<p>My dog, Madame, is 10yo and has been doing good until last week when she had a hard time trying to breath. Parents and I took her to the doctor and found out she had a lack of red blood cells. Only way to possibly treat her is with blood transfusion, but that isn’t cheap, and it’s a 50/50 shot. Parents didn’t go along with it. So for the last week my dog has had a hard time breathing, and then she died today. My questions are, when you have lack of oxygen, do you pass out, and don’t feel pain? Or are you in pain and then die?</p>
<p>she would have had trouble breathing (like if you ever had an obstructed airway or had food gone down the wrong pipe) and then probably fell into a coma. the actual death would not have painful.</p>
<p>when you can’t breathe, don’t your lungs hurt?
same feeling, yep the actual death isn’t painful.
I think most deaths aren’t painful. Even if you’re stabbed to death, right before you die, you just feel very numb. And when you drown to death, your chest hurts because you can’t breathe, but then you fall into a coma. so death is technically, peaceful.</p>
<p>sorry about the dog by the way. losing a member of the family is always hard. :(</p>
<p>the split second of actually dying (medically) is painless (so i assume), but all leading up to death (be it seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks,years) can be terribly agonizing.</p>
<p>I’m so sorry kinglin. I LOVE <3 my dog, and I know how devastated you must be. What kind of dog was Madame? She might have had a genetic or autoimmune disease, or aplastic anemia, or some problem that could not be treated with medication. The final result may have been the same even with transfusions. Panting dogs don’t seem to be in distress. I knew a dog who wheezed due to congestive heart failure, but did not seem to be in pain…she lived a couple of years that way. I think if Madame was in pain, the vet would have suggested putting her down. Luckily, you had that extra week to love her and to come to terms with her illness and death. </p>
<p>I hope you keep your memories of Madame close to your heart, and don’t worry about her any more. I don’t think the vet would have let her suffer.</p>
<p>When you can’t breathe, it does hurt. Usually in chest (duh), like somebody punched you really hard. You also feel a stabbing sensation in the back. This probably applies to humans only.</p>
<p>Well, none of us are vets, so we don’t know for sure. But the lack of oxygen that killed the miners is WVa wasn’t painful…they just lost consciousness and went to sleep. When people sniff/huff/whatever the term is these days, they are depriving their brains of oxygen, but it is not painful. I think the panting is more stressful to us humans watching than it is to the dog. Rapid breathing is only the body’s effort to get more oxygen, but is not painful itself. When humans have an infection, their respiratory rate increases, but nobody really notices because it is not painful. Even asthma attacks are not “painful” (although they do cause anxiety for most human patients). When you breathe hard during exercise, you have an oxygen deficit, but you are not in pain.</p>
<p>Kinglin, you should just talk to your vet so this doesn’t haunt you. I’m certain that you will find that Madame did not suffer in pain. Otherwise, your vet would have recommended euthanasia.</p>