If you caught the last post then you know that my pony was very sick.
When I called the vet out to our house over a week ago, shortly after Bud started to show obvious symptoms, we started her on drugs and I held out hope they would have an impact. Her symptoms didn't seem to get worse, but they never got better either. Last Friday, the symptoms finally took a turn for the worse and I was anticipating that I would need to be making a decision that night about putting her down. The vet thought she still had a fighting chance because she was fairly responsive mentally even though other parts of her movement weren't faring so well. We tried a treatment of an anti-inflammatory drugs the next day via IV to see if that would maybe help ease things.
When I came out Sunday morning, she was a mess. Her coat was soaked and she just kept pacing in circles, the most energy she had exerted in awhile. I likewise became a mess. I've still been in some pretty miserable back pain, and being acutely aware of the possible decision I would probably need to make about whether to put her down or not just sent me over the edge mentally. I brought a halt to my Sunday and cancelled all my plans and even ditched church. I was supposed to teach the 4 year-olds but I didn't see that going over very well. I just wanted to sit in a dark corner and cry my eyes out, which I ended up doing for the most part.
I checked on her periodically throughout the day and every time I went out, she would be laying down in her stall, something she hadn't been doing since she had been sick. She just wasn't getting up anymore.
I texted the vet and told her I think it's time.
God bless this vet, Dr. Marylou Rings. I don't know what I would have done without her compassion and patience. She is the best person I could have called. She came out later last Sunday afternoon and by the time she arrived, it was abundantly clear that we had reached the end.
I don't ever want to have to make that kind of decision again in my life, the decision to bring an end to life. One of the hardest things I have had to do in a very long time.
But I couldn't watch her suffer anymore. I couldn't stand to watch her flail around, trying to get up and finding out that her body just isn't cooperating, that her neurological system is completely failing.
And I wanted to feel guilty in some sort of irrational way, like I wished this on her somehow. That because I wanted to find her a new home and a new owner, that I inadvertently brought this on. I know that's crazy, but my emotions have run the gamut in the last two weeks. Guilt. Relief. Worry. Fear. Hope. Believe me, I have thought all sorts of crazy things. Pain will do that to you. (And maybe just being a girl will do that to you.)
But it was this weird moment - that moment when it really was this graceful exit, when the decision was made and her heart stopped beating, it was like a release. It was time to move on with life. And I don't mean that in calloused, cold-hearted, unfeeling, detached sort of way. Death is simply a reality of life this side of heaven. It's like in 2 Samuel 12 after David has an affair with Bathsheba. They have a child together, but the child ends up getting sick and dying. All while the child was alive, David fasted and prayed and wept. Then when the child died, he got up, he worshiped and he ate. The servants were ranting at him, wondering why on earth he was now eating and going on with life when his child had just died. David simply said, "Can I bring him back again?" The answer was simply no. And while the loss of a child is vastly different from merely losing a 19-year old pony, the concept still applies. There's nothing I can do to bring her back again. I did all that I could to keep her alive and it simply wasn't enough to fend off this disease. So now I get up, I worship and I eat again, so to speak. Life goes on. And it is in this moving on process that I have to reconcile the severe mercies of life and the graceful exits. No doubt, there will be some changes to life - no more buying feed or running up to the grain mill to get bedding. No more calling the farrier to come trim her feet. No more nights juggling a schedule and making sure somehow the pony gets fed. No more having my parents feed her while I'm off to some corner of the world. No more text messages from my dad saying he fed "the mule" for me whenever I had a late night. No more winters spent getting up and paving a way to the barn in the below zero temperatures to make sure she gets fed. Nineteen years of habits undone in just a few moments.
Both the letting go and holding on, all wrapped up at once. Severe mercies - the disguised graces. And the graceful exits, when we move on and find that in the end it is all just as God planned.
1 comment:
Courtney, I am so sorry to hear about Bud. And how terrible about your back. I'll be praying for you!
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