Euthanizing Aggressive Dogs: Sometimes It's the Best Choice

Euthanizing Aggressive Dogs: Sometimes It's the Best Choice

August 12, 2013 (published) | June 30, 2014 (revised)
Phyllis DeGioia, editor Veterinary Partner and VetzInsight


When my dog lunged at my face, I fell down the stairs.

I saw him watch me come up the stairs at 12:30 a.m. He seemed fine, but a moment later he went for my face. I pulled back and fell down half a flight of steep stairs. My head ended up in the bottom level of an open-sided end table. Had I hit my head on the top I could have broken my neck and become a quadriplegic like my mother had been.

Or died.

The vet who euthanized him said I looked like I'd been in a bar fight. I cried on her shoulder.

"If he were healthy, you wouldn't be here this morning," she said, and I knew she was right. I have no doubt that ending his life was the right thing to do. This choice - and it didn't feel like a choice, but something I had to do - is not one everyone would make, I know. However, we would all be safer if more people euthanized dogs whose behavior cannot be improved after professional assistance.

I had been working with Dodger for months on his aggression. Three months before that fateful night, my 42-pound, 9-year-old English setter had bitten me three times in two seconds; he left six wounds on my forearm under a sweatshirt after I petted him on his back. I was stunned, but I knew what to do.

He had a thorough medical work up, and went on the anti-anxiety medication clomipramine after no physical cause for his behavior change was found. I called in a certified trainer, a woman highly experienced in dog aggression. When she arrived, she said, "I cannot guarantee he won't bite again."

Dodger seemed to be getting better and although he'd snapped at me a few times he hadn't broken skin. I thought his bite inhibition was back, and that as long as I didn't startle him, it would be okay.

I was utterly wrong.

Being attacked by someone you love is a visceral slam to your gut. For a short while, rational thought is gone. It happens so quickly. Your body shakes, and your heart pounds as the instinctive fight-or-flight response is set off. I cried that night as I iced my face, wishing I could ice half of my body. Being bitten by my own dog was a traumatizing event, a betrayal of trust by a beloved canine who’d always slept on my bed.

Dodger had been anxious enough when he arrived five years ago to wear down a path in the back yard within three days. He'd always been snappy when startled. Exercise was never lacking, as we frequently went to fenced, off-leash dog parks. However, last winter I noticed he was much more anxious than he used to be.

When I started talking to people about him, I realized that many friends have euthanized aggressive dogs, including one who owns a dog training school – and so did one of the training school’s co-owners. Veterinarians too: Years ago, Dr. Teri Oursler brought home a 3-year-old rescued beagle. Every time he had gotten in his former owner's way, she kicked him, and then she kicked him when she shoved him into the kennel. Dr. Oursler consulted with veterinary behaviorists who told her she could not cure Sherman, and that all she could do was improve his behavior and try not to put him in any situation where he could cause harm. Three months later, Sherman attacked her 8-year-old son's foot, leaving eight puncture wounds. It was his fourth bite and by far the most aggressive and unprovoked. Sherman was euthanized.

Eight years later, Dr. Oursler still struggles with the guilt of putting Sherman's needs above the safety of her children.

"I will never forget the sounds of his attack and my child screaming," she said. "He taught me that some animals are wired wrong and cannot be fixed, just like some people. Think of Ted Bundy. Sherman taught me that euthanasia of a severely anxious animal is relief of suffering as much as euthanasia for a physical problem is relief of suffering. He taught me that euthanasia for a behavior problem relieves human suffering as much as animal suffering."

Some aggressive dogs can be helped by a good trainer or veterinary behaviorist, and that is where people should start to work with the dog; getting professional help can make the needed difference. But I now believe strongly that some dogs - like Dodger - aren't wired correctly, and no amount of training or medication can fix broken wiring.

From where I'm sitting, too many people make excuses for repeat offenders, no matter if the cause is medical or otherwise, rather than actually addressing the problem even if it’s escalating. They wait until a disaster transpires. Sometimes they don’t even realize that’s what they’re doing.

What I realized later, through my grief, was that I'd been walking on egg shells around him and that relief was a big part of my emotional response. Mostly it was sadness. In the first few days anger was a large part of it: That he suffered from anxiety, because I could have broken my neck, because I will never again see his stunningly graceful run.

I struggle with his unhappiness despite all my efforts, and I wonder when or if that will ever end. A rip in my soul feels like it might never heal.

In my sadness I turned to Dr. Michele Gaspar, both a veterinarian and human therapist.

"There are some dogs who are mentally ill, either due to genetics, trauma or their development," she said. "I appreciate the effort that people put into understanding them, but some of these dogs just never are normal. I don't think meds would have helped Dodger. Escalating behavior is not good in any species. Dogs should be mentally strong enough not to startle in a home environment."

Dr. Gaspar said she is increasingly intolerant of dogs and cats with behavioral issues, but it seems to her that as a society we try to overcome these issues in pets more than we do with people.

