The week previous to that one, my dog Gracee... a dog I've had for nearly 14 years now and who has been suffering from severe arthritis for several years now... began to lose control of her bladder and bowel. I knew it was something completely undignified for a girl who'd gone her entire adult life without ever having an accident (save for a couple of times when she'd been ill). But at this point, she'd been looking longingly at me, my mother, and anyone she'd see... with almost a "help me" request in her eyes. Everyone asked her, "What's wrong? Do you want something?" It was obvious that she did.
I knew she wanted to be released from the pain and from her failing body. Unfortunately, she was healthy in almost every other way... except that she'd been losing her vision to cataracts... but otherwise, she was eating and drinking and going about her life as usual. This made the decision to put her down all the more confusing to me.
Gracee was a therapy dog to me, as pretty much all of my dogs have been. When I'd realized in early 1993 that I was accidentally pregnant and had made the decision to start a family, I had an additional moment of panic about 2 months into that decision... it was the realization that I knew absolutely nothing about taking care of babies. Sure, I'd babysat before... but those were older children. I'd not even so much as held a new baby in my arms, however... and I hadn't really had too much responsibility as an art student at that point, except for my 3 cats and one guinea pig. Those don't count all that much, and I knew it. I hadn't even had a puppy in a decade at that point, so I couldn't imagine what ways I might screw up an infant.
As the next couple of weeks of this line of thought progressed, more panic continued to set in... that's when I found myself at the Humane Society, as would often happen whenever I was stressed. I always found that playing with puppies was a great way to lift my mood.
So there I was... 22 years old and about 3 months pregnant at that point... and terrified. As I played with the puppies and put them back in their cages, I began to realize that I had to take one home. If I could house train a puppy and keep it from hurting itself or choking on anything, then I figured that I should be able (with slightly more vigilance and time, of course) do the same for a baby human.
I'd been playing with one very energetic eight-week-old with a fawn and black brindle coat, but I could tell she might be too much for my small apartment... so as I kept her out of her cage and took another, calmer puppy out of its cage to compare the two, that's when I felt a tug. I looked down and saw that the brindle pup had a mouthful of my skirt and was pulling me towards the adoption offices. I pulled the skirt out of her mouth and tried to get her to play with the other pup, but she wanted nothing to do with him. Instead, she went right back to pulling me by the skirt in the direction of the door. I think one of the workers there said something to the effect of, "Looks like she's chosen you!" That's all I needed to hear. An hour later, I was walking through the door of my apartment with my newest family member... much to my cats' and guinea pig's dismay.
A couple of weeks after my first child was born, we got some bad news about Gracee. First she went completely lame at home... a dog who could bounce and leap and never sit still for a moment was suddenly crying in a heap on the floor. She was still just a 9 month old puppy, but the vet was telling me that she would suffer in pain for the rest of her severely shortened life... she had patellar luxations, a condition in which the knee joints aren't deep enough to support the musculature and ligaments of a dog of her size, causing the bones to slip out of place. She was given a maximum of 10 years to live before needing to be put down, and that she'd always need to be kept from running, jumping, or bouncing. I remember crying for her for days, thinking she might have a horrible life of confinement.
She did have to be confined quite a bit, but she had a much longer and fuller life than the vet could have predicted back then. At 11 years, she stopped being able to climb stairs... but with glucosamine and fish oil and the occasional baby aspirin added to her diet, Gracee managed to get around okay. She also helped to raise all 3 of my children and was great at babysitting... taking on drool and clean-up duty with complete devotion. She also helped to raise countless kittens and puppies, who came and went from our house over the years. Despite her deep bark and rather menacing looks, she never met a stranger she didn't like.
As far as looks went, she wasn't a beauty queen, by any means. Although the Humane Society had labeled her as a German Shepard mix, there was no way that was true. By the time she was an adult, I could tell exactly what she was mixed with... Pit Bull and Golden Retriever... a combo that mottled her long coat into somewhat of a hyena look. Combine that with her bear-like shuffle and... well... see for yourself:
A shaved Gracee, 1994... looking like her Pit Bull half and cradling the newest baby of the house.
Gracee au-naturale... junkyard dog exterior, sweet as pie interior.
Last week, I knew her life had come to an end and she needed to be given her dignity. I asked Dean on Monday if he would come with me on Wednesday and help me through it. He'd offered previously and at that point, after spending a week trying to get up the courage to do it alone, I knew I needed him. The next morning, as if Gracee knew that her time was up, she stopped eating. Since the weather was nice, I allowed her to stay outside that day and her last day... she didn't eat that day either. I'd been giving her table scraps for weeks already, but on her last day, I began giving her chocolate truffles and brownies... she loved chocolate, but of course could never be allowed them otherwise.
