My Best Friend. Never once did I ever thing that a dog could still my heart. like Dusty did. She was the most beautiful dog I ve ever seen

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1 Robin Fleming Ms. Collin Hull English 2010 October 25, 2012 Memoir My Best Friend Never once did I ever thing that a dog could still my heart like Dusty did. She was the most beautiful dog I ve ever seen and was such a smart dog since she could learn commands and tricks faster than any dog I know of. We got really close and had a person /dog relationship that was out of this world. I never knew that she would be leaving me so soon. When I got married to my husband, I knew that he couldn t have kids because he had a vasectomy many years before we got married. A few months after settling down into married life, we got our first dog. We named her Shania. She is a malamute/wolf

2 mix. She has some wolf features such as her snout and her tail. Even though her tail curls up like a malamute, she s got the classic wolf tail that plumes out. She was the runt of her litter and now comes in at 100 lbs. But because my husband and I were on different work schedules, we knew that Shania needed a buddy, someone who she could play with. So we got Dusty. It was a cool fall day and Petsmart in Sugarhouse was having a super adoption so we went to see what they had up for adoption, not really expecting to find anything. There were a few metal pens around, just outside of the doors that had different breeds of puppies running around and playing in them. I went from pen to pen but really wasn t seeing anything I thought would fit into our family. Then it happened. I saw this puppy that definitely had some husky in it. There were about 5-6 puppies but one caught my eye. She looked a lot like the others except for one distinct feature. She had one blue eye and one brown eye. I fell in love instantly. We decided to go home and pick up Shania to see if they would accept each other. To make sure that the puppy wouldn t be adopted out while we were gone, we asked a clerk to please make sure she stayed. We went home and got Shania and went back to Petsmart. When I walked back up to the metal pen, there was another lady there and I got quite nervous thinking, Please don t take my little puppy. She was commenting on how cute they all look. I knew she saw the puppy I wanted because she said, pointing at the blue/brown eyed puppy, I don t want that one cause it s blind. I replied, She s not

3 blind, it s a husky mix. Besides, I plan on taking her home with me. I picked her up and we took her over to where Shania was. They smelled each other and then didn t really care if the other one was around or not. I knew I was taking her home by then. We named her Dusty (Fig 1). Smart Dog Dusty was a very smart dog and learned very fast. The first few months that we had Dusty, we kept her in the house in a dog crate. Therefore, we had to train her to let us know when she needed outside. In order to train her, we needed to watch her constantly. When she would start sniffing the carpet, I would put her on a leash and we would walk Figure 1 Dusty the day we got her hugging our cat Smokie. outside. She had a corner of the grass that she liked and ended up going there every time. She had only one accident in the house. It got to where she would walk over to the door, look at the door knob, look back at me and keep repeating until I took her outside. I was surprised to see that she could learn so fast so I decided to see what else I could teach her. We taught her to bark on command, Shake (alternating paws), lay down and I even taught her to back up. She would sit down and I would say back up and she would scoot back. We would say

4 Dusty, bark, she would and then we d give her a treat. Then Dusty, shake. She would lift one paw, Dusty, shake other paw she would lift her other paw, Dusty Figure 2 Dusty after diving for pear pieces in the water cooler lay down she would lay down. After each command, we would give her a treat. She was so smart that she caught on to what we were doing. So eventually, she it got to where we would say Dusty, bark and she would bark, lift her paws, lie down and back up all at the same time. It was so funny to watch. On hot summer days, we had a small thermal lunch box that I would put Shania and Dusty s water in. The water was about 6 inches deep in the lunch box. My husband and I would sit outside and eat pears and would give some to the dogs. Dusty was a great catcher when it came to food being tossed to her. One time, my husband threw a piece of pear and it landed in the water. I stood up to get it out so that I could give it to her and before I could, Dusty had her whole head submerged in the water and got the piece of pear out by herself (fig 2).

