. She seemed to show up for treats. She knew where the doggie door was - most of the time - and where the water bowls were. We previously had lived without one and I took her out four times a day, when I got up early in the morning, before I left the house, as soon as I got home, and before retiring for the evening. But she was able to use the doggie door to go out as needed, and I thought that was a good thing, since maybe as she aged she wouldn't have to hold it so.
I bathed her twice in a week with a new aloe and oatmeal shampoo, had just cut out some tangles in her hair that were mysteriously formed and trimmed her dewclaws and bathed her Wednesday morning - the day before. The morning of, she had hopped up the steps on the way back from our brief walk in the cool air and was interested in eating.
But it was her day of death. And I suppose busy people always die on days when they have more to do and plans.
I had to get some work done. I had long lists of things that needed edited, that needed researched, that needed printed out and scanned. Excuses.
Long ago when I was a teenager, one of my classmates invited me to a sleep over party at her house. They played a game called Stiff As A Board - Light As A Feather.
I lay down on the floor between them and four girls extended their two hands, with two fingers each, under my back, not too far under. They chanted Stiff as a Board, Light as a Feather, three times, and then lifted me up. For a moment I felt utterly weightless and in the air. Was this just diverting a hundred twenty pounds or so by four? Was it about BELIEF? Confidence? Was it hypnosis? Other than laying there, how did I cooperate?
I would like to think that as my dog lay there stiff as a board, she experienced the light as a feather, that her spirit did go out of the body that was failing her, that it was her time, that she did not fail me or I her, and that there is a place for doggies like her, and that is again with me.
C 2022 Christine Trzyna
Saw that this book was on the London Times best seller list, found it as bought by the Friends of the Library, and sunk right into it.