Feeling very down

[KennyR]

Some of you may remember that I asked advice about a noisy dog in the AO forums some months back. That dog was called Travis, and we more or less got the noise problem under control. I make no secret of the fact that I was never particularly fond of the dog because of his noise, but he was a member of the family and the others loved him, and I love my family, so...

Every night, my dad takes the dog a long walk. On this occasion, as with many times, he took him to a place behind a small shopping centre to run about free for a while, as being a dog he loves doing. It's a safe distance from the main road, an A class road. Well, as it turned out, not such a safe distance.

I had decided to take an early night, but I was awakened by hysterical screaming from my family around 10pm. I never want to experience anything like it again if I live another hundred years. Travis had seen another dog, run across the road, and had been hit by a vehicle going at maybe 70mph on an otherwise empty road. He died instantly.

My family are devastated, especially my dad, who had to carry a very dead dog home and explain it to us. He blames himself for the dog getting on the road - which is ridiculous of course given his carefulness, but guilt never was very logical. He spent many long hours training the dog to stay away from the main road and stopping on a command, and he was always scrupulously careful about where he let the dog run free. But everything seemed to work against us this time. My dad taking him a different way from usual on a Saturday night. The unusual appearance of another dog. The only vehicle on the road for miles hitting the dog. Yes, it was an empty road. It really seems the fates conspired to kill another one of our pets.

This is the second dog we have lost to this same road and probably the last. Travis is lying downstairs in the living room like he is asleep, apparently unmarked, but heavy spots of blood fallen from his mouth mark where we carried him in. He didn't suffer, unlike the first dog, which is a blessing. We plan to have him cremated tomorrow. It's going to be a sleepless night for everyone. He'll be sorely missed. For all his noise and excitability, he was a very loving and affectionate dog, and I still remember the first day a very small puppy came in and playfully bit my feet and slept on my lap. We had hoped to have him in the family for many years to come. A further irony is that I has spent yesterday taking many digital pictures of my cat for possible posterity, and had neglected the dog.

I also plan to write to my MSP or MP tomorrow telling him the dangers of this road and the way drivers go at excessive speeds when the road is clear at night. Hopefully one day they'll install automatic speed cameras and harshly punish the people who endanger lives. It's just a miracle there hasn't been a person killed by speeding motorists on that stretch of road yet. Maybe those who whine about their "rights" being taken away by this kind of non-invasive surveillance should realise their own selfishness.

Well...that's ruined my Christmas. If I had it all over to do again I'd have treated the dog better.If I wasn't such a useless lazy bastard and got up most mornings, I never would have had so much of a problem with him. If I had spent more time with him maybe he wouldn't have been so excitable. The fact that most of what I ever said to him was "shut up!" is guilt enough for a lifetime.

[KennyR]

Thanks all. I appreciate your thoughts. But unfortunately none of us can do anything about it, short of divine intervention or a time machine...

It's so strange - my dad has walked that dog about four times a day for over a year. I never expected him to bring the dog home dead. It just seemed impossible. I just wouldn't believe it when I heard it, and had to see him for myself. It's been quite a shock, to say the least. The lavish Christmas decorations we set up this year seem hollow and pointless now.

[KennyR]

cecilia wrote:
kenny, try not to beat yourself up. the great thing about dogs is that they love you no matter how bad your mood is.

I don't think I deserved any affection. There were times I got so angry at his constant barking I hit him. And it wasn't always his fault - sometimes he was left in that cage for up to six hours while my parents were out. All I had to do was sit downstairs with him sometimes, watch TV and look after him so he could be out of his cage, or bring him upstairs to sit, but I didn't do either that often and now I feel terrible. I was going to make it up to him some day, once he had calmed down a bit and became less excitable. I never will now.

I don't think my family will ever get over this. When the last dog, Sid, escaped from where he was tied up in the yard and was killed running across the same road, it was so much of a shock that they didn't get another dog for almost eight years. And this one didn't get outside unattended for fear of the same thing happening again. I don't think they'll ever get another dog. Ironically I think they should, although I didn't want this one.

Thing is, I saw this coming. I even joked about how I'd like it to happen when we first got him. I didn't mean it of course, but I did realise from the start that another excitable dog was going to be a problem. It makes me wonder about all the other things I know are a definite possibility. Like my cat getting out and being torn apart by my neighbour's vicious dog. She's a walking dog-target and has no real fear of them, or people, or vehicles. That's why she never gets out. I just fear that one day she will escape (as cats do), and she'll die young too.

[KennyR]

Anyway, there is something you can all do for me. Please, explain to me how to raise an animal with street smarts. My old cat knew how to avoid all trouble, because she was allowed outside as a kitten. We didn't have much choice in that, in fact - she escaped a lot. She lived to 15.

We didn't risk that with our two dogs and our new cat, and none of them have been very smart around the dangers of the outside. I've lost two dogs and I almost lost my cat last year when she nonchalantly wobbled around on top of a fence with a dog that would certainly have ripped her apart just six feet below. By sheer luck she fell off on my side of the fence when the dog barged it. We also lost one of the kittens of our old cat - it simply went out one day and never came back.

How do you teach an animal to be wary and to survive without wrapping it in cotton wool? I believe that the way my family raised the dogs - by keeping them safe tied up outside or confined when a person was not around - exaggerated their natural excitability. And yes, both dogs were already natually very excitable. Some people just throw their dogs out and let them wander the streets, and they can live decades, even in areas with heavy traffic.

Is there a way you can teach animals to be wary outside without having to risk them early in their lives? That initial risk where you just leave them to do their thing is just too dangerous. Too many dogs and bad people, too much traffic, too much chance of them never coming back.

[KennyR]

that_punk_guy wrote:
He was however, quite capable of sticking to the paths so I started walking him off the lead alongside a quite empty, very straight road with good visibility near my house. If he seemed to consider stepping into the road for whatever reason, I'd say "Dale..." in a "warning" tone of voice. Quite deep and heavily stressed but not at all aggressive. A week or two of this was enough that he rarely looked to the road.

Yes, that's the correct method, or so we were told. This is what my dad did with Travis, every day, just how you have described it. Like with Dale, it just wasn't enough to prevent an incident. Due to the worst possible misfortune, it happened at a very rate time where the lapse would have been fatal.

There was a car coming and I shouted "Dale!" forgetting in my panic that he was more likely to ran away from me if I shouted at that point.

This is what my father is blaming himself about, that he shouted "Travis!" and not "Stay!", and so he claims that the dog ran away from him rather than stayed. Now, being panicked like you were, and even if he had the presence of mind to shout the right word, I doubt a young dog full of excitement would have stopped. You should have saw him with a stick, he stopped for nobody, not even for fear of me. Dogs, especially young ones, as you pointed out, act on emotion. It's extremely hard to discipline them properly.

There is no way I hold my father responsible for the dog's death, even if he does hold himself responsible. He did absolutely everything to prevent that dog being killed on the road short of keeping him tied up forever, knowing what happened to our old one. He was a better master than many dogs ever got, better than I was for sure, and the dog loved him more than anyone in the world.

I find this worse than the loss of the dog. I deluded myself into thinking I hated the dog but I was lying to myself. I'll miss him greatly, I'll even miss his morning barking. But worse than that, what this has done to my family has shattered me to pieces.

[KennyR]

He's gone to the vet where the cremation people will pick him up. We should get the ashes today or tomorrow. Finally some closure.

My friend Gelb kept the two fuzzy pictures I took of him days before the accident. That was a big bonus, I thought they were deleted for good.





RIP, pup.