Suggestions on what to do with pets during this time

My husband has a rare cancer, and we have never been given a prognosis of his life expectancy. He has lost quite a bit of weight and is becoming no match for our 2-7 year old, 90 lb labrador retrievers. We have both always considered them our family, but as caregiving for my husband is the household priority, they get put on the back burner. Also, they are both so big that one knocked him down the other day dislocating his knee.

 I love these dogs to pieces, and if I were to lose my husband the thought of not having them would break my heart. Has anyone been in this position? What are some suggestions for what we should do? I have looked at dog day care, but it is so very expensive and we are now a one income family. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Perhaps you can contact a rescue organization and see if they might have a foster provider who would take your dogs temporarily.  The rescues usually have people signed up who provide temporary foster homes while they are trying to place the animals for adoption.  Maybe they could help with a foster home while you and your husband focus on his care, with a plan of eventually returning them to you.  It can't hurt to ask.  Or maybe you will have to confine the dogs to certain areas of your home and yard, so they will not be around your husband putting him at risk of falls.  At least they have each other for companionship (so not spending as much time with them isn't as bad as it would be with only one dog, IMO).  Or maybe it would be best to find another home for them, although I think that would be difficult. 

Best of luck.

Thank you, these are all good suggestions.

We went through this thing and it was very hard but as diseases progress you have to simplify your life.  We had a beloved English Mastiff and we contacted a the mastiff organization and someone 4 hours away adopted her.  They have foster parents as well but since we weren't sure how long it would be we didn't want to tramatize her too much.  It will be sad but we email monthly with the wonderful lady who adopted our dog and she is much happier with all the attention then she would have been being ignored all the time by us!  Good luck it's a hard decision but you have to put your pet first!

 

On 7/6/2009 Caring4Cancer wrote:

My husband has a rare cancer, and we have never been given a prognosis of his life expectancy. He has lost quite a bit of weight and is becoming no match for our 2-7 year old, 90 lb labrador retrievers. We have both always considered them our family, but as caregiving for my husband is the household priority, they get put on the back burner. Also, they are both so big that one knocked him down the other day dislocating his knee.

 I love these dogs to pieces, and if I were to lose my husband the thought of not having them would break my heart. Has anyone been in this position? What are some suggestions for what we should do? I have looked at dog day care, but it is so very expensive and we are now a one income family. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

  We have two very quite jack russels and while many would think having them here and doin chemo at home is a bad idea,we have instead taught them boundries and to only cross when asked. We started with this when hubby came home with his chest tube and have continued the practice every since. We brough the first round of chemo drip home yesterday after the push at short stay and all is going well. All four of us were able to continue to sleep in bed last night without fear of anything happening to the line feeding his port. Hubby has stage four mestatic adenocarsinomia that is inpoerable and is on the Folfox 6 regimin.