It sounds as if it's time. I'm sorry. It's hard no matter how many times you've had to make the decision and go through it. I can't say for sure whether the first time is harder or not. Every single one seems uniquely hard to me. I think every pet owner hopes for their pet to go quietly and peacefully in their sleep. It rarely happens. As far as staying or not -- I do think that's an individual decision, although I would encourage you (or your DH--someone he knows and loves) to stay with him until the sedative takes effect. The right way to do euthanasia is for the vet to give the pet a heavy dose of a sedative before administering the euthanasia drug. The sedative usually takes just a few minutes to take effect, and when it does I don't believe a pet is aware of whether their person is right there with them or not. I've always chosen to stay, but IMO it's not wrong if you don't want (or don't think you can handle) that final injection being the last memory of your pet. Hugs.

My guess is any kind of oil would act as a barrier, and I don't think would cause any harm (other than blurry vision for awhile). Being sprayed on the eyelids, though -- Yikes. That is a whole different issue from protecting the eyes from the de-skunking solution!!

If you happen to have some nighttime eye ointment you can put some of that in the eyes to protect them from the deskunking mixture. Groomers often use something like this for regular bathing, but I think Refresh PM or similar human ointments would accomplish the same purpose.

My understanding is that the best remedy is to rub the hydrogen peroxide/baking soda/Dawn mixture onto the dog's dry fur. Massage it in well, then let it sit for a few minutes before rinsing. I'd follow up with a regular shampoo to make sure I had all the skunk mixture washed out.

I'm glad it's good news!! I started to post this earlier, but didn't want to be overly optimistic. But now I'll say it -- I had a young, seemingly healthy dog once with elevated liver enzymes. The vet said even something like getting hit/bumping hard against furniture in the area of the liver while playing could cause it. His were never elevated after that until he was old (almost 15) and at that point both his liver and his kidneys were going. I don't think developing liver disease in very old age had anything to do with the one time elevated enzymes when he was young, though. I think that was just some weird fluke.

Same. That said, I'm at the point in my life where if I started a business it could be for fun or simply to have something to occupy my time. That I wouldn't mind too much.

We have a programmable thermostat. Our AC is set to come on to keep the temperature in the house at 73. I don't know what the outside temperature generally has to get to for that to happen. I rarely pay any attention to when/whether the AC or heat are running, as long as I'm staying comfy. Opening the windows during the spring isn't really possible given the astronomically high pollen levels we have here, and by mid to late May the humidity is high enough that opening windows is useless for increasing comfort.

French fries Chex snack mix Lots of other crunchy, salty foods

My niece had the same problem when she was in her late teens/early 20's. The docs blamed it on having had mono a few years before and it still clearing out of her system (or some very similar reason--I know it related to her having had mono). And I do think some people are just more prone to having swollen lymph nodes than others are. I'm 56 and can only remember having a swollen lymph node once in my life (and coincidentally that was in my teens), and for no reason that my mom or I could figure out. That was back in the day before everybody went to the doctor for everything, and since I had no symptoms of anything else we never got it checked out. It eventually returned to normal.

It's horrible.

Oh no -- I didn't mean that she might have kennel cough, but that if she dry heaved hard enough that might have triggered a fainting spell. That's what happened to my Brittany--he coughed really hard a few times and fainted. He was a little dazed for a few minutes and then he was fine. I did take him to the vet afterwards to make sure, and he said what happened wasn't uncommon. It seems to me the action on dry heaving is fairly close to a hard cough, so just the violence (can't think of a better/more correct term right now) of it might have triggered it.

Seizure was what I first thought of. But years ago I had a young, otherwise healthy dog who had kennel cough who fainted once due to coughing hard. So I'm wondering if the same thing could have happened due to her dry heaving?

MS was also the first thing that occurred to me.

I hope she's okay! Let us worried aunties know what the vet says, please!

When we bought this house one of the upstairs bedrooms HAD to be painted before move in. It's a convoluted story, but due to damage to that room done when the previous owner was moving out (which necessitated the need to repair some places and paint right away) he ended up cutting us a check to Sherwin Williams. We were in a huge hurry and didn't have time to think about it, and so we chose Sea Salt because everybody was raving about it at the time. And I didn't like it at all. It looked light powder blue in that room. Morning, noon and night.

