His name was Pete

One of my board members does pet sitting in her not so spare time. This past week, she had a pet sit in my neighborhood. It is a nice urban neighborhood, with sidewalks, huge oak trees, daffodils blooming in the yards. a neighborhood where the neighbors know each others names and I know the names of all the dogs and cats.

She called me on Friday night very upset. this house where she was tending the pets had a visitor. It was snowing, sleeting and raining, the low was to get down into the twenties. in the back yard, in a little nest under a window was an abandoned dog. he was of the American bulldog breed - a breed much maligned by society today. he looked just like the dog on The Little Rascals television show. this breed of dog doesn't have much hair and unlike the belief of society due to bad press and even more so bad people like Michael Vick, they are not tough. They are just dogs needing a safe loving home. They don't choose to fight, they don't choose to die violent deaths.

This dog had ears that were cropped by some yahoo in their back yard with either a pair of sharp scissors or a pocket knife. not attractive and even more so, I imagine very painful surgery.

but he was sweet. he was quiet. he was calm. he had found a quiet place to be. he was half starved. you could count the bones in his spine. it being late in the evening, and no vet clinics were open, we had no place to take him at that point in the day. we grabbed about 15 blankets, some canned dog food and some kibble dog food. we made him as warm and dry of a nest as we could for the evening. he knew what it was for and burrowed down into his warm nest after gobbling up some dinner; he was quite content in his warm, safe quiet place to be for the evening snow.

the next morning, the sun was shinning and the ice and snow was gone. we went over early to feed him and check on his status. he wouldn't eat, he was still in his warm bed but not interested in getting up. I could see in his eyes that he was there to die; his breathing was very labored and quiet heavy, with a wet rattle.

After much encouragement, he shakily got up and went where I encouraged him. I had hoped to get him to drink some water and do some business. he was not interested in either.

We loaded him up in the car and got him to the vets office. he never growled, he never flinched, he never showed any fear.

When we got him to the vets office he stood quietly as the vet tried to get some blood from a vein, several pricks, not a flinch. The vet listened to his chest and his heart. Pete was in the middle of a heartworm heart attack. he was dying. the vet told us that had we not gotten him there, he would have died a very violent painful death within the day. His heart was blown and there was no way to save him. We had to choose the only loving thing we could for the sad dog who had never been given any sort of decent care. The vet gave him a sedative, the dog took a nap and then was given the final injection.

His name was Pete

posted by Elizabeth @ 7:51 AM