I'm a veterinarian and I think I've killed an animal before for no reason other than it was badly behaved.

I'm a vet at an emergency animal hospital. I've been one for about 7 years. I absolutely love my job, and until recently I was very confident in my abilities. I've made a couple of mistakes in the past, but no more than your average vet, and certainly not more than I'd see at a regular practice. I've only had one incident where an animal died that was likely my fault, but this was on my first night as a vet and I was so overwhelmed, someone asked me for an antibiotic and I gave them the wrong one because I was so stressed. I don't know if the dog died from the antibiotic I gave, or if it would have died anyway from the underlying cause, but I've always felt horrible about it. <br><br>I write all of this because I want you to see I'm not a monster, I love my job and the animals I take care of.<br><br>Recently I had a dog come in that was in extreme amounts of pain, it had gotten its head caught in a cheese grater. It was in so much pain it was biting and snapping at everyone, it took 5 people to hold the dog down to look at the wound, and we couldn't even get a second look without giving it some very strong pain medication. Eventually we decided to sedate it to take a better look, but it was so agitated it required double the usual sedation dose, which was very risky. It took 3 attempts of that dose before the dog was calm enough to look at the wound, and at that point it was so late in the night that we decided to give it a small amount of additional sedation just so it could be comfortable until the next morning when more staff would be there to deal with it (I always give more agitated animals extra sedation because I feel awful seeing them in so much pain/anxiety).<br><br>The next morning my co-worker looked at the wound and noticed some necrosis already, and she thought it would be best if we just put the dog down. She was an old lady, she didn't want to risk it getting an infection and the owners didn't want to spend the money on a very risky surgery that might not even be successful. I agreed with her, and even helped her find the right drugs to give to the dog. When it settled down we took it to the back room and gave it the drugs we had decided on, and it died shortly after that. <br><br>The whole time I was dealing with the dog, I just felt like "This fucking dog is so badly behaved, I hope it dies so I don't have to deal with it again. I don't even care if it's in pain, I just want it to die and stop being a problem". I kept having thoughts like that the entire time, and they never went away. And when my co-worker suggested putting it down, for a brief moment, I felt happy because I would never have to deal with that dog again. Every other time I've dealt with an animal like that, it's because the owners are awful and don't train their dogs, or because the dog has been abused before. I've never met an animal that was so badly behaved without a reason. But this dog had an obvious reason for it. It was in a ton of pain! <br><br>I keep getting the feeling that I might have given that dog a larger dose of the drugs than I was supposed to, or maybe I mixed them wrong, or maybe I should have waited longer to give it to the dog. I don't know, I just have the feeling that the dog died because of me, and because I secretly wanted it to die because it was so difficult. I remember at the time thinking "I want this dog to die so I don't have to deal with it again", and I remember my next thought being "Well I'm giving it the drugs that will kill it so it's not a problem anymore", and just feeling happy. I've never thought that way before, and I haven't thought that way since, but I might have killed an animal just because it was badly behaved, and it really might have been my fault.