Mind Fog

I’m walking around in a daze, and nooo not because SITSmas took it out of me (though I had a blast!!) It’s because of my furry baby – Sammie (aka The Barker). She hasn’t been doing too well and had been eating less – not much less, but less. I thought it was the stress of having a new baby in the house. Hey… dogs act out on stress in funny ways. But then 2 days ago she stopped eating altogether – even her favorite things (like hard-boiled eggs, carrots, or yes – even bacon)… she would just sniff and turn her head.

I made an appointment with the vet yesterday. Drove the hour to my mums to go to her vet (my old vet) 1) because I was sure I might need the extra support, though I was still hoping that she wasn’t eating because of something stupid 2) I wanted to go see my mum anyway so she could see the Muncher and 3) I liked that vets office.

The news was not good – Sammie had lost over 2 lbs (that wasn’t news to me I could see that, but on a Maltese that’s a lot!! She is just skin and bones right now) and her tummy was bloated. He took an x-ray to see what was going on in there. Those were the longest 5 -10 minutes ever. Long story short, either her abdomen is filled with fluid or there’s a giant tumor in there – add to that a bunch of little tumors in her chest cavity that were visible on the x-ray. But… her heart is ok. Great, she’s got a healthy heart, but she’s so full of cancer that it doesn’t help her. Her birthday is on the 22 of this month and she won’t make it to it. I had them give me some medication to help with her pain and get rid of some of the fluid (if any) to see if that might help make her feel better and start eating again. But she still refuses to eat and just looks at me with those eyes.

Now I am making the hardest decision I feel I’ve had to make in my 31 years. I couldn’t do it yesterday, but I can tell she’s in pain and not comfortable… she can’t even lay still for more than 5 minutes. I don’t want to make her suffer any longer. It’s happened so very fast – she went from ok and playful to terrible and lethargic so very quickly. She can barely even stand for more than a minute.

She’s had an adventuresome 11 (almost 12) years. She moved with me to Germany and spent almost 7 years there (yes she is bilingual!! =) ). She went on a vacation with me to Mallorca, Spain. She went everywhere with me, everywhere. She fell off of a balcony and lived to tell the story that the only thing that hurt her when that happened was a ripped claw and some bruises (I could have killed my ex-boyfriend – he took so freaking long to get the new railing put up after he had the old one ripped out). Though she never had puppies of her own, my Oma’s kitten did suck on her so much that she actually produced milk!! Oh and when she was a puppy (I was away in Germany already), she had gotten into a pack of crayons at my mum’s and eaten them…. and then had colorful poop =) The neighborhood kids thought it was funny to see red, yellow, and green dog poo. (I secretly wish I had seen it too I got to hear all about it though when I came back over to bring her back to Germany with me).

I had hoped that she would grow old and be able to play with the Muncher for a few years, after all, she’s only 11 and they usually live to be 16. We had thought that Snickers – the beagle, who is older, she’s 15 now – would be the first, but she’s still going strong.

My head hurts from crying, my eyes are so swollen it looks like someone punched me and I am heartbroken. She is my baby and it’s so hard to say good-bye.

EDIT: Being the good dog that she was, she spared me the grief of having to play God. We were on the couch and I was holding her at the time that it happened. I will miss her.