How My Dog Saved My Life
Ever since I can remember learning about Santa Claus and how he granted little kid’s greatest wishes, I remember asking for a puppy for Christmas. My parents didn’t allow any animals in the house so I knew Santa was my only option if my five-year-old self were to ever get a dog. Some years it was the only thing I’d ask for, thinking if I didn’t give any options for Santa he’d be forced to get me one, makes sense right? In the warmer seasons whenever I saw a dog in west Windsor, where I grew up, I would walk up to the owner and always ask, “can I pet your dog?” I remember spending hours grooming my mom’s friend’s golden retriever, the dog appreciated the attention while my mom and her friend were grateful for interruption-free chat time. Dogs brought me such joy. Somehow that all stopped about the time I stopped believing in Santa, I was heart broken knowing I’d never get a puppy. Around the time of puberty I started to develop a fear of larger dogs, I don’t exactly remember where that fear came from; maybe it was my cousins’ large and in charge labrador, or grandmother’s protective german shepard, but after a few years it became quite significant. So, I got myself some cats and became content to call myself a cat lady. Dogs are too much work, they’re unsanitary, they are dumb - I’d think to myself.
In March 2015 while visiting an old friend in Toronto, my house got broken into. Everything was stolen. For a female who lived on her own, and that hoards everything for nostalgia’s sake, it was very traumatic. For someone who already has a history of mental illness, I became very depressed. The trip to Toronto was supposed to be a break from my overwhelming new job. It was my first ever ‘real life nurse job’ and it was difficult to find my stride. I began to spend days in bed. I couldn’t bring myself to clean my house; everywhere I looked reminded me of an item that was missing, memorabilia that will never sit there gathering dust and reminding me of certain events/ times in my life. I became really paranoid - I knew that the likelihood of me getting broken into again right after a break in were slim to none, and yet I couldn’t get it out of my head that someone will break in again soon. I had three objectives to make me safer; get an alarm system, get a guard dog, and get a gun. This was the point that after years of being a cat person I considered getting a dog.
Roxy didn’t come into my life right away. I knew getting a dog would be expensive, and time consuming. I thought I didn’t have patience to train a ‘dumb dog.’ I did some research - doberman was what I decided on, or plan B was a husky. I wasn’t too excited for a dog either, again, with the fear of large dogs.
September 6th came around, it was a Sunday. I found myself driving back from Flint, about a 40 minute drive, early Sunday morning. My mood was pretty low, and I had a horrid headache. About a dozen exits before mine I decided to stop at a mall, shopping makes me feel better. I knew there was a pet store located in the mall, but I wasn’t going to buy any puppies. ‘Well, only unless there was a husky or a doberman, I need one of those anyway,’ I thought to myself.
That morning I saw the cutest little white dog I had ever laid eyes on. I asked a sales associate named Alex to see her, among some other puppies. This adorable white dog was so cuddly and so playful. We played tug of war with an unstuffed elephant for at least 20 minutes. I barely believed the words coming out of my mouth, “I’ll take her.”
Roxy is not much of a guard dog, she didn’t save my life by fending off burglars, or dragging me out of a house fire - she did it in a much more significant manner. I have a mental illness; generalized anxiety, major depressive, and borderline personality disorder. Seemingly mundane events illicit extreme reactions from me, I have intense and stormy relationships with friends and loved ones. My anxiety paralyzes me. I have spent days in bed having crying spells that last from 15 minutes to 4 hours; only getting up to use the rest room, eating only granola bars and apples for days. I’ve attempted to take my life in the past, unsuccessfully of course. I’ve been in and out of therapy for years, trying a handful of different medications. Some things have helped, others have not, but in the end I always found myself surrounded and almost comforted, by dark thoughts. My most persistent problem was loneliness; people came, and people went. There’s no stability in the people in my life, throughout the years I couldn’t even rely on my family for any kind of consistency or support. Around the time Roxy came into my life, I had a plan. I didn’t know when I was going to do it, but I knew I was going to. She changed all of that.
This little four pound Pom-Bichon named Roxy, she’s saved my life. Roxy loves me unconditionally. I come home after a terrible 13 hours at the hospital, miserable and ready to snap. People are not good to each other. I see it every day at work; seeing cases in a major children’s hospital in the middle of such an impoverished urban city like Detroit, it is rarely a happy ending. But Roxy, she’s there wagging her tail when I come home, looking at me with only pure love in her eyes. She doesn’t resent me for leaving her for so long, she doesn’t know hate or jealousy. She doesn’t judge me that I may have given that medication late, or that parent yelled at me for not changing bed linen right away. All she knows is I’m home, as if she thought she’d never see me again. Some days I have yelled at her, out of frustration; she peed on the carpet, or chewed on my Mac Book cord when I was already having a bad day - but she is quick to forgive me. I order a new cord online, and in five minutes we’re best friends again. I’m scratching her belly, she’s licking my wrist, both of us completely content. No human relationships are as free from disagreement, and frustration as the relationship I have with Roxy. Our relationship is simple, there’s no second-guessing, mind games, or grudges between us. When I start to cycle in my dark narcissistic human thoughts, she breaks me away from it. She teaches me joy, to live in the moment, and that it’s the little things that matter most - playing tug of war in the living room, a walk in the woods, a trip to the dog park, sometimes even a quick car ride. She keeps loneliness away by being present, yes, but also - what better way to meet a stranger than to bond over puppies in the dog park, or have two dogs meet when you’re out on a walk? She doesn’t only drive away loneliness, but she also attracts good people to me. Roxy has made me happier than I have been in years, she’s saved me from myself.
