Lea: The Last Day

As soon as Delia died three and half years ago I started dreading Lea's death, thinking through the different scenarios of how it could happen. It's a bad habit, to dwell on things like that.

When the day came, (one month ago today) it was both better and worse than all those times I had laid in bed or driven down the road and imagined how it would happen.

When I went to bed on Thursday night, I knew that would be the last night I had with her. I was exhausted. Grieving. Hurting because I was watching her struggle so greatly. I was defeated. I didn't know what else to do to save her. She was only declining for one week. Just one short week before she had seemed to be doing quite well. But I stood watch over her for those 7 days. Watching her weaken as each hour passed. I worried and came up with different plans for how to help her. I tried a dozen different foods trying to get her to eat. I carried her up and down stairs. I held her, swaddled in towels, for hours at a time. I forced meds down her throat. I cleaned and bandaged her her head. I fielded a thousand questions from the boys.

And it just wasn't enough.

So as soon as I was up on Friday morning I called the vet. Made an appointment. Wrapped her up and headed into the office. I didn't take anyone with me. It's hard to explain why I had to do it alone. Part of me just wanted to be alone in the grief. But, the greater part of me knew that the only way I would survive that morning is if I didn't have a choice. If I was alone, driving us to the vet, talking through options (or lack of options) with the vet, making hard decisions and filling out a lot of paperwork, then I had to keep it together. I had to get through. But if someone had been there with me, likely my dad, I wouldn't have been able to push through the whole mess of it. I would have broken and not managed to maintain the little control I had. And I wanted so badly to be calm for Lea. I didn't want my emotions to scare her more. I didn't want her to see how nervous I was and then she feel anxiety in return.

So I left Courtney's house and drove us to the vet. And I gripped the steering wheel and prayed fervently that I would stay calm. That I would just stay calm until after it was over.

And I (mostly) succeeded.

We saw a new vet. He looked over her infection. We spoke briefly of her medical history. He talked through the options for treating the infection... aggressive antibiotics (that she probably wouldn't survive), surgical removal of the flaps of both infected ears (that she probably wouldn't survive), a lengthy hospital stay...

And, in the end, there just was only one option. So I held her while they got all of the paperwork together-- the papers where I signed my consent for them to kill her. Then I waited in that room alone while they took her back to place the port in her leg where they would administer the drug. And I stood beside her while she laid on a striped towel on the table beside me as the (very nice) vet talked me through the process.

It was pretty straight-forward. An overdose of anesthesia. She would get sleepy, fall asleep, and then the overdose would do its job and her heart and lungs would stop. And the (very nice) vet ran through some possibilities of what might happen during the moments before she died. It was such an anxiety-ridden moment. All these scenarios of things that might happen after the anesthesia was administered. Things that were pretty likely because dogs with heart issues often die a little more dramatically than other dogs.

She was already laying down on the towel. I stood behind her and petted her. The (very nice) vet very slowly administered the anesthesia. She immediately started getting sleepy. Several seconds later she snored loudly (very normal for her an extremely sweet moment for me--it was just so her) and several seconds after that it was over.

She died so well. That sounds ridiculous, but that was my very first thought. She was so calm and so quiet. There was nothing scary or surprising. She just did so well right up to the last.

 I was on the brink of falling over the edge. You know that moment when you aren't quite crying, but if you blink or make any attempt at speaking that you will immediately fall into that ugly cry and completely lose any semblance of control? That's where I was--for the entire hour at the vet-- but in those very last moments it was almost unbearable.

I made it through that morning. I made it through that whole week. And I am so thankful I was with Lea for those last days. And I am so glad that I was able to be with her when she died. But, I didn't escape unscathed...watching her die scarred my soul.

It has been one month since she died. And I miss her, every day. I don't know why I grieve so slowly or struggle so much from losing a pet. But I loved her deeply and am so grateful that I had her, and she had me.

Lea was cremated and delivered right to my door. There is something vaguely unsettling about that. But it was unbearably hard to leave her in Maryland and travel back home without her. I felt relieved when she was back home too.