RYLEY

Our Ryley is gone.  He was diagnosed with bone cancer in June.

Moving into the RV has been the best thing we could have done for Ryley's last months.  While living in a regular home with a back yard, we only took our dogs for walks for our own enjoyment.  Now that we are living in an RV, we HAVE to take the dogs for multiple walks.  Ryley loved all the new smells every day.  Much better than the same old smells in the backyard.
We've only been at Four Paws Kingdom Campground for 2 days. Ryley has had a blast in those 2 days. He had been depending more on our help walking him with the harness. Although he never showed pain, he was using his cancerous leg less & less. His spirit has always been happy through  all he's been through.  See his biography HERE.
I was able to spend the morning laying outside with him and petting him all morning. He was quite relaxed. It was difficult to make the decision since he didn't seem in distress.  We chose to put him to sleep maybe a little early.  He had a terrible night and today wouldn't walk or go potty. His shoulder has ballooned out which makes it uncomfortable to lay and roll over. But being a Saturday, we were afraid if he had another bad night, then he would not only have to suffer through Saturday night, but also Sunday night, until the vet opened on Monday. We knew he wouldn't get better with rest. This was damned bone cancer. He was too good a dog to be selfish and keep him for us. We loved him enough to let him go before he suffered a lot. (Yes, I'm crying as I type.)
Birgit, an owner of the campground has been absolutely wonderful. This was the best place to be other than home for Ryley's time to come.  We don't have cell service and the vet was closing at 1pm. I didn't want to leave Ryley to try to find someplace to make a phone call and explain to a vet we've never seen, our situation.  Birgit took care of it all for us.  She called her vet, explained everything, gave the vet all our info, so when we arrived, we could concentrate on our last moments with beloved Ryley.
We were hoping to avoid the stress of a vet visit. We hoped since he had never been to this vet he would be relaxed. But no, our smarty knew where he was. Different place, same environment. Poor baby was shaking as he usually does at the vet's office.
I hope he is running around with Chance and having a great time barking up a tree at the squirrels!