5 Dusty s Devotion It was soon apparent who Dusty felt closest to. She chose me to be her person and I couldn t be happier. My husband was more of a disciplinarian and she knew that she would get away with anything with me. If Shania was sitting by me, she had to push her way between us. When I and my husband would sit outside, she would sit right next to my chair and I would have my hand on her side petting her. If we were in the house, she wouldn t settle down and rest unless she was touching my foot somehow whether it be laying on it, or laying her back next to my foot. Something s Wrong I work the graveyard shift and when I would usually get home, Dusty and Shania would run to the fence and wag their tails as if to say Welcome home. I loved coming home to my dogs. In March of 2010, I had gotten home and both dogs stayed in their house and never ran to the fence. I found that rather strange so I went into the house, put my things down such as my lunch box and cell phone. I walked outside and Dusty remained in her house. I walked into the kennel and she didn t move. I had noticed that her left side was wet and that the was the side she was laying on. I looked around and there was no water that she could have gotten into so I was getting very confused. I told

6 her, Dusty, come here. She didn t move. I said it again, Dusty, come here. She stood up and was walking sideways. I knew that wasn t a good thing. I knew that it was either something wrong with her brain or she had something lodged in her ear. So I loaded her up in the truck (I put my animals in the front seat because I won t put them in the back of a truck). I noticed that there was a bad smell coming from Dusty while we were heading the vet. But I couldn t put my finger on what it could be. When we got to her vet, I texted my husband and told him where we d gone so after he got off work, he headed down. Her vet told us that she had had a seizure and gave us some syringes of Diazapam (Diazapam, pg 1) which helps relieve anxiety and helps control seizures. Figure 3 Dusty resting on my husband's lap while laying in a wagon. I also found out that the smell I smelled was the smell of urine. She had peed all over herself when she was seizing. He sent us home but said that if she has another one, we should bring her right in. We got her home and I gave her a bath. I put a couple towels on the floor and laid Dusty on them. I sat next to her and was rubbing her head. We hadn t been home for 10 minutes when she stiffened up like she was stretching and started seizing again. She defecated and urinated it was so violent. My husband grabbed a little, red wagon that he had bought to take to hot rod shows and we put clean towels in it

7 and laid Dusty in it (Fig 3). When we got back to the doctor, they took us right in, bypassing anyone in line. By this time she was so out of it that she would pace the floor, putting her nose in the corners of the walls and just standing there for a few seconds before moving to another corner. She wouldn t respond to her name. Her vet put her on Phenobarbital to control her seizures and we went home. Things went really well until September 16, I was on my way home from work and my husband called and told me not to come in the back yard when I got home. I knew it was Dusty. I asked him It s Dusty isn t it? He just repeated Don t come in the back yard. I hurried home and of course went in the back yard. She was in a full blown seizure. She was lying on her side and seizing so hard that she was lifting off the ground. I immediately start crying uncontrollably. We decided it was time to take her back to the vet. I stayed behind because I had just got off of a graveyard shift, had to work that night and thought she would be coming back home with us. So while my husband took her back in, I went to bed. My husband came home and woke me up. He tells me that they can t stop her seizers and we need to do the right thing. Honestly, I didn t want to go see that and told my husband I didn t want to go. He said to me, Robin, she s your dog. So I got up and got dressed. When we got there, they brought Dusty in the room and she was very lethargic. She didn t know her name and wouldn t come over to me. She would just walk around and I doubt she even knew

8 we were in the room with her. The vet came in and we talked about our options and in that time, my husband began to cry. She informed us that we could spend all kinds of money and still not find out what s causing her seizures. We decided to euthanize her since she would suffer and she would never be my Dusty again. The vet left us in the room by ourselves so we could say good bye to Dusty. She was so weak that we had to hold her up and was able to take some pictures of her with each of us. After a little bit, the vet came back in and laid her down on a blanket. My husband asked her, In your opinion, are we doing the right thing. At which she answered, I would never agree to euthanize an animal if I didn t think it was best for the animal. With that, she put the Pentobarbital(animal and Veterinary) in Dusty s IV and in about 30 seconds, Dusty was gone. I had my husband take her collar off from around her neck so that I could keep a part of her with me. It currently hangs on my computer desk. I also went as far to memorialize her by getting a tattoo of her name and face over my heart. I hope to be able to see her again when I pass on. It s been 2 ½ years now and I miss Dusty as much as I did when she left us. I am a firm believer that euthanasia is a good thing if used for the right reason. It would break my heart even more if I knew Dusty had to live not knowing her name, not knowing her surroundings and having uncontrollable seizures that couldn t be controlled.

9 Work Sited: "Animal & Veterinary." PENTOBARBITAL IN DOG FOOD. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Oct < ewsletter/ucm htm>. Diazepam. U.S. National Library of Medicine, 18 Dec Web. 27 Oct <