I'm not very crafty or very good at decorating. We're definitely on the minimalist side (less is more!). Our wall decorations are almost all either jigsaw puzzles that DH has completed and framed, or photographs from our travels over the years that we've had large prints made of and then framed ourselves. I don't have the patience to coordinate colors in pillows and throws and stuff like that. I'm much more the type to buy individual pillows and throws that I really like rather than buying things I don't like so much just because the colors match. We prefer our entire house to be painted the same color throughout. We found "our" paint years ago. It's a golden beige color and we've used it in three houses. We made the mistake once of allowing the boys to pick the colors for their bedrooms and bathrooms and goodness was that a mistake. I'm sure they liked it but it was sort of a sensory overload thing for me. That said, I can do handy type stuff if I watch enough YouTube videos and read enough blogs. I've re-floored almost this entire house. I pulled the carpet off of our builder's grade stairs and managed to make them look pretty darn nice with lots of sanding, paint and molding. I recently painted the top of our dining room table. It's a sturdy table but the finish was starting to look bad. Some paint and seven coats of wipe-on poly improved it tremendously. But I consider stuff like that more handy than crafty.

I no longer identify as a Christian. But even when I did (which was for the vast majority of my life) I tried to avoid corporate prayer outside of church. Lots of things in the Bible aren't clear cut, but it's always seemed to me that Jesus' words on this were crystal clear.

It seems to me a clear violation of Matthew 6:5-6. So I have zero idea why a Christian would think it was an okay thing to do. But . . . lots of things don't make any sense to me.

The SSA does NOT initiate contact with people via phone. Period. (Note: A person may arrange contact by setting up an appointment for a phone meeting with the SSA. In that situation an SSA representative will call at the pre-arranged time. But the contact is at the behest/instigation of the person.)

We chose other types of investments, as the "cons" (which you can read about by doing a search) of 529 plans weren't worth it to us. I can understand why others like them, though.

I'm 56 and have scoliosis, although I don't know how it would be classified. My lower back (not the part that's curved, more like the SI joint area) hurts and often locks when I stand still or even partially still for more than 30 minutes or so. I think mine is age more than anything. DS20 has scoliosis that required monitoring during his prime growing years but didn't require any treatment. He also has spondylolisthesis. He says his back never hurts.

I'm the least ADHD-type person you can imagine. I have (or at least I'm pretty sure I have) strong executive function skills. I won't say I would have completely struggled with that situation, but I wouldn't have liked it at all and would have felt mentally flustered even if I didn't show it outwardly. As @maize said, regardless of what you read or what anyone claims, human brains aren't able to multi-task well at all. As @Arcadia said, taking command of the situation was really what was needed. As an introvert I used to have trouble with that, but it's definitely a skill that I've developed a bit over the years. One of the few pros of getting older.

It was a long, long time ago. All I remember is that the poor little dog acted like she was trying to prepare a nest for birthing, and then she carried around her favorite stuffed toy and treated it like a puppy, including urging it to nurse. I hope it passes quickly.

I'm sure that article resonates with lots of people. My sadness is due to the history and the architecture. Not so much anything religious. And I'm guessing a lot of other people feel that way, too.

I'm not exactly sure what you mean, but here's a "for instance" that involves something other than modifying speech: A couple of years ago we were at my MIL's. This is a lady who is very dear to us. DS has seen her for at least a couple of hours almost every week of his life. We walked in the door and I knew within ten seconds that she was worried or upset about something. I think I'm fairly NT, and my perception was probably a combo of intuition, reading body language and simply knowing someone well. After our visit was over and we were on the way home I wondered aloud what she might have been worried or upset about. And DS was like "What? I would never in a million years have known anything was wrong." So I had to explain to him all the details I picked up on that made it clear to me she was worried--she looked a lot more haggard than usual, she seemed distracted, she wasn't as talkative/upbeat as she normally was, etc. Once I explained how to put all those things together and what they likely meant he was like "Ok, got it." And he filed it away in his brain and will use that for future reference. He can quite easily learn those things intellectually. But he'll never (I don't think) be able to intuit a person's mood, even someone he's very close to. I hope that's what you meant?? I think I understand the sense/sensory thing you referred to. Is it like the analogy of an autistic person constantly being in a foreign land? I'm pretty sure that's how life is for DS. I don't think his is forged through trauma, but I do think he uses his working memory--and he is profoundly gifted in that area--to help him navigate through daily life. He relies on his memory to dredge up everything he's learned intellectually about how to fake NT. And even with prodigious stores of working memory to rely on, faking it still wears him out.