timbo
Deceased
For those that havent caught it from the title,this is to our dog,Toots who was given the release today. She is with her sister dogs now.
Toots came into our life when my DW saw her in an inner city school parking lot where DW works. Dogs are always running loose in this area and you sure see your share of dead dogs along side the streets.
Toots was trying to pry a McDonald's wrapper off the parking lot surface while avoiding the little heathen students who were yelling and kicking at her(but not making contact). DW thought to herself,now after I park and before I go into the school,if she is still there,I will do something about this.
Well Toots wasnt at the wrapper anymore,she was right at DW's feet!
Gad,was she dirty and stinky. She looked to be about 10-12 weeks old,just out of suckling probably.
DW picked her up and into the school they went. She took her to a friend's classroom(DW is a speech therapist so has no classroom of her own). It was November and Toots was cold and of course very hungry and thirsty. After taking care of those things she put Toots under a desk where Toots promptly fell asleep! This last is important because as Toots life went on,she fell asleep alot!
One of the Special Ed kids(who years later was shot to death) crawled under the desk with her and never left her(kindred souls I'm sure).
She called me and told me what was going on. The only provision I had was the dog not be a male. I had male dogs before and dont take kindly to them,dont know why,just dont.
I went to the school hours later and brought Toots home and fed her and fed her and fed her. Poor little pup hadnt eaten in days Im sure.
When DW came home we bathed her and oh yeah,fed her again too.
The next morning I was to take her to the vets for a checkup and a fleadown if necessary and any shots she may have to have.
Later in the day........bad news. Toots had parvo,a puppy killer. We told our dear doctor to start treatment and see if he could save her. He told us she had a 50/50 chance of living through this. He also said with parvo,if we would have been another 24 hours getting to him,he couldnt have saved her at all.
For three days we called to check on her,not knowing if she had died or not.
Of course she didnt and we brought her home,where she got another bath because she stunk. She had to lay in her own mess because of her immobility and IVs she was on.
Doing that she curled up in front of the couch and.....fell asleep.
Our old crabby mutt,Lady(shoulda called her Switchblade,it fit better) walked over to her,sniffed her for the longest time and it seemed to us in retrospect that Lady adopted Toots as her own from that day.
She would play with her and wrestle and fake bite her and romp around like two puppies for hours and hours it seemed. They were buddies.
Now the collie. Mercedes,the snot......she would snarl(but never bite) at Toots when Toots would kinda crawl up and "submit" to Mer. Mer would show every tooth in her jaw. Well after awhile,Toots being the dog she was,started licking Mer's teeth! Now how do you think Mer felt? Here Mer is,being this big ferocious dog and this pup licks her teeth! Gad! Finally,Mer did accept Toots and from then on the 3 of them were good friends.
Mer and Lady passed away after time and we ended up with still three dogs.
A little Jack Russell,Lucy and Abigail,our Corgi. As tough as those two breeds are,they always gave Toots the lead dog role. Not that she was tough and ask for it,they just gave it to her.
Toots had her share of woe. We discovered her thryroid was all screwy and she ended up taking medicine for that the rest of her life. Then about 5 years ago,her tear ducts stopped! Poor baby still got the crud that forms in your eyes but no tears to wash it away. So many many times a day we had to give her artificial tears and carefully wipe her eyes clean. She never complained or pulled away when we would use a kleenex to get the crud out. She would lay there and not move until we were done. Her eyes would get so bloodshot and sore looking but she would always just lie there and let us take care of her eyes.
Actually Toots never did anything bad or even reluctant to us. The worse thing she ever did was scratch at the couch(nesting they call it) when we were away. We finally started putting up something on the couch. That way a good dog couldnt go bad.
First of July this year: DW found some lumps under Toots' jaw. The vet said after a biopsy that it was lymphnoma,a deadly cancer that would take her in about 4 months at the most.
We were about to head out on our 3 week vacation and we asked the doc if we should even go. We had decided to start her on a mild chemo to help Toots and we werent sure we wanted to go. Thankfully we heeded the Doc's advice and went on vacation.
Tooters(as we called her often) loved our motor home! One dog went to DW's feet,one dog went to a cage and Toots........she got the couch!
We live about 1/4 mile from the x-way entrance....Toots is asleep by the time we get to the top of the ramp! We called her our "professional sleeper-dont try this at home" dog.
We had a wonderful vacation! 3 weeks in upper Michigan staying at a number of state parks. There,we always went for walks around the camp ground,just to be snoopy but also to give the dogs a chance to sniff all those wonderful smells and to say howdy to all the dogs staying there(boy did they all say howdy!) And also to get petted by a bunch of nice people out walking as well.