At least I have the comfort that he will never get worse. He won't ever bite anyone else, simply because he can’t. Children can be allowed in my house again, and I won't ever be sued because Dodger hurt someone. Nor will he get turned away by my veterinary clinic because he bites the staff. These are the things I tell myself when I’m trying to feel better. They are not small comforts.

The frightening statistics for dog bites account for a lot of fear and hateful feelings about dogs. Bitten children, the most common victims, often grow up to be afraid of dogs. Bites affect people who work with dogs: boarding kennel operators and pet-sitters, trainers, rescue group volunteers, and veterinary staff. Veterinarians and veterinary technicians receive many of those bites, affecting how they feel about their profession and future clients.

Dr. Beth Ruby discussed her reaction to an aggressive patient on a message board of the Veterinary Information Network:

“In all the years I have worked in a veterinary clinic I have never been bitten in the face (before today). It created a fear I don't think I have ever dealt with. The complete lack of warning from the dog has left me very insecure. I have been bitten and scratched a lot in the last 25 years, but never have I felt so small and vulnerable as I did today. Seeing those teeth coming at your face and having absolutely no control creates an emotional experience that you can't imagine or describe.”

You can’t imagine or describe it, but if you’d lived it, her words ring true.

That day nearly three years ago changed the way Dr. Ruby practices. She has become more cautious during exams. She keeps her head and face at a safer distance, only approaches a dog from the side where she has plenty of opportunity to back off quickly, and uses muzzles more often.

"I am definitely jumpier than I used to be, which can be embarrassing," she said.

What I have never understood, even before Dodger came into my life, was how people could keep dogs who bit people or other animals repeatedly and just live with it. That’s an unacceptable risk. While owners may accept it for themselves, it is immoral for them to accept it for anyone else. I also believe it is wrong to turn the dog over to a shelter or rescue, and even worse not to disclose the truth about aggressive behavior. There’s enough bad stuff in the world that people cannot control; sending along a dog who will hurt someone is a moral failing.

Imagine what you would feel after your aggressive dog mauled a toddler’s face. Imagine what you would feel if a stranger’s dog attacked you or your child. Wouldn’t you wonder, forever, why the dog’s owner didn’t do something about the dog’s escalating behavior when they could have?

I don’t have to wonder about that any more. As I continue to sort through and address my feelings about Dodger, what I could have done and what I finally did, I am secure in knowing that ending his life was the right thing to do.

“Death is the ultimate loss but not the ultimate harm," said Dr. Gaspar. I agree.

UPDATE

It's been exactly one year since I euthanized Dodger, which was one of the worst episodes of my life. I'm thankful to everyone who has written. The comments from readers have been enormously helpful and are full of solace. (We didn't publish the handful that essentially said, "How dare you murder that dog, you piece of &%#!," as they violated our language policy, although they never bothered me.) I've had lengthy back channel conversations with several commenters. All too often, though, I don't answer individual comments because they slice into my sorrow and keep it fresh; I can't answer for the sake of my own mental health. My pain has eased greatly, but it is still nearby, as though all that's needed to unleash it is to open a cabinet.

This subject is filled with angst and guilt, not to mention shame at a perceived inability to "train" the aggression out of a beloved dog. Some of our solutions involved ending the life of someone we love with all our heart in order to protect others and ourselves. I cringe every time I read about another mauling by a dog, and I wonder if the owners of those maulers experience the massive guilt and regret that I would. I could not live with myself if my dog hurt someone that way.

Thankfully, I never felt guilty about euthanzing my boy, and did not regret my choice; this is not the case for everyone. Then and now, I didn't feel as though it was a choice; it felt like something I had to do. Because of his protectiveness of that stairwell landing, he would have lunged at me again, and the kind of luck I had walking away from that fall is not going to happen twice. I still don't understand how I walked away the first time, landing crumpled up and passed out inside an end table with a painful and swollen body.

The physical scars are fading, and some of the emotional ones are too, but it takes longer than we think it will. Whenever I see someone with an English setter, I stop and ask if I can pet it. Sometimes I cry. It's embarrassing, but so what? We must keep our hearts and souls intact.

I still cry remembering Dodger's head resting on my knee and looking deeply into my eyes: connecting, bonding, trusting. It's the behavior of his I miss the most, although I deeply loved his silly sense of humor. Needless to say, I never miss being afraid of him, and I recall well why I chose to euthanize him. But that doesn't mean I can't take pleasure in remembering the aspects that made me happy: the way he'd greet visitors with a toy; the gentle way he took treats; the games he loved to initiate; his incredibly graceful and swift running; his look of joy and anticipation on his way to the dog park. Enough grains have shifted in my sand clock that these memories are the ones surfacing more often, rather than the other ones. Time is a good healer, and I am thankful beyond measure for that.

Source: Euthanizing Aggressive Dogs: Sometimes It's the Best Choice - VetzInsight - VIN