WHEN IS THE RIGHT TIME TO LET YOUR DOG GO?

Dear Jubilee:

I have a healthy dog, but I keep hearing people talk about when it is the right time to let a dog go. I don’t want to be morbid, but it is a question that will face us at some time or another.  

Akron

Dear Akron,

We all wish that there were easy answers to this question, but there is no one answer for every dog. I received the following from another Airedale owner, and it is the best answer I have ever seen.

I wish there were easy answers.  But that's a stupid thing for me to say... we all want easy answers, me most of all.

When I was about 21 or so, Raggedy Ann, my first Airedale, was ailing. I knew she was getting on and was a bit stiff, but I didn't realize quite how bad she had gotten until I got her clipped for spring.  That was when I realized how much weight she had lost and just how bad her health had gotten.  Under all that winter fur, the gradual weight loss had slipped by me unseen.  I realized that it was time, that there was more going on than just old age, and given her age and condition, I knew she wouldn't be able to make it. 

I talked with my vet, who concurred.  I slept on the floor with her that night.  I went in early to the vet and they let me in the office where I gave her all the love I could and held her and talked to her and told her how wonderful she was.  And then I let her go.  It was the hardest thing I'd ever had to do in my life.  She was the friend who got me through some wretched teenaged years when I couldn't trust anybody else to listen and still love me (I wouldn't be a teenager again for anything).

My Airedale, Ginger, is three years older now than Rags was then, and Ginger is doing beautifully, as long as I remember to give her glucosamine.  She's also been a faithful friend (except for sleeping on the bed with me—she won't).  I know that in the next couple of years I will be making that decision for her.  I am spending a lot of time playing with her and petting her and paying attention to her.  She's eating it up with a spoon.   

I think the reason I love Ginger so much is that Rags taught me how.

Susan McCullough

Jubilee