Not the Right Way...

For those of you who may need to explain euthanasia to your children at some point, take a lesson from Chuck and me. Here are some phrases to avoid, as they tend to bewilder little kids:

• He wasn't feeling well so the doctor helped him die.
• He was hurting and his brain wasn't working right so the vet helped him pass on. (This was Chuck's attempt to correct Bullet #1, which was my first attempt at an answer to the question "what happened to Norman?")
  
• They gave him medicine that made him die. (This one doesn't even work when you tack on "but it was peaceful." Just avoid it entirely.)
• We took him to the vet and they helped him die.

The best way out of this situation, as we learned, is to just keep talking until the movie on the TV becomes more interesting than your explanations.