The Story of Max

I fell in love with the large deep gray beauty with the velvet ears standing before me.  As he walked over to me and sat down by my side I knew those feelings were reciprocated.  So it began, a match made in heaven, but we had a little bit of a journey ahead of us.  At 2 years old Max came to me untrained, very thin, obviously deprived of food and water, locked up in a kennel 12+ hours every day, not neutered or up to date on his shots, and at his first veterinary appointment it was discovered that he had hookworm.  The health issues were resolved within a month and in the meantime we worked on his training.  The fundamentals, sit, lay down were quickly learned, but jumping took a bit longer!  He eventually got it down pretty good, but at times he still couldn’t hold in his excitement when meeting new people!  He was a loyal dog, perhaps the most loyal that I’ve ever had the pleasure to call my own.  Never left my side and boy would he cry when I left him home alone (didn’t blame him based on his previous experience).  Feeling bad, I occasionally toted him along with me to school leaving him in the car with his must have “cheetah” blanket (which used to be Papa’s, but when he confiscated it for himself, I didn’t argue…who could with those beautiful eyes staring back at you…not this softie).  6 months into his adoption my Max suddenly began having seizures.  It was genetic, without medication I was told he would suffer from them for the rest of his life.  To aid in reducing the number of them he was put on phenobarbital in the hopes that in a few months they would be significantly reduced.  The opposite happened.  Despite increasing his medication twice, his seizures got worse.  The frequency stayed the same, every 6 days or so, but the severity of them increased and he began having them in clusters of 3…all within 15 minutes instead of just one seizure at a time.  “Coming too” began to take much longer as well.  There were other options his regular veterinarian suggested I could do, such as take him to Cornell to the neurologist in an attempt to pinpoint the cause of the seizures, and perhaps a better diagnosis, leading to a better medication, but the price of this was too great to comprehend.  The difficulty with having two little ones in the house also presented a problem, as I couldn’t explain to them in a way that they could understand that during Max’s “episodes” they needed to stay away from him due to the oversensitivity of his senses returning one by one and the possibility of him lashing out at them because he was scared, unable to understand what was going on in his own mind.  I write this letter to you with my sincere thanks.  I felt as though there were no other alternative than to let my Max go so that he no longer had to suffer from these awful paralytic seizures.  It was an extremely difficult decision to make and one that, believe me, I wrestled with long and hard.  Last night was a tough one.  I woke up several times in the night, not feeling him squished up against me and then remembered, he’s probably squished up on a way more comfortable bed now anyway, so I’m sure he’s extremely happy!  It will get better and time will begin to heal this wound, but I must admit, no dog will ever take the place of that deep gray beauty.  I never thought that in an 8-month period of time a dog could steal my heart as much as he did.  There will forever be a special place in my heart for him alone to call his own.  He is buried, along with his favorite cheetah blanket J, on my parent’s farm in Masardis where he can rest in peace and no longer suffer from those horrible seizures.  I will miss those velvet ears my Max, and you are deeply loved and greatly missed.  Run free my boy, run free!