They couldnt keep their hands off of Tooters. For some reason,Toots never lost that super soft puppy fur. Her hair was so soft,it was like touching nothing! Several people thought she was the youngest(even thought she was a big puppy!) of our three,not knowing she was just 12 years old! That is how great she looked in those three weeks!
We celebrate her birthday on August 10th. We didnt know her real birthday and so we gave my Mom's birthday to her. She loved it because they always got special food on birthdays,and besides sleeping, Toots loved to eat!
We got home on Saturday. She was fine. Sunday,as usual,we fed her in the morning. About an hour later she threw up her food and then refused her pills,which she never does. Not being able to get to the vet until Monday,we just had to wait it out.
I stayed up all night with her. Every half hour or so she would have to go outside and either throw up or try to go to the bathroom. And then she would walk and walk for at least 15 minutes. We would go inside and she would lay down and sleep until the next bout hit her and off we would go again.
Monday morning we were at the vet and after blood tests found she had what the doctor believed was pancreatitis. And very dehydrated. He said she would have to go on IV's for the dehydration to see if the pancreas would come under control. We of course checked on her everyday for how she was doing.
It got worse. She started to jaundice and the doctor thought the liver was shutting down.....and possibly problems with kidneys as well. But he said give her at least a few more days and maybe she could come out of it.
9am this morning. He called and said that Toots was worse. I called DW and we met at the vets. Poor Toots. Her breathing was very labored and she was so weak.
We knew. We knew that it was time to take on the responsibility that all pet owners have and that was to unselfishly let her go. The ultimate let go.
Because Toots already had an IV in,the doctor inserted the hypo of sodium pentathol that would allow Toots to just go into a natural relaxing sleep and keep on going.
As my DW held her and told Toots that we loved her,Toots fell asleep.And of course we cried. Not the first time for this sweet gentle friend,and Im sure not the last time either.
We looked down at her lying there,and she looked just like she did for so much of our life.
Sleeping peacefully.
Toots came into our life when my DW saw her in an inner city school parking lot where DW works. Dogs are always running loose in this area and you sure see your share of dead dogs along side the streets.
Toots was trying to pry a McDonald's wrapper off the parking lot surface while avoiding the little heathen students who were yelling and kicking at her(but not making contact). DW thought to herself,now after I park and before I go into the school,if she is still there,I will do something about this.
Well Toots wasnt at the wrapper anymore,she was right at DW's feet!
Gad,was she dirty and stinky. She looked to be about 10-12 weeks old,just out of suckling probably.
DW picked her up and into the school they went. She took her to a friend's classroom(DW is a speech therapist so has no classroom of her own). It was November and Toots was cold and of course very hungry and thirsty. After taking care of those things she put Toots under a desk where Toots promptly fell asleep! This last is important because as Toots life went on,she fell asleep alot!
One of the Special Ed kids(who years later was shot to death) crawled under the desk with her and never left her(kindred souls I'm sure).
She called me and told me what was going on. The only provision I had was the dog not be a male. I had male dogs before and dont take kindly to them,dont know why,just dont.
I went to the school hours later and brought Toots home and fed her and fed her and fed her. Poor little pup hadnt eaten in days Im sure.
When DW came home we bathed her and oh yeah,fed her again too.
The next morning I was to take her to the vets for a checkup and a fleadown if necessary and any shots she may have to have.
Later in the day........bad news. Toots had parvo,a puppy killer. We told our dear doctor to start treatment and see if he could save her. He told us she had a 50/50 chance of living through this. He also said with parvo,if we would have been another 24 hours getting to him,he couldnt have saved her at all.
For three days we called to check on her,not knowing if she had died or not.
Of course she didnt and we brought her home,where she got another bath because she stunk. She had to lay in her own mess because of her immobility and IVs she was on.
Doing that she curled up in front of the couch and.....fell asleep.
Our old crabby mutt,Lady(shoulda called her Switchblade,it fit better) walked over to her,sniffed her for the longest time and it seemed to us in retrospect that Lady adopted Toots as her own from that day.
She would play with her and wrestle and fake bite her and romp around like two puppies for hours and hours it seemed. They were buddies.
Now the collie. Mercedes,the snot......she would snarl(but never bite) at Toots when Toots would kinda crawl up and "submit" to Mer. Mer would show every tooth in her jaw. Well after awhile,Toots being the dog she was,started licking Mer's teeth! Now how do you think Mer felt? Here Mer is,being this big ferocious dog and this pup licks her teeth! Gad! Finally,Mer did accept Toots and from then on the 3 of them were good friends.
