April 29th...
Five years ago, I lost my first dog, April. She passed away suddenly at the vet's office (I left her there to get blood work done while I had to spend the entire day down at Methodist Hospital finishing up a lab practical for PA school.) I didn't really get to say good-bye to her. It was a bad day and I pretty much have dreaded this date since then.
Today...we had thunderstorms overnight...Abby woke us up at 3am barking...not unusual for her at all...she's scared of the storms. I got up as usual around 6am, took my shower and got ready to go to work (Wednesday, so just a half day for me). Chris got up to feed and let out the dogs. Abby apparently went straight to the couch and didn't want to eat her breakfast. Very odd...not sure that I've ever since her turn down a meal. She was very quiet. I decided to take a peek at her belly and noticed a small amount of bruising. Not a good sign.
The plan was to get her blood drawn at 2:30pm after I got home from work. I called the office and they moved her appointment up to 9am and Chris took her in. Dr. Havens (our normal vet) was able to see her then. She was very lethargic and pale. He noticed the bruising on her belly as well. He decided to give her an injection of steriods and to draw some blood work to be sent off STAT. They also wanted to keep her and monitor her until the blood work came back. Luckily, I was able to be on the phone with Chris while he was at the vet's office.
Dr. Janicki was the neurologist on with me in the hospital. I let him know what was going on with Abby and he was nice enough to let me leave early. I think that I left by 10:30am or so. I went straight to the vet's office to visit with Abby. I sat down on the floor with her and read a magazine. Dr. Havens came in and chatted with me for a little bit. Labs weren't back yet. Abby did have a dark bowel movement while there, that would suggest GI bleeding. So, that was concerning, but a little better in my mind than the other thought that we had which was hemolytic anemia (the body attacks red blood cells instead of or along with the platelets). Since the bloodwork wasn't back yet, I ran down to mom & dad's house (they are vacationing in France) to pump water off the pool cover and ran a couple of errands while it was running.
I got back to the vet's office around 1pm. The lab work still wasn't back yet. I had them bring me Abby and we sat on the floor some more. She snuggled up to me and was dozing.
Dr. Havens came in around 1:30pm with the news that I didn't want to hear or was really expecting. I was hoping it was just the low platelets again and some mild anemia due to a GI bleed...fixable. Abby was severely anemic...Hgb 4.7 (normal 12-18), Hct 14 (normal 36+), her platelets were 3,000 (way, way down from just a week ago) and her white blood cells were down to 2,000 (normal 6.0-10.5). And not only were all of her levels dangerously low, there was also evidence that she wasn't making any new cells either.
Dr. Havens' best guess is that Abby has been battling a form of cancer that affects the bone marrow, which would explain why we've had such a hard time with her platelet counts for the last four months. Back in January, Abby had an abdominal ultrasound and lymph node biopsy that ruled out some forms of cancer. We didn't initally do a bone marrow biopsy as it would've been too dangerous with such a low platelet count. Later, we were given the option to have it done, but decided against it, as we didn't want to go looking for something bad.
So our options he gave us, weren't good ones. He could send us back to the Emergency Vet Clinic where Abby spent several days in Jan. to get a blood transfusion, which would make her feel better for a few days, but eventually we'd be back at the same critical point. He didn't think that she'd last very long with the blood levels that she had.
I called Chris with the news. We decided to take her home with us for a little while and think about things. We didn't want to do the blood transfusion just to prolong things. I wanted to get some pictures of Abby at home and with Elle and Brendan. We had the option to just let nature take it's course or take her back to the vet and have them put her to sleep. As much as I didn't want to have to put her down, I didn't want to wake up in the morning and find that she had passed away in her sleep, alone in her crate.
Chris went and got Brendan from daycare, while I sat with Abby. She never got up off the couch...just laid there. She looked out the window some and didn't seem uncomfortable, just very worn out. She ate a few bites of food and got lots of petting. I took lots of pictures of Abby, alone, with Elle and Brendan. We wrapped her up in her favorite blue fleece blanket and then headed to the vet...before I lost my nerve. As I had told Dr. Havens...with April, it was almost easier...I didn't have to make a choice and didn't get to say good-bye. This time, I had to make a choice and I didn't feel that there were any good ones.
Things happened quickly and quietly once we got to the vet. The ladies up front were nice enough to watch Brendan for us as we weren't sure that he should be present. We got to pet Abby and talk to her as Dr. Havens adminstered the anesthetic. She went very quickly and peacefully. We wrapped her up in a towel and her favorite blanket. Dr. Havens carried her out to the car and put her in my arms for us to drive her to my parents' house to be buried near April.
It was kind of a mess trying to bury her...it's been very rainy here for awhile and everything was a muddy mess. But we got the job accomplished while Brendan had some snacks in his stroller. She's buried across from April in the woods behind my parents' house. We covered her grave wtih some rocks from the woods and will tomorrow get more rocks and hopefully a marker of sorts.
Coming home was painful. No barking when we opened the door. No one climbing into the dishwasher as we tried to load it. No one under our feet while we ate dinner or watching Brendan like a hawk as he ate in his highchair. The house feels very empty and quiet without her.
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