For her last two nights I stayed up with her. Every so often she would begin a desperate but futile struggle to stand, he legs too tired to lift herself up. I would pick up her hind quarters with a towel slung under her belly, and allow whatever was fighting inside her to get out and on to the training pad spread on the floor. We could usually use the training pad twice before discarding it. We went through three packs of six.

Angel lay all night on the floor with one of our son’s t-shirts to keep her company. We both were able to sleep from 1 until 5am.

Our daughter and her husband came to spend last night with us. My wife left for Florida yesterday to be with her ailing father, and I expected to be here alone. Our daughter refused to go to the Vet with us, and had a good cry this morning. Her husband helped me carry the dog to the car, where Angel laid quietly in the back seat. Talked to my Dad last night and he told me about making the same trip with one of our family dogs (Hazel, a Cock-a-Poo (however it is you spell it)). Hazel somehow figured out what was going on and decided to go down fighting. Not so with Angel.

They set up a bed in the examining room where we placed Angel, now wrapped in various towels and plastic sheets. She lay there quietly, even dozing off as we waited for the Vet, a very nice lady, probably around 30 and very kind. She explained the procedure to me and administered the medication as Angel watched. She lay her head down between her paws with her eyes half closed, her nose over the edge of the bed, and was gone in a matter of seconds.

I stayed with her for a few minutes and cried a lot more than I thought I would. Took me about 10 minutes just to be able to walk out and say a quick good-bye to the staff (and I understood why they had me take care of the paperwork first – it was impossible now).

Thank God I had someone were waiting for me when I got home. We sat and talked for hours, sharing memories of Angel, discussing our son’s future in the Army and our daughter’s new job. We went to Bethlehem PA for lunch, where we stopped by a book store where I bought Rescuing Sprite.

Can’t recommend it too much – our experiences and feelings matched to a ‘T’. Thanks to Mark for putting it into words for all of us.

Picture is of Angel between her close friends Dylan and Freddie.

Dave from PA