Remembering Caesar

By Samantha Errett
I believe that everyone is allowed one heart animal in their lifetime – the lucky ones sometimes get more. Caesar was mine. I first met Caesar on the day he was relinquished to Animal Care Center, where I was (and still am) working as a registered veterinary technician. He came to us with a fractured hind leg. He was just 14 weeks old and one big ball of white standard Poodle puppy fluff. Despite running around with a large cast on his leg, nothing could get him down. He maintained his happy-go-lucky attitude up until the day before he left this world.
For his entire life, Caesar spent his days greeting clients at the Animal Care Center. Being so large and sporting his signature colored mohawk, he was easily recognizable. One terrifying day he had a seizure while at the clinic; he was just nine months old. This was the start of a life-long fight against epilepsy. Doctors at the clinic estimated he’d live perhaps seven years.
I searched everywhere for integrative remedies such as acupuncture, diet changes and essential oils. These worked for some time, but soon we had to turn to prescription medications to control his seizures. After his diagnosis, Caesar became my buddy more than ever; he could no longer be left alone for longer than a couple of hours because of his condition.
Through the years, we went on many adventures. Caesar has climbed to the top of every trail on the Wasatch Front (even Timpanogos), trekked through every inch of Southeastern Utah, and pranced in more parades than I could count.
With Caesar by my side, I felt as though I could do anything. In moments of weakness, all I had to do was turn to him and his reassuring look would keep me going strong. Caesar stood strong by my side though every failed relationship, rough days at work, moving to many different homes, and losing my dear friends and their dogs in a tragic car accident. He shared joy in finding my significant other, growing our family and finally making a home on our farm.
Caesar had a huge personality that radiated everywhere we went, especially at home. We are involved with fostering for CAWS, and every dog who wandered into our home was welcomed and shown the ropes by Caesar. Having grown up in a veterinary office, he had a gift for helping even the most fearful dog feel welcomed in our home.
Just before Caesar’s seventh birthday, disaster struck. He went into status epilepsy, which is a state of continuous seizures. We rushed him to the emergency hospital where he was induced into a coma by doctors to stop the seizure activity. He had a temperature of 108 on arrival – a fever that could cause severe organ failure.
After two days, there was little hope he would recover. This is where you start to begin to think of the dreaded question none of us want to answer, “Is this the end?” This was not the end I wanted. I desperately wished for a chance to say goodbye and have one last kiss.
Against all odds – after 70 hours in a medically induced coma – his seizures finally stopped. He awoke and was back to being Caesar.
After the near-death experience, I knew it was time to start planning for the end. I had just started as the care nurse for Utah Pet Hospice and began my certification as a hospice technician.
Part of being a hospice nurse is helping families with memorialization of their pets. If ever there was a dog to be memorialized, Caesar was it. I did not know when the end would come for Caesar, so I began collecting memories to remember him, along with discussing with my family what their ideas were.
I first contacted Gina Fox with Paw Prints by Fox for a pawsitive memory photo session with my sweet boy. I started an album on my Facebook page with Caesar, as well as his own Instagram account, to document the little time we had left. I went to Utah Dog Park’s pet paint night and attempted to create a canvas painting of him.
Through the next three years, I had his paw print tattooed on my foot and a portrait of his face tattooed on my shoulder. I was gifted a stuffed animal replica of Caesar this past fall, and I even created a book for our veterinary clinic called “Caesar’s Day at the Vet” to help illustrate what happens when pets go to the vet.
Caesar was a fighter – he lived three years after his status episode, exceeding all expectations. However, during those three years, Caesar battled a bout of pancreatitis, had to have his spleen removed, developed dementia, broke several bones and had to have a foreign object removed from his stomach. Though all this, he still ran and played with all his pals on our farm.
He stunned us all when he was diagnosed with heart failure. The prognosis gave him six months with medication. Caesar, however, had other plans. We were playing outside and – for the first time since his diagnosis – he started to be his old silly self again. We went back inside to work and Caesar began to limp. We later found out a blood clot had lodged in his front leg as well as several smaller ones in his kidneys. He would never recover.
May 25, just a month after he turned ten, and only four days after his heart failure diagnosis, we decided to say goodbye. That morning I looked down at my best friend as he opened his eyes to look back at me and said, “Caesar if you do not want to stand you do not have to, it is okay to stop fighting, my squeeze.” And with that he laid his head back onto his pillow.
I called one of our amazing hospice doctors for a home euthanasia. It was a beautiful day. He laid under his favorite tree as a gentle breeze rang the wind chime above, surrounded by his many fur and human friends. As the final medication was administered, he took his last calm, slow breath.
I had planned this day for years but was still not ready. No one ever is. There are so many options after death, and even having previously discussed this with others, I felt overwhelmed. Do I give him a funeral? Do we have a celebration of life? Should I bury him at home or in a cemetery? Do I cremate him? Do I have ashes retuned?
There are other options for memorabilia: to get photo necklaces, nose print pendants, cemented ash art, many types of paw prints, and the less talked about option of taxidermy. In the end, I decided to have a ceramic and bronze paw print made. My kids made several ink nose and paw prints. We kept a lock of his hair, and we cremated his remains that were returned in a special urn just for him.
I did decide to have Caesar’s skull preserved and nickel plated as a special tribute to his place in my life. I am aware this is not for everyone, but I had talked about this with my family for several years. It turned out beautifully and was perfect for us.
It’s important when feeling overwhelmed by the choices of remembrance items and ceremonies to keep in mind: remembering is so much more than the physical pieces of our beloved friends. From Rainbow Bridge poems, a statue, a professional colored pencil drawing, to the thousands of photographs of your pet, the most important part in the end is that you remember her the way you and your family choose to. Caesar was a huge part of my life, and for my friends and clients – his memory will live on forever in my heart.
If you are thinking the time is near for your dear friend, reach out to us at Utah Pet Hospice. We are happy to help with home care for terminally ill pets, home euthanasia, grief support and providing options for memorialization and remembering your furry loved one.