I'd called the vet on Tuesday and set up the appointment for the next day at closing time... they would only do euthanasia at the end of the day, so not to upset the animals or the clients as much. After making the appointment, however, I couldn't stop crying... and not just crying, but sobbing. I lost an hour of that morning just staring at the phone in my hand and sobbing... then when I had to drive across town to work, I continued to sob... not good in Atlanta's traffic, but it couldn't be helped.
Dean and I took a leisure day on Wednesday... not accomplishing much of anything... taking a long nature walk and talking... those kinds of things. Eventually I had to return home and get Gracee for her appointment. You might think that I would have wanted to spend the last day with her, but I couldn't do it... I had to keep myself preoccupied in other ways rather than wallow in what was to come.
When we got home, I went over to my neighbor's house and told her what was about to happen. My neighbor is an angel of a woman, who always treats my animals like they're human members of my family. She talks to the dogs when they're in the yard, actually coming over to the fence and asking them how their day is and occasionally giving them a treat. My dogs, in turn, think she's their other grandmother (my mom being their first grandmother, of course). As soon as I started getting the words out to her, I began to well up with tears and she did too. She ran to get her shoes and come with me so she could say goodbye. We stood talking to Gracee for a while, with my neighbor crying and telling her how beautiful she was and what a great girl she'd always been and how glad she was to have known her. She even went home and came back with big chunks of chicken to give Gracee from her own dinner and to see her into my vehicle. I thought briefly about driving Gracee to my mom's house for a last goodbye, but I knew that it might upset my mom even more than it would upset me... so I passed on that idea.
We arrived at the vet at exactly 5:30 and they showed us to a room right away, giving us time to say goodbyes there... which seemed too sterile for me to do. Gracee was pacing and panting, where she'd normally be wagging her tail and happy to see everyone. She knew... and I felt the wait was almost too cruel.
Ten minutes later, they came in to do the injection. Unfortunately, Gracee's vein blew in the process and they had to start over... leaving her loopy, but still very much alive and conscious for several minutes. In the time when they were injecting her, I was having my final moments of panic. I couldn't cry at that exact moment, but inside I was wanting to tell them to stop. I couldn't say anything at all though... I just held my hand on Gracee's head and wished for something... anything different at that moment.
Very quickly, however, Gracee's head drifted down and her eyes half-closed as the anesthesia took effect... that's when the tears started to roll down my cheeks. As the vet techs went to find a stethoscope, I leaned down to Gracee's ear and whispered, "It's okay, Gracee. It's okay. You can go now. You're a good girl." When the tech came back an listened for a minute, she finally nodded that Gracee was gone. They gave us the room to stay with her, and although I wanted to and I didn't want to leave her, there was a part of me that wanted to run home... and another part of me that wanted a time machine to go back to 1993 when I first took her home, so that I could give her a whole life again.
With her body still and doll-like, I couldn't stay. It had only been a few minutes, but I needed to leave. By the time I'd gotten back in the vehicle, the clock said it was only 5:50pm, but it felt like a lifetime had passed in that little room.
I know it seems odd to schedule something like that before a holiday, but I felt it would be the only way that I could be truly thankful this year. I was thankful for the life that Gracee gave me while she was here, and for her no longer being in pain. I was also thankful for the support and understanding that Dean gave me at that moment... and for my neighbor's shared love of my dog and her shared tears over saying goodbye.
And even though I knew it would be painful to hear, I called my mom immediately afterwards and told her that Gracee was gone, so that she could weep and share her thoughts with me, too... she could only manage to repeat, "She was a good dog," through her own tears. But the next day at her house, there were no more tears for any of us. We had a good holiday... probably the best Thanksgiving that I've had in years... in a moment of connection that seemed all the more sweeter and profound somehow.
Although I've lost 2 of my dogs in just 2 months time, I have a lot of good things to be grateful for right now and the future feels filled with hope in many ways. I still cry easily thinking about the moment of Gracee's death, but I do not shed a tear for her life. She gave me so much... she taught me how to love unconditionally and how to be responsible for another... how to never give up on something so beautiful... and in those last moments, she also taught me just how precious and short life is and that we all have to let go sometime.
January 16, 1993 - November 22, 2006
