Dexter

I have had too many of these posts lately. Dexter was euthanized yesterday after the onset of a bizarre set of symptoms about a week ago. Dexter was a Lodge dog, you may remember him from previous posts about hand feeding him to work on his issues with food aggression, he was sweet and a little nutty, but very lovable. Nobody ever thought he was as old as he was, people often thought him to be a young kid - three or four years old - everyone was always shocked to see that he was about eleven years old. He had so much energy and loved to play fetch, he would play fetch all day long if he could, balls, frisbees, anything that you could throw, he would try and fetch. He loved it! He also loved to eat sticks and juniper berries, the berries aren't toxic to dogs but they can't digest them, so they come out the other end looking pretty much the same as they went in - poop scooping in Dexter's run was always a bit challenging because of the volume of his berry intake . . . I'll just leave it at that. Prior to my arrival at BF, over the course of about six months everybody thought that Dexter was dying because every time he opened his mouth it smelled like death. They were filling out caregiver observation sheets on an almost daily basis and calling the vet techs when the smell would get really strong. He was acting just fine, eating regularly, playing, there were no physical symptoms other than the stench emanating from his mouth. After a while, he was scheduled for a dental and when they got into his mouth, they found a piece of rotten wood wedged between two of his back teeth. Never stopped him from eating branches after that, though.Last week he started acting very strange, he was lethargic and wouldn't eat - this from a dog that would gorge himself on food until he exploded if given the chance. He collapsed on a walk, he didn't really loose consciousness entirely, just sort of fell over. He was taken into the clinic and they did an ultrasound. They could see a mass near his heart and some nodes on his liver, they did an EKG and took him for a walk to see if he would collapse again, but he decided to hold off on collapsing until about 3 minutes after they had taken the EKG sensors off. His behavior in the clinic made it clear that he was really not feeling well, in addition to not eating, he was a fairly willing participant in all of his diagnostic tests - this from a dog that usually required at least two people just to restrain him for anything remotely resembling a medical procedure. There wasn't really much they could do for him beyond putting him on Prednisone to see if the steroid would help. After a week of Pred his condition had not improved, he spent his days staggering around his run looking very confused. It was clear that his quality of life was way below our standards and it was decided to euthanize him yesterday afternoon. I had not seen Dexter for a few months but went up to spend some time with him and be there when they sent him over the bridge. He really wasn't the same dog that I remembered - very tired and clearly confused. He did have a last burst of energy before the vet arrived and decided to go out for a little stroll in front of the building. He wandered around, staggering like a little drunk, peed on a weed, and started wandering up the road that would have taken him back to his run. Megan stayed with him and when she blocked his way, he tried to fake her out, walking one way and then trying to quickly change direction and go around her, but his motor functions weren't so good, and the speed necessary for a successful fake out wasn't there. He made his way back to the kitchen and plopped himself on his bed, ready to go, it seemed. He will be buried with one of his favorite balls and we will miss him dearly. He was a long time resident of BF, it is always sad when they fail to find that forever home, but I think he was pretty happy. He got to play lots of fetch and go for lots of walks with our volunteers - he was well loved by everyone who knew him and will be remembered fondly.

(All photos copyright Best Friends Animal Society.)