Nala and Me

 My dog Nala is dying. 

She is fifteen. She has been the family dog for over fourteen and a half years. I will add to this post in the future. She eats, but she is very picky and wants softened food that is as close to human as she can get--she likes gravy, bacon grease, and tuna on top of her kibbles. She eats enough to not be as bony as she is, and she is close to skeletal. She pees and poops in the house sometimes because she cannot get out the doggy door. She sleeps a lot, and getting up is very difficult for her on my non-carpeted floors. We have to pick up her back legs sometimes, and she sometimes eats in a sit position. She doesn't seem to see or hear well, and walks around until she stands exactly in my path, not knowing what to do. 

I feel like I am watching a precursor of myself in  . . . how many years?

Although my husband says she is his dog and Butter is mine, Nala is more my dog. She and I have walked probably a thousand miles together. She used to ride shotgun in the Volvo station wagon, either because she wanted to be near me or to see the road. When my husband and I were separated, I missed her, not him, and got my son to bring her to me so she could see my house, sleep in my bed, get used to Butter, and learn how to use the doggy door. Eventually my husband let her come live with me as long as he could visit, and she became a very happy dog again. That was three years ago, and he thought she was dying then. She just needed me, that was all. 

I do not want to euthanize her and wish she would just pass away in her sleep. She has had some seizures. Is she in pain? She doesn't seem to be, but how could we really know?

I love dogs; I took up with one in Turkey and wish I could have smuggled it home*Sometimes you just connect with a dog that way. But I don't believe they will be in heaven with us (perhaps new earth?) nor do I talk about the rainbow bridge. Her death will be difficult because of all the memories she and I had, especially our walks at Heritage High School and the Chickamauga Battlefield. 

As a pitbull mix, she was not a pushover. "She has an opinion about everything," my son would say. I did not worry about walking her at night, let's just say. Others were somewhat intimidated by her. 

I will tell more stories, like the time she and her partner in crime, Buddy a little dog we had, tripped me on a tennis court at the high school, leading to an embarrassingly bruised face, and ran off for their own pleasure leaving me on the ground, stunned. No help then! I will grieve because of what she meant to me, not because she knows what she meant.

*It's very hard and expensive to get one of those Turkish street dogs. Despite their supposed protection of them, I think they are neglected. The cats can survive that way; dogs need people. There are ways to adopt, but it's prohibitive, and one agency does not send them to the U.S. Thousands of street dogs would be adopted by Americans if they knew.