I have worked at an open admission county animal shelter that sees about 30,000 animals a year come through it doors for the last 17yrs and I have personally euthanized thousands of animals and have yet to see one rise from the dead.
@steelerino exactly!!! I’ve seen animals requiring an additional dosage but never have I ever seen one “wake up”. In fact, out of respect, we always always always allowed the body time afterwards before we moved it to the freezer. This was mostly for religious purposes of the vets “to allow the soul to pass” but it did also give the body time to expell waste. This way if an owner wanted to visit the deceased after being in the freezer, they were cleaned up.
And yes, a lot of people do visit after. I don’t know how commonplace it is but in my career, it happened frequently. I always tried to prepare the body to look as if it were sleeping (glueing eyes and lips shut if possible, tying the body in a curled up sleeping position, if possible)
But never ever did anyone “wake up”.
My thoughts are that someone said he was euthanized and he really wasn’t. I know in the shelters I worked at, the techs euthanized, not the vets, so it is possible that this miracle was staged. And I bet that adoptions went up afterwards too.
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@Chachie Or what I think could have happened is maybe the animal was sedated for euthanasia and never got the juice. We use a heavy mix of ketaset/ace/100mg xylazine which leaves them nearly lifeless. If you have a couple of things going on at once and are careless to not confirm death I feel like this could be an explantion.
Yep. Not every vet I have worked for sedates prior. Lord knows I wish that they did! But I agree, something isn’t right about this. That’s why it is so perplexing.
i remember years ago a PR stunt of a TV reporter assisting/documenting live a euthanasia of a dog and after that, people flooded to the shelter to adopt. Seems about the same in a roundabout sort of way. Freak people out to increase adoptions.
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Some more rural shelters in the US and many shelters in less developed countries still euth by cramming 5-10 dogs in a box with a pipe hooked to car exhaust… not uncommon for a survivor to wake up, but they are usually just killed (again?)
solution costs money, car fumes are free…it’s evil.
The movie was “I Remember Mama” starred Ingrid Bergman and a very young Barbara Bel Geddes. Very cute movie about a Swedish immigrant family. They used chloroform to euthanize the car but wound up just putting it to sleep for a while.
Similar story in one of the Anne of Green Gables books.
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Thank you so much! I couldn’t remember it for the life of me and it was killing me! I did read all except the last Anne of Green Gables books but don’t remember that…or maybe the last two? Some time after she got married my preteen self started to lose interest.
Anyway…now I have to go watch that movie again. Weird that all these years later I remember that scene specifically.
That is disgusting. I hope anyone who has ever done that to an animal meets a similarly painful and cruel fate. The lack of humanity in this world is unbelievable.
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Do vet offices usually give the option to sedate before euthanasia?
I have only witnessed one dog euth and it was my husband’s older lab that was doing great, and suddenly had internal breeding. Surgery would not have been fair to her at her age, so we opted to sadly euthanize her. We were at the emergency vet, and they didn’t talk to us about the process prior to euthanizing her. We were in the room, she was awake, and when they administered the fluids she did NOT go very easily. She fought it, and it was so painful to watch.
Our other dog is starting to age and this is on my mind at times. Was our experience normal? Do vets usually sedate prior to administering the euthanasia drugs? If the dogs are sedated first, is it less violent when they pass? I honestly don’t think I can watch that happen again, but this girl is my whole life and I can’t imagine not being with her when it is her time.
My vet has always sedated prior to euthanizing. They shave the front leg, insert a flexible catheter/IV and administer the sedative then the euth drugs. They described the process first.
The clinic where I work usually uses Telazol IM to sedate prior to euthanasia. They are basically asleep when the final injection is given. Very peaceful.
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Hope this helps. That is a horrifying story!
From the American Veterinary Medical Association’s Euthanasia Guidelines:
“S1.8.1 Individual Animals in Presence of Owners: Pre-euthanasia sedation or anesthesia should be provided whenever practicable, either before or after the owner(s) has had the opportunity to spend some final moments with his or her pet. Once the animal is calm, either direct venipuncture or use of an IV catheter is acceptable for IV injection of the euthanizing agent. Use of an IV catheter prevents repeat injections and minimizes the need for restraint while pet owners are present. When circulation is compromised by the animal’s condition and sedation or anesthesia may reduce the likelihood of successful injection, it may be necessary to proceed with IV injection in the awake animal, or another route of administration of euthanizing agent might be considered. Alternatively, general anesthesia may be induced, followed by administration of a euthanasia agent.”
Perhaps the fact that your dog was bleeding internally meant that she wasn’t a candidate for sedated euthanasia? Still…
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Was it “I Remember Momma”?
If you’re still in shelter work, or have ties, I have found great luck naming the black cats Sirius Black. I was helping a farm cut down on their barn cat population. I had the same issue- the black cats were the last to go. Then I named one Sirius Black. I had about 5 calls about him! I also had 3 black cats, and as all 3 looked alike, I was able to get all 3 of them adopted with the one ad. I was pretty proud of myself on that one.
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YES! I think someone else upthread mentioned it also. It’s in my DVD queue now. I’ve been marathoning Supernatural so I haven’t watched my Netflix DVDs much lately.
Thank you for this. Puts me a bit more at ease when someday I have to make the decision for my girl.
I wish the vet had given us a heads up about the procedure and process. She was calm and laying on a table they brought in to us to say goodbye before euthanizing (she was relaxed but awake enough to have her head up and know we were with her). Not sure if they gave any drugs prior or if she was compromised with the internal bleeding, but had we known that’s how it was going to go - I think we would have opted to not be in the room. My poor husband was crying and saying “Suzie just go!” as the dog was crying/yelling out and trying to get up. The vet had to restrain/hold her until she finally passed.
The vet did offer surgery to remove the bleeding internal mass, so I have to think her body would have been able to handle anesthesia or they wouldn’t have offered that? (She was almost 12 years old, and the vet said he strongly felt the growth would return, and she would likely need chemo after if it was cancer - and recovery would be very hard on her. We felt it was in her best interest to let her go).
I hope I never need to go to that ER vet again. This happened a year and a half ago and it still haunts me.
