I don’t know if I’m doing the right thing saying goodbye
These posts are probably commonplace here so I apologize in advance. My dog, Macaroni, is a Pitbull bulldog mix. We don’t know how old he is, unfortunately. The estimate is around 10, but he could be older.
5 months ago Mac had his first IVDD flare. I don’t know what stage he was at, but he was not immobile. We were able to recover him with gabapentin, prednisone, and rest.
About 2 weeks ago he had a very sudden decline. He is now paralyzed in his back legs and can not control when he pees or poops. Once again I am not sure what stage he is. We did not opt to do an MRI or get surgery because we just can’t afford to.
He is still alert, he still drinks water and has a very healthy appetite.
We currently have him on prednisone again but are not seeing any improvements in his leg movements or incontinence. Diapers are a terrible fit on him and we live on the 3rd floor of a building with no elevator so taking him outside in his current condition is a production. Our home is too small to accommodate any kind of dog wheelchair situation if he did improve to that level in the future. We also have another dog who is not getting half the attention she used to.
I have scheduled euthanasia in 4 days and I’m going through the entire spectrum of grief, especially the guilt. I can’t stop crying at home l, crying at work, just crying. I keep obsessing over reading stories about dogs who survived similar levels of this disease and questioning if I’m being a bad owner or throwing in the towel too soon. Is there a life where he’s just disabled, and what kind of life is that? Am I an asshole for not seeing what that life is?
He’s an old boy, he’s blind, has dental disease, and a lot of recent muscle wasting. He lost 3 lbs of muscle between his two flare ups. I look at him and I see he’s sick… but he looks back and is still completely there… and it’s killing me.