For Love of Dog

I have always been a dog lover since I was a kid, not sure how it developed since I never really grew up around animals except for fish. We first got dogs when I was 13 years old, two of them because my mom figured one for each kid (while that works with boxes of cereal really well, it doesn't with dogs). My mom was a smart lady, but she didn't know much about dogs, so hence the two.. sisters from the same litter. Since our family didn't know much about dogs, we didn't walk them as much as we should, clean up after them as well as we could have, and train them properly. They started to fight after a few years, not just play fight.. these were I'm jealous of you and going to rip into you type of fights. We had them for 5 years and then had to split them apart and send them to different homes. After that I learned more about dogs and realized all the thousands of mistakes we made and vowed that when I got another dog I wouldn't make the same mistakes.

So after I graduated college, I moved home and started to work. Things in my life got a bit crazy, my mom passed away and I was devastated, trying to figure out how to feel "normal" again and live with her being gone. In that same year, I had lost my grandfather 10 months before her and my grandmother 2 weeks after, it was an insane time. I was finally feeling more stable and also in a relationship for awhile after then. Then the relationship ended and I was single again. My friend suggested I get a dog, I dismissed the idea only because for so long I kept saying, it's not time yet, it's not time yet that it became an automatic answer. But the more I thought about it, why not? I was working, living at home and had a steady income.

So I started my search. I was going to take my time and make sure I met the right match (because I work full-time), I started looking online and 2 weeks later started visiting shelters and submitting applications. Two weeks after that, the president of Furry Friends Rescue suggested Griffen. I had originally put in applications for two other pups, but she said they wouldn't do well in my home, but that Griffen seemed like a good match. So one sunny Saturday, I took two friends and went to see him. Love at first sight!

He had a spunk in his step despite being 10 years old. When I kneeled down in front of him, he stuck two paws on my legs and grinned up at me. He was so adorable I didn't even noticed his lack of teeth until my friend pointed it out. They told me he was hard of hearing, which didn't bother me one bit.. later I realized he was completely deaf and only responded to vibrations. That was okay, he was really good at paying attention to where I was. I was lucky enough to take him home that day, paid his adoption fee, had the home check done and he was mine! I kept his name since I figured that's what the rescue had been calling him for the year he was with them, but usually I just called him Griffy or Dog.

We bonded really quickly and he became totally devoted to me as I was to him. He was my heart and soul and made me realize how much I could love again. This was difficult after everything I had gone through and before that I was always happy-go-lucky, always trusting and loving and had infinite patience. Not always true now, but he brought a lot of it back. Then I was hit with another punchinthegutheartbreakinglifefeelsincrediblyunfair incident. I was the first to receive a call that my best friend had been shot and killed for no apparent reason. She was in a great part of town and it was so completely random that 6 months later.. the police still have no real leads. I broke apart that day, sank down on my couch and pulled Griffy into my lap and just wept. He sat completely still in my lap for hours (and he doesn't like doing that). I couldn't have gone through the next 4 months without him and I didn't realize how much he was helping me until he got sick...

Unfortunately, Griffy had kidney problems when I first got him. The vet explained how he'd have to be on a prescription diet, but didn't explain just how serious this could get. I didn't know and didn't recognize the signs right away that something was wrong. And since he was already older, the problems advanced too quickly. I got back from vacation and he had gotten skinnier, I thought it was due to me being gone. But one day he didn't want to get up or move or eat. I rushed him to ER and they ran a blood test, they didn't call me the next day, but I took him in the day after that... bad news, his kidney levels were sky high. He was hospitalized Christmas Eve and they started running flushes. It only got worse and he seizured once. Then a few more times, I received the phone call the day after Christmas that his quality of life was nothing.. there was only one decision to make. He had given me an amazing and life changing 7 months and at 11:15 am on December 26th, Griffy passed to the bridge in my arms.

He will always be my first love and it is to him that I dedicate this Blog.. For Love of Dog.