Choosing Death

Hey y'all. Today, in about 45 minutes, we're going to be taking our dog Abby to the vet to have her "put down."  She isn't old or infirm or have any diseases that we know about. She's attacked our other dog, George, twice in the past several months and done real damage to her. She'll also attack the cats if she's not on a leash in the "cat part" of the house. (We have a dog zone in one room that stays closed. They come into the "cat part" of the house at night before bed. Abby sleeps in a crate.)

Anyway, Abby is fierce when she wants to be, and that isn't something that we can anticipate. We don't know when she's going to go nuts and attack George. She's done it around food, and over other things we can't identify. So it's getting scary having Abby in the house with other animals; we've talked to our vet, we've talked to an expert trainer, and both say there's nothing they can do besides let her go.

She's never been my favorite dog, and I yell at her a lot, but I don't want to have to let her go. Guilt: was there something I could have done differently? If we walked her more or spent more time socializing her would things be different?

So here I am crying at the computer writing about this while I wait for the clock to strike 5pm. My partner is down the hall petting Abby, and she said she's going to stay down there until it's time to go. I've spent time with her quite a bit today already and didn't want to go with her. I'm tired of crying. Will this end, will these feelings subside, once she's gone? I feel so guilty and low for doing such a selfish thing, but we have to protect the other pets. She could kill one of them if we weren't there to break up the fight, and boy have we broken up fights -- that led to very high vet bills.

So now there's about 30 minutes before we have to leave. I don't have a job so I've been waiting all day, waiting for the inevitable. My partner had work to keep her mind busy, but now she's down there letting it out. I can't believe we're going to kill a sweet dog like Abby, but we have to because she goes a little crazy now and then. No one else will want to take her in. What if she starts attacking people? She's afraid of other dogs usually (just not George). The no-kill shelters are all full. So we have no choice, right? Even our wonderful kind vet thinks it's time to do this. So it's the right thing to do, right?