A dog saves my broken soul

The title may seem rather exaggerated, but I believe it to my very core. I mentioned in my previous post, my son died a couple of years ago. What I didn’t mention is, I also lost my brother on that very same day. We all lived in the same house. My brother had recently divorced and had moved in until he could get a place of his own. He also had three young children that came to visit him and stayed at the house frequently. I helped out with the kids often. The house was alive with love, laughter, siblings arguing, singing, playing, etc… We had a house full! After the funerals were over and it was time to go back to regular life, the best I could. Life was not the same, as you can imagine. The horrible pain of losing two people that I was very close to and not understanding ‘why’ this happened. To make it worse, the three kids stopped coming over. We went from a house of seven, to two. The house was so quiet and so empty. Most mornings I would wake up and think “I don’t have any reason to get out of bed.” I had such a big empty feeling in my soul. I was devastated and felt so alone.

Fast forward to a couple of months later. My 20ish year old nephew told me he was getting a puppy. He was excited to show me the photos on his smartphone. I immediately wanted one too! I mean who doesn’t look at cute puppy photos and say “Oooh… I want one!”?  After I thought about it, (overnight) I was sure I wanted one. I do have an older dog, he is great. Although, he doesn’t like to be indoors and he can be aggressive around food. He is wonderful to go on walks, do tricks and enjoy the outdoors with. I noticed he also was sad and missing our loved ones. He and my son were very close. My nephew checked with the people selling the pups and found out they did have one puppy left for sale. A few days later I was able to bring her home. I swear, she was sent to me from above. She was sent to save me. She is a beautiful, fluffy, perfectly – imperfect Husky. Right from the start, getting her helped me get out of the dark place I was in. I was no longer in a state of endless grief. I had something else to focus on and puppies are a lot of work. I HAD to get up in the morning to keep up with her potty training schedule. I HAD to get dressed and go outside. I HAD to take her for walks, which made me get out and exercise. I HAD to take care of her, she needed me. It was the best feeling; to feel needed in that way again. She relied on me. 

I live in a rural area. At first I walked her on a leash. After a few months we switched to an e-collar – it has three options for correcting the dog. Beep, vibrate and zap. The collar has worked wonderful for her, 99% of the time I never have to escalate from ‘beep’. 🙂  Once she did ignore the beep and vibrate as she was chasing after something. Turns out she was chasing a skunk!! That’s a blog for another day. lol

Since I work from home. She lays down next to my chair while I work. She has attitude and ‘talks’ back to me when she doesn’t get her way – as Huskies do. On those nights when I break down and cry… she is always there to console me the best she can. I am never alone because of her. She loves me unconditionally and thinks I am the most wonderful person on earth. She makes me laugh out loud. She is such a big part of my world. She is an indoor dog and has a huge kennel that she goes in when I have to leave the house. Both of my dogs get along very well – they are buddies. I know getting the puppy cheered up my older dog too. She filled a void in his heart as well.

I know getting a pet doesn’t fit in everyone’s life. I just wanted to share how much getting a puppy helped me out of a dark place. I still have my days – there is still a chunk of my heart that is broken. Day by day things get a little easier.

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