Another 1999 Entry (Euthanasia)

Euthanasia

I lost my cat, Tiger. I’ve lost cats before and it’salways pretty hard on me… but the pain doesn’t linger, nor do the painful memories.

I had a cat named Muppet some years ago. She contracted mammary cancer and, after some time, she had a stroke and died in my daughter’s arms. Her death was relatively peaceful and we avoided having to get her put to sleep… dying in a strange place with strange people. We owned her for about

12 years.

Muppet’s mother was Jenny-Any-Dots. We had owned her for 15 years. Jenny was a great cat and

in terrific shape, but she died when we had an apartment fire. We found her stretched, mouth open, looking miserable right in the middle of the laundry on my daughter’s floor. That was tough for all of us and we shed a great many tears over poor Jenny’s fate.

We also had a cat named Toby for a short time. Toby was barely ours before a heart problem brought him down. He, too, was found stretched, mouth open and dead on his side. A veterinary autopsy concluded his heart had a congenital defect.

And then we had Tiger. Tiger was such a great cat… he was a real trouble maker (my favorite kind of cat) and he had a personalitly all his own. We had owned him for about three or so years when he came down with some sort of chronic liver problem. At first I took him to the vet and I spent over $800 trying to get him healed. Nothing worked, however so we had a family meeting and decided to wait for him to die… We wanted it to be like Muppet who had died in such peace. We didn’t want him to be ‘put away’ at the vet’s. On the other hand, we didn’t want him to linger in pain so we left the door open for euthenasia deciding to wait until we were sure his spirit was gone before we would do away with his body.

Remarkably, he held up well. Even the night before he died he ate and played and showed some of his old personality. The trouble was, he was descending fast the next morning. I heard a meow from the dining room and found him lying helplessly on the floor there.

It was about 4:00 AM, so I brought Tiger up on the bed and tried to comfort him. He began his last battle with death then. The pain must have been terrible because he hissed and stretched and was writhing. I didn’t know what to do. I cursed myself over and over again for not having had him euthanized before this happened. Finally I asked my husband to go get some sleeping drops I had in the bathroom. I figured I could squirt some in Tiger’s mouth and that he would at last be delivered from this agony he was experiencing. While my husband ran for the drops, Tiger gave one more hiss then stretched to the side, mouth open. By the time my husband got back, Tiger was not alive. His eyes stared and his mouth and face looked like a dead cat’s, but his little heart continued to beat for a short time. There was no point in trying to force drops down his stiffened mouth now.

In all, Tiger’s torment went on for about an hour or an hour and

a half. Through the whole thing I cried and tried to comfort him. I had hoped that he would go peacefully like Muppet had, wrapped in my arms with me whispering words of love. Instead there was this nightmare experience. Some people won’t understand because Tiger was just a cat, but for me it was incredibly traumatic.

It’s been a couple of months now, but still I can see Tiger in my mind’s eye, writhing and hissing and stiffening into death. The pain and guilt in my heart is tough to deal with but I don’t know how to get rid of it. The whole experience comes back to haunt me and I’m filled with regrets.

Prior to this trauma, I was somewhat opposed to euthanasia. I was one of these people who didn’t really believe in pulling the plug or giving up. Now, I understand it better and maybe

I don’t really believe in euthanasia for people (since we have potent pain medications), but perhaps pulling the plug isn’t a horrible thing if it’s something someone has clearly made known they would want. And perhaps euthanasia for a poor animal isn’t quite as heartless as it seemed when I was contemplating Tiger’s

future.

I miss him a lot and so does my little boy. He was a special cat that I would have never forgotten, but now he’ll be in my mind until someone pulls the plug on me.