What is the point of no return in suffering for an animal or us?
When you love an animal or person, how can we decide what is enough?
We can ask a human and if he/she can voice an opinion you have direction, if not what to do?
An domestic animal is subjective to the will of the humans around it, be kind or cruel, functional or necessary.
On a farm life is harsh and different. Much of the day to day reality are based on the function and need. My husband worked alongside a foreman on his family's farm. The man would take a baseball bat and club groundhogs to death with a blow to the head. Mice were swung by the tail against a tractor tire to be killed instantly. My husband learn to do this aggressive behavior as a part of farming, there was one difference, after killing a couple of animals, he lie awake in bed at night thinking this is a horrible things to do. He stopped himself from doing it.
His father use to shoot groundhogs to keep them from making holes in the ground that could either get a tractor tire stuck when plowing or get your leg caught while seeding and make you fall or worse, break a leg. (Groundhogs ate crops too) Deformed or diseased kittens that were born were chloroformed, put in a bag and thrown in the river. Chickens were beheaded, plucked, and cooked. Watching this as a boy was forming behaviors and thoughts that would affect his life.
Years later Sweetheart learned the bow and arrow to hunt. He prepared, was out to kill a deer. When face to face with another innocent animal, he looked at it and would not kill it. He thought, "Why?"
As a moral dilemma developed from past abuse, my husband decided killing an animal for any reason, even to comfort, was wrong. He decided all life is sacred and be allowed to take a natural course to live as long as possible. I asked if this morality extended to humans? Murderers? He said, "In my mind it applies to all innocents. Animals are innocent. None of them kill for hate, they kill to protect themselves or eat. Humans that kill, torture, animals or other humans, are not to be tolerated, and if killing is the only way to stop that human from hurting innocents, so be it."
And so we have come to a compromise, our cat will be put on pain meds and our son will watch over him, feed, him, medicate him, pet him and keep him in Hospice care until we know it can be done no more without noticeable pain. We will weigh in on this day by day. Picking a date to euthanize him may rob the cat and us of hours of loving one another that might otherwise be enjoyed. (After all it's not like picking a date to have a C-section.)
Euthanization. What is your perspective?
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