Kiste

It has been 16 months since Kiste died. I think I can finally write a bit about her. Yes, 16 months to mourn the loss of my dearest Brown Dog to the point of blogging about it. It wasn’t just her. It was the fact that her loss was added to some other losses not yet healed. She was my constant, my tie to home and the way things had been. She loved mom. She lived in The Yellow House. She went horseback riding with me. She was by my side through painful moves, losses, and events. She was my co-adventurer, travel companion, snuggle buddy, and sidekick. She also worshipped the ground I walk on, and we all need a little of that. All I had to do was look at her and she’d get the biggest, goofiest dog grin on her face and that fantastic corndog tail would go a million miles a minute.

I came home from work one night in January (09) and there was something really wrong with her. She was weak and pale and looked bloated. We immediately went to the emergency clinic and determined that she was severely anemic and was likely bleeding internally- most likely from a rupture spleen. We got her started on IVs and scheduled emergency surgery for the next day. I was a mess- I’ve been through multiple exploratory surgeries with probable splenic issues and the outcome is almost never good. I was prepared and basically said my goodbyes that morning. But wonderful Dr. Thwaits with the assistance of Dr. G and Dr. D (and me as anesthesiologist) were able to locate the grapefruit-sized bleeding tumor and remove her spleen. A thorough exploration of her abdomen showed no tumors or other signs of disease. She recovered beautifully. She was a puppy again just days later. She ran and jumped and did all her Brown Dog things. Max faithfully stayed by her side. This was also when Rocky came into our lives. He took care of her and slept with his chin on her back.

It was a second chance for her. Pathology (performed by an unnamed lab used just this once) showed that the tumor was benign and was completely removed so no further treatment was necessary. She rebuilt her blood count, ate like a horse, and played as if nothing had ever happened. Then one day in February (a month to the day after the first episode) I came home to find her exactly as I had that night… pale, weak, bloated. We went back to the emergency clinic (always at night!) and I had a long talk with the vet on call. He said that if I hadn’t been standing there telling him that I had seen her spleen being removed, he would say that she had a ruptured spleen. Then I told him that the pathologist had determined that the tumor was benign so metastasis was not likely, so the only option at that point was to either do an exploratory again the next day to find the source of her bleeding or to schedule an ultrasound to find it. The ultrasound was, of course, the first choice. So the next day (which also happened to be my last full-time day at RiverWoods for awhile) I left mid-day to take her to the internist in Salt Lake. I knew that the prognosis was grim, but when the first ultrasound images had such clear metastatic lesions, my heart just sank. There wasn’t anything that could be done. In the month since her surgery, dozens of tumors from pea- to golfball-sized had sprung up all over her abdomen- anywhere that the cells from the ruptured splenic tumor had touched. I was devastated. The pathologist had been wrong about the tumor. It was so painful because there was my beautiful Brown, smiling at me and so bravely trying to wag.

She was so weak, wouldn’t eat, and was obviously starting to be really painful. So I knew that it was her day to go. We decided to gather at my house that evening and let her go peacefully in her own home, on her own doggie bed, with Max and her people by her side.

That is one of the great blessing through this ordeal is that I was able to take care of all the “technical” stuff that is involved in euthanasia so that she wasn’t afraid and wasn’t nervous.

I’ve written before about the privilege of being present during the last moments of an earthy life. It was no different with my dear Brown Dog. She peacefully left her ill little body. Precious little Max laid there by her side. Then I called on a sweet friend to help take care of her body—cremation is not my first choice, but this way I can take her ashes with me to wherever my permanent home is and she can be buried there.

So that is the story of how Kiste left.

She was so loved, and I can still hear her breathing sometimes.