Rest easy, Mango 🧡

Yesterday I had to make the hardest decision of my life to put my best friend to sleep. I noticed that Mango had lost a lot of weight a few months ago and have been syringe feeding her critical care daily since early January to try to help her gain weight. The critical care plus her eating on her own was helping her stay essentially even in terms of weight, and even though she was underweight, she was still super alert, energetic, and happy. The vet wasn’t sure why she had been losing this weight and said that tests are normally not fully conclusive and that there isn’t much that can be done for whatever was causing the weight loss - possibly kidney issues, cancer, or some other unknown, and warned me that there was a good chance she wouldn’t gain that weight back. My main goal was to make sure that she had something in her tummy and was happy. It wasn’t until a few weeks ago when she stopped eating efficiently on her own, and she started losing weight again, and this past week when she became very lethargic, weak, and had very little energy. I took her to the vet again yesterday assuming the worst, and they essentially said that I could try some different supportive cares to try to help her condition from worsening, or I could put her to sleep. The supportive cares offered wouldn’t solve the problem that was causing her weight loss and behavioural changes, and only would’ve helped prevent her from getting worse for who knows how long. Based on her behaviour this last week, and specifically since Monday, I think it’s safe to say that her little body didn’t have much fight left, and I didn’t want her to suffer :( I just want the best for my baby. I’m gonna miss her forever. One of the difficult things about this loss is not knowing exactly what was causing her to lose the weight, and it’s making me second guess everything about my care for her. I feel so much guilt in the times where I could’ve spent more time with her, could’ve taken her outside, could’ve offered her more food, etc. I hope I was able to give her a great life for the seven years that she was on this earth. I’m heartbroken.