I was sooo sure that Wiggles (I didn't name him, okay! lol) was going to be just fine. The vet saw nothing on an x-ray and said he probably ate a mushroom or something in the yard that has his stomach upset, and hoped that he'd perk up after being on fluids for a day. Well, we got a call this morning that he was even worse this morning, there was now blood in his stool, and they wanted to do exploratory surgery right away. I still felt like they would go in, find something, and then we'd know how to treat it. 20 minutes later the vet called and said that his bowel had a perforation and a large amount of the contents had leaked into his abdomen. He said it would take a miracle for him to be able to pull through this, so we said to put him down. Since he was already under for the surgery, the vet just did it while he was still under.
Even though we hoped to find him another home, he was a truly amazing dog. DH and I would joke that we should rehome the other two and just keep Wiggles because he was so sweet, gentle, and well behaved. I've never met a sweeter dog.
I try to make myself feel better by remembering that he had 2 years that he wouldn't have had if I hadn't picked him up from that kill shelter. We had done some fun stuff with him over the last few weeks, like a trip to the mountains, which he loved. But it's hard because he was only 2 years old and should have so much life ahead of him. Then I try to not think about what he ate, could we have prevent it, was this our fault, maybe this wouldn't have happened if I had tried harder to rehome him.
I'm not sure what I'll tell my 3 year old, who loves that damn dog. He hasn't noticed yet that he's not at home, probably because he is used to him being in the yard, but DS loves to go outside with us to feed him and is used to us bringing him in at night to hang out with us, so he's going to eventually ask. I guess I'll tell him that he went to live somewhere better.
I hate that this happened to such a sweet, good dog.
Obviously I jumped the gun on the CL ad and I just deleted it.
If you can find out what he ate (maybe the vet can?)- I would want to know so you can protect your other dogs from having this happen again.
The vet said he could look around to find it, but I told him not to. We had been out of town for four days and the dogs were at a dog sitter's where they had free roam of her yard, so I think he likely ate something there. He's a chewer, though, and often chews up stuff from my garden and also chews sticks. I actually don't think it was something that could have been prevented. Because he chewed stuff up, we knew to keep him away from toys, shoes, etc, and at the dog sitter's he was always in the yard, laying on the couch with them, or in their spare bedroom which only has a futon and nothing to chew. Our other two dogs aren't chewers.
I'm so sorry! Obviously I know how you're feeling right now. We need to do drinks soon and toast to our doggies.
I was all teary eyed on the way to work and actually thought to myself "Tia and I need to do drinks!" It's even harder with a dog who has been with you a long time like yours. The dog I got as a puppy in high school died about three years ago and I was such a mess.