We left the day after Thanksgiving. Maddy's elf, Dee told Maddy all about her vacation. Mommy didn't have the money to take her to Disney World, so we asked Dee if she would help and she sure did :) I posted the video on my YouTube channel.
Thanksgiving night Manny started acting funny. I attributed it to the fact that he was nervous due to suitcases being out. If I had known it was the beginning of his end I would have stayed home. We got maybe three hours of sleep the night before we left due to excitement. Friday morning finally came and we were off to the airport with my parents. On the way to the airport I thought Maddy's cap had fallen out. I know it doesn't sound so bad, but I truly felt like I was being attacked and told the devil he could just go away. Thank goodness her cap did not fall off and we were good to go. Once we made it to Disney poor Maddy had some horrible stomach issues and had to make several trips to the bathroom. She couldn't even enjoy the rides that day because she felt so bad. I felt so bad for her :( She did end up getting better. I think she either picked up a 24 hour bug from the plane, or she was nervous being away from home. The timeline is a little blurry to me as to what happened when from this point on. I think it was Saturday I got a text from the lady keeping Manny that he was not doing good. He wouldn't eat and he was throwing up bile. At the time I thought it was his nerves and told her he never really eats when we leave, and he should be fine. The next day she texted and said she was really concerned about him and wanted to take him to the vet. I agreed for her to take him to the vet and from there things just went downhill. His numbers were through the roof. The vet she took him to was not our vet. He did call me and told me to expect the worse, but he was certainly willing to try to help him. He assured me Manny was not in any kind of pain so I opted for treatment to continue. I think the next day the vet told me he was not responding to treatment and basically asking me what I'd like to do. I couldn't have him put down without my vet telling me that's the best option. My uncle was kind enough to offer to pick Manny up and take him to my vet to be checked out. My uncle said Manny's breathing was very hard. My vet told my uncle Manny was in a lot of pain and there really wasn't much that could be done. Once I knew he was in pain I knew I had to have him put down. Here I am on what is supposed to be such a magical trip, and it was anything but magical. I was able to FaceTime Manny and say my goodbyes. I decided not to let Maddy know what was going on because I wanted her first trip to Disney to be amazing. The day after he died we were eating at a restaurant and the server's name just happened to be Manny. I couldn't believe it. My mom asked him if he would take a picture with me so we could remember it. He agreed. I told Maddy on our last night of vacation, and she was crushed. Coming home to an empty house was so painful. The lady who was watching him for me put a bouquet of roses where he was staying. I thought that was SO sweet, and it helped brighten the moment just a little bit. I felt horrible because once Manny was diagnosed with kidney failure, I promised him I would be with him to the very end. I did not have the funds to fly home and even if I did I wouldn't have made it in time. We miss our little buddy so much!
After having a dog go through kidney failure, there are a few things I did notice about him that may have helped him sooner. The number one sign is he lost a lot of weight even though he ate. The second thing is he drank a lot of water. The water issue wasn't as noticeable at first to me. The last symptom he had was he did not want his back touched. This wasn't immediate, but something that happened over time. I make sure to pay a lot of attention now to those details in our current dog Marley.
I was going to post a few pictures of Maddy's first trip to Disney here as well, but I am not finding them. If you're interested, you can head to my YouTube channel and watch the videos :)
Going forward I will be writing about our life currently. If I have some time I may write about some of our past events, but I am finding it much too difficult to do right now. I have missed blogging and I am so sad there are memories I am missing because I stopped.
I hope you all had a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
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