Comments | stupidpetowners: what would you do?

fordarkness in stupidpetowners

what would you do?

Jan 23, 2006 21:00

if someone in your family that you were close to died and left their pet behind ( Read more... )

Comments 55

42dirtygirl January 24 2006, 02:05:05 UTC

God forbid if anything like that happened we're taking whoevers animals that we need to. I grew up with my parents beagles so thats a no brainer. Either my sister gets them or I do. I could never in a million years think about rehoming anyones animal that I was close to.

ilex011 January 24 2006, 02:05:12 UTC

Someone came into my old clinic once with the same thing... only she wanted us to put the cat to sleep because she thought it was mean to the cat to leave it in the shelter. I tried to talk her out of it... uh, NO KILL shelters dumbass, rehoming, etc, and at the end of it I refused to assist in the euthanasia and the entire staff was really pissed at the doctor who did it.

fordarkness January 24 2006, 02:33:29 UTC

that's horrible. :(

(The comment has been removed)

ilex011 January 25 2006, 00:52:53 UTC

That is true.

Still, it *really* sucks to be right smack in the euth room at the time... :/

squid_ink January 24 2006, 02:08:51 UTC

the only time I would NOT take an animal in would be if it were a cat-agressive dog (I have kitties). But even then I'd try going thru a trainer and see if we could work it out. I wouldn't dump the dog off at a shelter in any event, I'd try and rehome and use the shelter as a resource.

To be dumped at a shelter is so disorientating for any animal.. especially after losing a friend.

squid_ink January 24 2006, 02:12:48 UTC

forgot to add... I live in a house that's big enough to separate everyone. They'd be pissed, but it's doable.

fordarkness January 24 2006, 02:34:21 UTC

the only time I would NOT take an animal in would be if it were a cat-agressive dog

that's why i said that my sister would take my parent's dog... since she's cat aggressive. but if things happened where she couldn't take jaki, i'd do everything i could to take her myself.

lesbianic January 24 2006, 02:09:10 UTC

One of the most frequent reasons people give when they surrender cats to us is that the cat belonged to a family member that died or was placed in a nursing home. I couldn't imagine doing that either, but I'm glad they bother to call us at all.. sometimes we get calls from people whose neighbors have died, and their pets were left abandoned on/near their property by their family members.

I would personally take or rehome the animal(s) in this situation, but not everyone is in a position to do so (they might not even like animals.) I'd rather see them in a shelter than in the home of someone that didn't want him/her.

fordarkness January 24 2006, 02:34:58 UTC

I'd rather see them in a shelter than in the home of someone that didn't want him/her.

true that... but i'd like to think that there's *someone* that's close to the person who'd be willing to take the pet in!

lesbianic January 24 2006, 02:40:43 UTC

I wish it always worked out like that, but very often, it doesn't. I have had hour-long conversations with people who have tried very hard to find someone to take in the pet of a deceased family member and were unable to. A lot of these people are elderly themselves and either already have pets of their own and can't afford more, or aren't allowed to have more, or can't have any at all because of where they live, etc.

fordarkness January 24 2006, 02:43:31 UTC

that's horribly sad. :(

Thread 6

sunflowrgoddess January 24 2006, 02:14:06 UTC

I could see having to rehome the cat due to allergies. I didn't develop my cat allergies until I moved away from home. I could also see just not liking animals. Some people don't.... and if you hated cats and you were left with a cat... it might really put you in a spot.

But I'd try to find a new home for it rather than go straight for a shelter. It doesn't take too much time to search!

sunflowrgoddess January 24 2006, 02:15:29 UTC

I'd also say it was an excellent idea to think about such things and put them in your will so you KNOW for certain your animals will have proper care should you die unexpectedly.

dragon_smoke January 24 2006, 03:12:12 UTC

This is a most excellent point and should be the whole "lesson learned" from this post.

I always assumed that if something happened to me, my husband would take care of the fur kids. But what if something happens to both of us (i.e. you neve rsee the bus with your name on it)?

My dad and step-mom are coming to visit this weekend and I think I am going to have a long talk with them about this very thing.