I can remember the first time I met him, a little fur ball rolling around in a temporary pen in the back yard of the horse farm where he was born. I picked him out of a litter of over a dozen because he was the first puppy who approached me, while the others kept their distance. I wanted a social dog, I knew he was going to grow up to be a big guy—his dad was over two hundred pounds—so I wanted a dog who wasn’t going to kill or maim any small children. Thankfully I picked the right one. Once I knew which puppy I wanted, I tied a blue ribbon around his little neck, and left him there for a couple more weeks to finish the weaning process and get him on solid food. When I finally picked him up, he was apprehensive, but sat happily on the seat of my pickup next to me. Thor loved going for rides. Even in the end, when our only destination would have been the veterinarian for another uncomfortable check up, he always perked up when he saw the leash, and jumped right into any vehicle happily. He would, somewhat impatiently, wait for the window to be rolled down just enough for his giant slobbering head to fit through—his lips flapping in the wind, and the drool, like a leaking faucet, would run down the side of the car.
Thor died on a Thursday, an ironical linguistic coincidence that does not escape me. I guess there was a 14.3% chance it would happen, it had to happen on one of the seven days. It might as well have been the day named after the Norse god from which his name is derived. Though we usually just called him Thor, his full registered AKC name was Thorbjørn Av Høyheim, which means “Thunder Bear of the High Home.” I had seen the name Thorbjørn in one of Snorri Sturluson’s Icelandic Sagas, back in my Medieval Scandinavian History class, and Høyheim is the ancestral place name used today by the Norwegian family of my great grandfather. It is associated with a small village on the coast of the Sognefjord of Norway, called Høyheimsvik. In coming to the United States a century ago, the original version of the name (my last name) was preserved, without any un-American dots or funny lines. It was called the “High Home” because it was the uppermost (and nicest) house on the steep banks of the fjord. Høyheimsvik, which I visited in 2001, is also arguably one of the most beautiful places on earth. I guess that was the reason I chose it as my kennel name, that place was still fresh in my mind in 2003, when Thor was born. I had big plans for breeding and training mastiffs, going to dog shows, devoting my life to the breed—it all seems silly, now.
Thor had been growing lumps under his skin for a few years. The vet called them fatty lipomas and a needle aspiration test revealed no obvious signs of cancer. He didn’t seem to mind them, so we never even considered getting them removed. This winter a new lump started to grow on his neck that seemed different, it didn’t have any hair on it, and it came in fast. But it sat for a couple months without being a problem, so we didn’t get anything checked out. A couple of weeks ago, the area around his neck began to swell up. This had happened before when he had gotten injured in a spat with one of his sons. That time the vet called it a hot spot, because the other dogs wouldn’t stop licking it, and he wouldn’t stop scratching it. It eventually drained out and he recovered, after a couple of weeks with a plastic cone.
It wouldn’t work out that way this time.
The swelling was more than just inflamed tissue, it was a pocket of backed up lymph fluid. Somehow his lymph nodes had become clogged, and this fluid stretched his skin to the point of breaking, which it did one day two weeks ago in my bed. We wrapped the opening with towels; we cleaned and re-bandaged it a couple of times a day; we had him on lots of antibiotics, steroids, and pain killers. The smell was overpowering, not like gangrene or a purulent abscess, but just a musty biological smell that still permeates our house. Try as we might, the wound wouldn’t heal. Even after it had completely drained out, the wound kept getting bigger. We realized then that the tissue had died and it would never heal.
We consulted with our vet and made an appointment for in-home euthanasia on Friday, February 8th, at 1:40pm. It was weird writing that down, almost like it was an execution date. I kept telling myself that I couldn’t think like that. We were doing the right thing. He had lived a long and happy life for a giant breed dog. It was better to let him die with some dignity before the wound got gangrenous and really stinky, before he lost control of his bowel functions, before he was unable to find joy in a good head pat and ear scratch, when a scrap of people food held no interest to him. And then he lost all those things in the matter of an hour the day before the vet was scheduled to come out.
Thor and I spent most of our last day together cuddling on the couch watching Star Wars. I went to work for a few hours in the afternoon. Andrea spent that time with him, trying (futilely) to get him to eat, and making sure he was comfortable on the couch. That evening, we were catching up on Season Three of Downton Abbey and eating big bowls of buttered popcorn, which was one of Thor’s favorite things. I may have dropped a few handfuls in his general direction, and he gobbled them up, as always. He fell asleep for a little while, and then let out a little whimper. He got off the couch and I sat on the floor with him, trying to keep him comfortable. Thor then got up and pooped a bit on the floor and wanted to go outside. We let him out and didn’t scold him for his accident. While I was cleaning up the mess, Andrea told me that Thor didn’t want to come inside. I put on my coat and went outside to sit with him. I could tell that something wasn’t right. I asked Andrea to make a nest for him in the kitchen and I would try to get him in the house. But he didn’t want to go in, he wanted to die outside, and who am I to argue with that? He lay down by the steps, near where he loved to bask in the sun in the summer months, and took a couple of big breaths. Then he stretched out his legs, like he was trying to get comfortable. We covered him with a blanket and embraced him in our arms. When he took his last breath, we were both next to him, stroking his fur, and assuring him that he was indeed a very good boy.
When it was done and all of my tears had dried up, I found myself feeling relieved. I’m glad he died before the vet could come out, I’m glad we didn’t have to share that experience with anybody else. I didn’t have to hide my overwhelming grief and sorrow. I’m also very glad he waited until we were both there, I’m glad he didn’t die alone, I’m glad we were there to comfort him in what must have been his last very fearful, very scary and confusing moments. Most of all, I’m glad his suffering is over, and that we don’t have to worry about him any more. Palliative care of a beloved pet is extremely exhausting and can be expensive, but it is an important part of inviting one of these animals into our lives. We got Thor the same year we got married, almost ten years ago. He was devoted to us completely, even when we lost our patience, even when we added other dogs to the household. He deserved the best from us. Ultimately we couldn’t cure him, no one could, but I don’t think we failed him. I hope he didn’t think so.
Until this blog post’s publication date, I’ve told a total of five people about Thor’s death. Partially I just wasn’t ready to deal with the repetitive canned expressions of pity on Facebook and partially I was nervous about people saying something cruel. As a childless adult, my pets fulfill a role that is something more than just a companion. People with children tend to get sensitive if you mention that your dogs are your kids. Obviously dogs aren’t the same as humans, I’m a realist about such things, I’m just saying that I loved Thor a lot and that this loss, although we saw it coming, has been very difficult. I feel like we’ve lost a member of the family.
For obvious practical reasons, we had hoped to nurse him through the rest of the winter and into the warmer seasons. Digging graves by hand is no easy business. Digging graves by hand in the winter in Minnesota is a lot of damned work and nearly impossible. We looked into pet cremation and found it to be very expensive and beyond that there just aren’t any other options. Which is why we have wrapped Thor in blankets and stored him in our chest freezer until the ground warms up outside. It’s not an easy thing to do, practically or emotionally, but it was our only choice.
I think I will bury him in our lawn next to an apple tree, right in the spot where he loved laying outside, rolling in the grass, basking in the sun all day. I look out the window now and expect to see him there, playing in the drifting snow, but there is only an unfillable emptiness.
Thorbjørn Av Høyheim
July 26, 2003 – February 7, 2013
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