{"id":469,"date":"2009-06-22T19:16:42","date_gmt":"2009-06-22T07:16:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.waikato.ac.nz\/bioblog\/2009\/06\/sometimes_life_just_sucks\/"},"modified":"2009-06-22T19:16:42","modified_gmt":"2009-06-22T07:16:42","slug":"sometimes-life-just-sucks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.waikato.ac.nz\/bioblog\/2009\/06\/sometimes-life-just-sucks\/","title":{"rendered":"sometimes life just sucks"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>And this is one of those times. Because over the weekend I did what is probably the hardest thing I&#8217;ve ever had to do &#8211; I made the decision to end my beloved dog&#8217;s life.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Bella was nearly 15, &amp; we&#8217;ve had her since she was an 8-week-old puppy. She grew up with our kids (&amp; our cats &#8211; she adored kittens, but would try to make friends with just about any cat she met) &#8211; but sadly, pets age so much faster than people. So in recent months our long walks became shorter strolls, &amp; often I&#8217;d go alone. And she no longer wanted to spend hours excavating holes resembling bomb craters, when we went to the beach. She was going deaf, &amp; had cataracts, &amp; her joints were giving her trouble (the last pay rise went on Rimidil for her arthritis!) &#8211; but she still loved her food &amp; her family &amp; her toddle round the park. But when faecal incontinence added itself to her list of problems, it was time to make that hardest of decisions.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"mt-image-center\" style=\"margin: 0px auto 20px;text-align: center\" height=\"214\" alt=\"Bella &amp; Fidget.jpg\" width=\"320\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.waikato.ac.nz\/bioblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2018\/09\/Bella202620Fidget.jpg\" \/><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"mt-image-center\" style=\"margin: 0px auto 20px;width: 542px;height: 402px;text-align: center\" height=\"432\" alt=\"bella's crater 1.JPG\" width=\"576\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.waikato.ac.nz\/bioblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2018\/09\/bella27s20crater201.jpg\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Bella worked out ages ago that when she went to the vet (once a year, until the last 18 months of her life, when they became more frequent), the visit always involved sharp pointy things, &amp; thermometers placed where the sun does not shine. In fact, she&#8217;d become understandably unenthusiastic about going to the clinic. Our wonderful vet, Dave, knew this &amp; made sure I knew that when the time came, he&#8217;d come to our home so that Bella wouldn&#8217;t be stressed or worried. So I phoned him this morning, &amp; this afternoon he did just that. And lying in the sun&nbsp;Bella slid quickly &amp; peacefully into her final sleep; no fear, no worry, no more pain.<\/p>\n<p>And I will miss her more than I can ever say.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"mt-image-center\" style=\"margin: 0px auto 20px;text-align: center\" height=\"640\" alt=\"bella.jpg\" width=\"389\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.waikato.ac.nz\/bioblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2018\/09\/bella.jpg\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>And this is one of those times. Because over the weekend I did what is probably the hardest thing I&#8217;ve ever had to do &#8211; I made the decision to end my beloved dog&#8217;s life.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[22],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>sometimes life just sucks : BioBlog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/blog.waikato.ac.nz\/bioblog\/2009\/06\/sometimes-life-just-sucks\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"sometimes life just sucks : BioBlog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"And this is one of those times. 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