Living with a Senior Dog
while contemplating seniorhood yourself...
“The Writing Assistant” joined our family in 2007, not long after my divorce was finalized and we’d moved to our new home. My daughter was in middle school, my son in high school. I’d met a wonderful man, who ten years later would become my husband, a few months before.
The Writing Assistant quickly became a beloved family member. Sure, it took him a while to become house trained, but eventually we cracked it by putting bells by the back door and teaching him to swat them with his paw when he wanted to go out.
He quickly became known as The Care Dog. He could sense when we were sad, and would come and give us snuggles. When my dad died, he slept on my pillow with me, as if he knew I would need his warm comforting presence to cope with my grief.
Four years ago, at 13, the Writing Assistant was diagnosed with Cushings after he started peeing in our bed. Fortunately, once we got him on meds that improved. The year after that, he was diagnosed with an enlarged heart. I cried as the canine cardiologist explained what that meant. I thought it was the end. But that was three years ago. I guess we all knew he was a little dog with a big heart, even without a cardiologist’s diagnosis.
Then our vet said it wasn’t possible to clean his teeth anymore because the risk of anesthesia was too great. Then his arthritis got worse, so I bought him a stroller so we could continue to go on walks.
More time passed. Over the last year, as his joints have become even more arthritic, he’s spent less time walking and more time in the stroller. His eyesight has failed. I want to get him a little helmet, because he keeps bumping his head against the wall.
The worst is the sundowning. I lost my father to Alzheimer’s 11 years ago, and watching the Writing Assistant pace around the living room after dinner, around and around in circles, brings back memories of that painful journey with Dad. At his annual checkup last week, our wonderful vet, Dr. Shutts, said to give him melatonin. That seems to have helped shorten the duration of his pacing before he finally settles down.
When you’re living with a senior dog on a day-to-day basis, you know things have deteriorated, but just like with Dad’s decline, it’s gradual, so you adjust to each stage, to each plateau, until the next tick down.
Last weekend, we visited my sister and her family. The Writing Assistant inspired them to get a Havanese, too, our cuzdog, Astro.
Being with Astro, seeing his lively brown eyes, intelligent expression, and oh-so-waggy tail, made me realize how much things have changed. It made me miss the younger version of Benny so much.
Friends have told me that I would know when it was time. Our vet said he would help with that, too. At the visit last week, he gave me a quality of life form to fill out every day so I could notice trends. He said doing that would help take the emotion out of it. But it’s made me more emotional, because the very fact he gave me the forms sent a message.
We’ve started using doggy diapers to protect the wood floors. I spend a lot of time washing said floors, because the diapers only catch the pee, not the poop.
I joke that I’m the Sarah Stairlift, because I carry him up and down the stairs constantly. At night, I cuddle him like I did my kids when they were babies.
In my eulogy for my father, I wrote about something I learned from his Alzheimer’s journey:
Perhaps the most important lesson I’ve learned from Dad’s condition is to live more in the present. I’m Jewish, and a Mother, which (funnily enough) makes me a Jewish Mother, and if that weren’t enough qualification for being a total worry wort, I’ve fought depression and anxiety since I was a teenager. When I went to visit Dad I had to learn to go with the flow - to meet him wherever he happened to be that day. Sometimes it was the past, but mostly it was the present. We’d hold hands, listen to music, enjoy walking Benny, and just being together. The last time my father said coherent words to me, he smiled, kissed my hand and said, “You’re wonderful.” He might not have remembered my name, or even that I was specifically his daughter, but he remembered his love all of us up to the very end.
And that’s the other really important thing I’ve learned from this long and painful journey. I’ve been to weddings of Christian friends, and always loved Paul’s letter to the Corinthians. I’ve thought of it often these last few years: “But now faith, hope, love, abide these three; but the greatest of these is love.” Dad didn’t remember my name, but his face still lit up when he saw me. Love is the greatest of these, and it’s what has supported us all and helped us get through this difficult time.
So many of my friends of a similar age have been posting about losing their beloved furry companions. Every time it breaks my heart, because I know that time is drawing ever closer.
So why am I writing this now? I guess as a reminder to myself to treasure every moment we have left, even as I’m cleaning the stinkiest poop off the floor I just finished mopping; even though I miss seeing our boy toss his toy behind him and then look around wondering where it went. Even though I miss his intelligent, knowing eyes and seeing his feathery tail wagging up a storm.
I’m also writing it because in 3 1/2 years I will officially be a senior citizen myself. And during Neilah, the closing service of Yom Kippur, this really resonated. (Note: I took the pic after Havdalah, not during services!)
“The gates do not stay open forever. We walk through the years, and they shut behind us. And at the end they are all closed, except the one final gate which we must enter.”
I write this to remind myself that the gates are closing behind my beloved furry boy, but also behind me, and that I want to enter the gates of kindness and compassion in the time I have left here.
PS: I promise to write something more uplifting next time!
Well put, Sarah!
This is beautiful Sarah !