This week for Girl Talk Thursday, we’re sharing tales of heartbreak. Drop by, leave your thoughts, and please, if you like — participate!
I have thought a lot about this topic today. There are two men who have broken my heart. One of them, I’ve talked about already; one of them, I will talk about later. And so I kept thinking…. what else in my life has been heartbreaking? I’ve been fortunate not to lose any family or friends.
Then I remembered Bear.
Growing up, I never wanted a chihuahua or any sort of small dog. I wanted a big dog, a hunter, a guardian. But when I met Bear, we kind of fell in love with each other, and that was that.
Bear, like me, was a first child. He lived with my mom, and he was the first puppy of her chihuahuas’ first litter. When he was born, his mom was so terrified by the fact that she was giving birth that she ran away, leaving him on the floor. My mom had to pull the sac off him and clean him. He was the biggest puppy of the litter, and that’s what earned him the name Bear.
He was a few years old when we met, which means that he should have picked His Person by then, the way chihuahuas do. He hadn’t really, though. He was looking for someone to love, and I was hurt, vulnerable, just out of a painful relationship, and looking to be loved. We bonded instantly.
But, I was heading to Canada, and while Chris was open to the possibility of us having a pet, he did not want a chihuahua. So I spent a lot of time taking various “what kind of dog suits your personality” quizzes online, browsing the AKC website, and looking at breeders within driving distance of where we would be living. I never ended up with chihuahua on those quizzes.
And so, in the weeks before I left to Canada, I tried to keep myself distant from Bear. I tried not to love him, or let him jump into my lap; he needed to get attention from other people, not me. I would be leaving soon, and it would do him no good to grow more attached to me.
A week or so before I left, I took Bear to the vet to get neutered. The veterinarian said to me, “So, I hear this little guy’s going to Canada,” to which I replied, sadly, “No, he’s not going to Canada, but I wanted him to.”
Chris came down to steal me away on December 27th, and gave me my Christmas gift — a very lightweight gift bag. I had no idea what was in it; this was our first Christmas together and I didn’t know his gift giving style.
In the bag was a dog harness. A small one. A chihuahua sized one.
I looked up at him, confused. Looked at my mom, confused. Looked at Bear, who stared at me and shivered in that stupid adorable chihuahua way.
Bear was coming to Canada with us.
“I can’t believe you believed me,” Chris said, as I snotted all over his shoulder and cried with happiness.
“I thought for sure that dumb vet blew our secret,” my mom added.
Bear sat on my lap for most of the 8 hour drive to Canada. For some of it, he laid on the armrest between Chris and I; for a very little while, he draped himself across Chris’ shoulders. Then he came back to me. We stopped at the Canadian border to “make him official”, expecting to have to do a lot of paperwork and prove all of his vaccinations and whatnot; instead, a border guard pointed at Bear with a grin and said, “Poof! He’s Canadian.”
Bear slept in our bed every night. He spent every day in my lap or at my heel. He loved me endlessly, and although I think a lot of that had to do with the fact that he was terrified of everything else in the world, I loved him right back.
A year and a half later, a week to the day before our wedding, Bear woke me up in the morning — something he never did. He was pressed against my face and panting as the sun rose. We had a house guest and so I thought perhaps Bear was just nervous about hearing someone else move around, so I lifted the sheets and he wandered down to my calves, curling up against them, breathing heavily. I fell back asleep.
He woke me up again shortly thereafter, and I realized something was wrong. I took him outside, in case he needed to do his business, and although he squatted like he was going to, nothing came out. I figured he was constipated, but paired with the fact that he was still panting and had wild eyes, I started googling things like “my dog is trying to pee but nothing happens”. Meanwhile, our houseguest had woken up and was talking with Chris.
I curled up on the couch with Bear after googling that, terrified of what I had found. Almost everything said to take him into a vet’s office immediately, that he had some sort of urethral blockage and needed medical attention or he would die very soon; a few things said he could pass his blockage soon. I chose to listen to the latter, even though my gut was screaming at me to get him to a vet. We did not have the money for a vet visit; we were young, trying to get my residency, and getting married soon.
But within the next twenty minutes, I couldn’t ignore my panic anymore. Chris and I took Bear to the vet.
They confirmed my worst fears.
We gave him painkillers, she said, he is in a lot of pain. We need to do surgery immediately.
How much will that cost? I don’t remember if Chris asked or I did.
She handed us a mock-up bill. $1700 … and that was with pricing him as a cat, not a dog, because he was so small.
We couldn’t do it. We could NOT afford that money.
We made the decision to put him to sleep.
Do you want to come say goodbye? the vet asked me.
I said no; I could not look at him and tell him we were letting him go because we couldn’t afford him. It tore at my gut; I was sobbing loudly, I was a mess, and this is the only time I’ve seen Chris cry. Still, he stood up. I will, he said. Because he is the strong one, and he did not want Bear to go without seeing one of us one last time.
To this day, I wish I had said goodbye.
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