Goodbye and Goodnight Chaos

After a few weeks dealing with kidney failure, Chaos peacefully passed away at home on Saturday. He was 15 years old - that's 105 in human years. Hey, he could have had Willard Scott wish him Happy Birthday on the Today show.

It wasn't an unexpected death. We had been told to basically wait for it to happen and it would be coming soon. Sure enough, it has been about three weeks from the time we learned of his illness to his passing.

He started getting weak at the end of March or so. We noticed that he wouldn't walk around as much as he usually did. From the first day we bought him home, he was a wanderer. He would slowly walk around the house on his stick-thin legs, head down, occasionally bumping into something in his path. That's the only time he would look up - as if he was recalling a time long ago when he could take on anything that got in his way.

Once, we came home and couldn't find him. We looked everywhere - under beds, in the closet, behind th couches - but he was nowhere to be found. We even wondered if Tiger had eaten him. Then we heard the rustling of newspaper. Somehow, he had gotten into the recycling bin and was sound asleep in the stacks of paper. When we woke him up, he looked at us like, "What are you people doing? I like my new bed!"

But recently, he hadn't been walking as much. We would leave him curled up on a blanket in the living room and he would be in the same spot when we got home. He would only stand to pee and wouldn't give his, "You're so irritating" growl and look to Tiger when she came over to kiss him. Rayni didn't really deal with him, unless Tiger got too close to him and then she would make "big body" and block Tiger off. She was his "on call" bodyguard.

The past two weeks, he hadn't been walking at all. He would just lay on his side and sleep all day. He would lift up his head and try to stand when he wanted to pee or was hungry. He wouldn't eat solid food, I had to feed him liquified high-protein dog food (yes, canine ensure) with a syringe. Apparently, he got used to not eating when he was at the vet's hooked up to an IV. Even with all that, he would stand on his four legs, wobbly and shaky, to pee in the yard.

At least we finally got some use of the Mad Cow's bed since Chaos would sleep in there while we were out. He would scooch around like a caterpillar so we didn't want to leave him on the regular bed or the floor anymore. We could block off the Mad Cow's bed with pillows. When we were home, he was by someone's side on the couch or the bed.

I think Rayni and Tiger knew Chao's time was coming since Rayni slept in the bedroom during the day and at night (she usually stays in the Living Room during the day and in one of the kids' rooms at night) and Tiger would come in to to kiss him (as best she could with her giant cone) before she went to sleep too.

On Friday, he peed on himself for the first time ever. He didn't lift his head up to eat and only took two small gulps off the syringe (usually,

he would eat 2-3 large syringes full of food). I remember that another vet told me that a dog will tell you when they are ready to go by not eating, not drinking or peeing on themselves. I hoped that it was a fluke but he peed on himself again later that night. I knew that on Saturday, we would have to take him to be put to sleep.

All Friday night, he had mini-seizures and would whimper in pain. He had a big seizure earlier in the week when he went for blood work at the vet's. The seizures were frequent, every 1/2 hour or so. He could not sleep but would cry and cry. I hacked off a small piece of Tiger's pain killers, ground it up and put it in some water. I gave it to him in a syringe. He still had the seizures but he was no longer crying so I hope it helped his pain.

On Saturday, Oscar and I made plans to take Chaos to the vets. I had to leave early to take the Mad Cow to bowling. Within an hour or so, I got a call at the bowling alley from Oscar telling me Chaos had passed away. He and the Diva were getting ready to leave so the Diva when to tell Chaos goodbye. She petted him and gave him a kiss. They were going out the door and she remembered that he had no water. So they went to give him his water dish and he had passed away. Well, Oscar wasn't sure if he passed away but I assured him the vet would make sure he was 100% gone before the cremated him.

I am not surprised that Chaos waited to see the Diva before he went. He was closest to her and she loved nothing more than being the Jewpanese Paris Hilton, carting him around in her big doggy purse. She was in tears the other day and I thought it was because he had passed but it was because she felt bad that he had passed away with black fingernails. She LOVED dressing him up, coloring his hair and putting nail polish on him but she worried that he would have a tough time in the afterlife with a goth look.

Chaos was another one of those sad story dogs that came into our lives. He didn't have an abusive life like Lana but he was abandoned like Tiger. He lived with an elderly person for most of his life but when she passed away, her children could not take care of him so they decided to board him at the kennels at the vet. He had been there for months, living in a small kennel by his lonesome. When we took Tiger for her first vet visit, the techs said, "Oh, you should have told us you were looking for a dog, we have the perfect dog for you!" But they took one look at Tiger and realized the combo of a small, frail, lap dog and a gigantic mangy mutt would probably not work. Plus, with Oscar the Grouch less than thrilled about us having TWO dogs, there was no way he would be okay with three (even a teeny, tiny ji-ji one). So, poor Chaos had to stay in the kennel for a few more months.

The kids and I kept thinking about poor Chaos, alone in the kennel everyday. Going outside just to pee a few times a day and a short walk around the block. We thought of him curled up, lonely, wondering where his beloved owner was. While we knew the staff would take him home on long weekends and holidays, it was still so sad that he would die alone in a cage when he deserved a loving family to care for him in his old age. So even though we knew we would be dealing with the wrath of Oscar, we caved and brought Chaos home.

My friends keep telling me I should open a doggie hospice since our recent furry additions have been senior dogs in pretty bad shape. I've read online that there is a trend towards hospice care for pets to make their departure from this world a lot less painful for them and for their humans. I like to think that Chaos left on his own terms, knowing that he was surrounded by people and other dogs who loved him.

Oscar has made me promise that I will not bring home any more dogs but even the folks at the vet know this is a hollow promise. Well, at least I will try not to bring home dogs that are over 100.