a reply to:
Dwoodward85
My male Ridgeback passed away mid November, just shy of his 20th birthday. We knew that our girl was not going to last very long. She moped, and
whined, almost all day, and all night. My cat, that thinks he is a dog, tried everything he could to console her. He slept with her, he washed her, he
rubbed her, and kneaded her, but it didn't help much.
She developed a tumor on her tongue and her hind leg. They were removed and were benign. When she started developing one on her side, I decided to
stop with the commercial food, and starting cooking her food myself. It really wasn't any more expensive, and I could control what was in it, and what
she ate. The tumor on her side actually starting getting smaller. I thought all was well, until I saw one of her nipples was swollen. It grew so fast
I thought it was a cyst, but the Vet said it was a rapidly growing tumor.
Thank God it did not cause her any pain, but it started to interfere with her ability to hold her urine, so she had to go do her business almost every
hour. When it got so large that she had trouble walking, and it started to opened up, the Vet said it was time to let her go, while she was still
happy and pain free. We lost her the first week of May, one month before her thirteenth birthday.
It was harder on my mother than it was on me, because Caleb imprinted on me, and our girl imprinted on my mother. The hardest thing is the quiet.
Both of them were very quiet dogs, Ridgebacks are not barkers, but I can't get over how quiet the house is without them.
I understand what you are going through. The only thing that helps me, is thinking back to all the happy times. The mischievous smiles they would
display, when they knew they had been caught, and knowing that they had a wonderful life, and died without pain.
edit on 25-6-2016 by NightSkyeB4Dawn because: Clean up.