Mer and Lady passed away after time and we ended up with still three dogs.
A little Jack Russell,Lucy and Abigail,our Corgi. As tough as those two breeds are,they always gave Toots the lead dog role. Not that she was tough and ask for it,they just gave it to her.
Toots had her share of woe. We discovered her thryroid was all screwy and she ended up taking medicine for that the rest of her life. Then about 5 years ago,her tear ducts stopped! Poor baby still got the crud that forms in your eyes but no tears to wash it away. So many many times a day we had to give her artificial tears and carefully wipe her eyes clean. She never complained or pulled away when we would use a kleenex to get the crud out. She would lay there and not move until we were done. Her eyes would get so bloodshot and sore looking but she would always just lie there and let us take care of her eyes.
Actually Toots never did anything bad or even reluctant to us. The worse thing she ever did was scratch at the couch(nesting they call it) when we were away. We finally started putting up something on the couch. That way a good dog couldnt go bad.
First of July this year: DW found some lumps under Toots' jaw. The vet said after a biopsy that it was lymphnoma,a deadly cancer that would take her in about 4 months at the most.
We were about to head out on our 3 week vacation and we asked the doc if we should even go. We had decided to start her on a mild chemo to help Toots and we werent sure we wanted to go. Thankfully we heeded the Doc's advice and went on vacation.
Tooters(as we called her often) loved our motor home! One dog went to DW's feet,one dog went to a cage and Toots........she got the couch!
We live about 1/4 mile from the x-way entrance....Toots is asleep by the time we get to the top of the ramp! We called her our "professional sleeper-dont try this at home" dog.
We had a wonderful vacation! 3 weeks in upper Michigan staying at a number of state parks. There,we always went for walks around the camp ground,just to be snoopy but also to give the dogs a chance to sniff all those wonderful smells and to say howdy to all the dogs staying there(boy did they all say howdy!) And also to get petted by a bunch of nice people out walking as well.
They couldnt keep their hands off of Tooters. For some reason,Toots never lost that super soft puppy fur. Her hair was so soft,it was like touching nothing! Several people thought she was the youngest(even thought she was a big puppy!) of our three,not knowing she was just 12 years old! That is how great she looked in those three weeks!
We celebrate her birthday on August 10th. We didnt know her real birthday and so we gave my Mom's birthday to her. She loved it because they always got special food on birthdays,and besides sleeping, Toots loved to eat!
We got home on Saturday. She was fine. Sunday,as usual,we fed her in the morning. About an hour later she threw up her food and then refused her pills,which she never does. Not being able to get to the vet until Monday,we just had to wait it out.
I stayed up all night with her. Every half hour or so she would have to go outside and either throw up or try to go to the bathroom. And then she would walk and walk for at least 15 minutes. We would go inside and she would lay down and sleep until the next bout hit her and off we would go again.
Monday morning we were at the vet and after blood tests found she had what the doctor believed was pancreatitis. And very dehydrated. He said she would have to go on IV's for the dehydration to see if the pancreas would come under control. We of course checked on her everyday for how she was doing.
It got worse. She started to jaundice and the doctor thought the liver was shutting down.....and possibly problems with kidneys as well. But he said give her at least a few more days and maybe she could come out of it.
9am this morning. He called and said that Toots was worse. I called DW and we met at the vets. Poor Toots. Her breathing was very labored and she was so weak.
We knew. We knew that it was time to take on the responsibility that all pet owners have and that was to unselfishly let her go. The ultimate let go.
Because Toots already had an IV in,the doctor inserted the hypo of sodium pentathol that would allow Toots to just go into a natural relaxing sleep and keep on going.
As my DW held her and told Toots that we loved her,Toots fell asleep.And of course we cried. Not the first time for this sweet gentle friend,and Im sure not the last time either.
We looked down at her lying there,and she looked just like she did for so much of our life.
Sleeping peacefully.
But its not a bad kind of crying, its the kind that lets your heart really feel something...............you and your wife had a special love for this little dog.........you rescued it and loved it, when nobody else wanted it. I wish that death didn't take away the ones we love.........but it does, and we find some way to live with that. Toots has just gone from this place to another place.........but she's still very much alive here through your loving memories of her.........the evidence of that is in the response of the friends that have posted to this thread. Their hearts are moved and they share your grief at her passing...........they could see in their minds-eye, Toots trying to eat Mcdonalds wrapper off the pavement in the parking lot...........your precious wife carrying Toots inside to safety.........you taking her home.........the most wonderful vacation memories that you had together. Thank you for sharing her life and her story with us.
)
They are all adorable!