My pandemic pup

I bought a puppy — designer dog no less. That’s something that happened to me in the middle of all this mess. I never saw myself as someone who would have a friggin’ designer dog, but here I am.

I always thought that I would get a dog as an adult, but I would most certainly have to be in a different place in life. The place in which you have all your shit together. You know the one. You have your husband, your house, your yard, your delicious double-incomes. That’s the point at which I knew I would get a dog. It would be the practice dog…the one you get as a couple to prove you’re responsible enough to be parents. And then the kids would come.

Well. I’m thirty-three. And I’m single. And it’s a pandemic. And I’m working from home.

So I decided to get a foster dog. Because that was also always my dream. You see those videos on Facebook of the foster dog finally coming out of its shell, ready to love the world, so happy to be alive. That’s what I wanted.

Gnome was my foster dog. A 60-lb, 9-year-old Anatolia Shepherd mix. And he was a very sweet boy, right up until he bit the hell out of my arm.

You guys. I loved this dog. I walked him forty-five minutes every morning, gave him two ten-minute walks during mid-morning and mid-afternoon, another one at 5, and one last one around 10 before bed. When he first came into my apartment, I left him alone, like the shelter told me to. I let him have his space. I was told to treat him like a roommate.

I heard a “thump” in the next room a few minutes after I brought him home. I went to check on what it was. That old man had jumped onto my bed!

And he looked so scared up there, seeing me look at him. But I said, “Good boy!” and then he grinned the biggest doggy grin and my heart smiled, too.

It’s hard to write this. I really did love this dog.

I was also responsible for giving him his meds. He had some chest irritation that two of the meds were for, and also a fish oil pill that I suppose was supposed to help with his joints because he was an older dog.

Well. He HATED that fish oil pill.

Honesly, I can’t blame him. As an adult I’ve taken fish oil, and the burps, if they come, are gross. So I can only imagine what the taste of biting into one might be.

So we had this routine. Every morning, I would give him his pills wrapped in deli meat (until someone told me you shouldn’t give dogs deli meat) and he would take the first two, and then spit out the fish oil.

And the first time that happened, and even the second and the third and the fourth, I very carefully picked it up and then offered it to him again, and he took it.

The fifth day, he was not having that fish oil. And now that I think about it, I wonder why I cared so much that he took it. What the fuck difference did it make? He was a nine-year-old dog with food and water and a person who loved him and he was happy. Why fuck that up over fish oil?

Anyway, he spat it out and wouldn’t take it when I offered it to him again. So I thought to myself, “I’ll try again later.”

Later came. After our 5 p.m. walk he hadn’t been fed dinner yet and hadn’t had a treat in a while so I thought he might take the meds. Well. He spat it out. This time I’d wrapped it in cheese. Because somehow processed cheese is a better treat for dogs than deli meat? I don’t make the rules.

This time when he spat it out, he turned away from me. I’ve had weeks and weeks to think about this, so I realize his body was placed differently from me than it was every other time now. But I didn’t think about it at the time.

He was perpendicular to me when I went for the pill wrapped in cheese. All the other times, he’d been facing me. So, when I reached down for the pill as I had every time before, all he saw coming toward him was my hand and my arm. And he lost it.

He bit into my arm HARD. No snarl. No growl. Just a big-ass bite.

And I remember thinking, “Oh no. I can’t keep this dog.” (God I so wanted to keep this dog.) And then also, “Jesus, skin rips so easily.”

Then he walked to the other side of the room, looking scared and confused and sad. He’d had a trauma response to my movements. He’d seen red. It was a shitty moment for both of us.

So I held my skin together at my kitchen sink and cleaned out the wound as best I could and called a friend who said he would be right there. And he was.

It took my friend maybe fifteen minutes to get to me. By that point, I’d moved to the bathroom so I could keep cleaning out the wound by the bathtub because I was worried that if I kept standing I might pass out.

When my friend arrived, he knocked on the door. And I realized I hadn’t planned that far ahead. Gnome was still out and I wasn’t sure how to keep him from getting to the door and potentially biting my friend. Well. Turns out I’d left the door unlocked after our walk. Which was really uncharacteristic of me, but, turns out, a lucky little misstep.

Because the door was unlock, my friend was able to pushed it open — which he did when I didn’t come to the door right away. He told me later he was also worried that maybe I’d passed out.

Gnome greeted him, good as gold, tail wagging and licking his hand.

We put Gnome up in my bedroom with food and water while I got stitched up and got my pain meds. Then my friend waited with me while the shelter came to pick up up to take him back.

The three weeks after Gnome left and I had to deal with the dog bite wounds (which, got infected btw, because that’s apparently very common with dog bites and I was lucky enough to have a common case) were the darkest weeks I’ve had during this pandemic.

It sounds stupid now, but I felt so alone and unloveable and like even a dog couldn’t like me.
So then I made a decision. With the help of another friend, who came to stay with me from Houston, because I was so low.

I decided to buy a dog. A puppy. Something that would never know any mistreatment. A dog I could train to be the goodest boi.

I found a boutique breeder in Texas who bred Malshis, half maltese, half shitzu, because those were two types of dogs we had growing up and I’d loved them and they’d loved me.

They didn’t have any Malshis available but had a litter of mini sheepadoodles coming that December. I called about those.

Well. They were done with taking deposits on those. Small litters. All filled up. But she told me she had a litter of regular sheepadoodles ready that weekend.

And I had all kinds of plans with family coming up. None of those included a new puppy.

But my friend in town said, “Get the puppy. You want the puppy? Get it. Call your family. They’ll tell you the same thing.”

And I did and they did. So I got Thibodeaux, or Tibby for short. And he is the goodest boi.
He’s not even four months old and he knows sit, stay, lie down, leave it, come, and place.

He’s a lot of work. He chews a lot of things. He wants to meet everyone and doesn’t understand that there’s a pandemic and everyone may not want to meet him.

He gets me up before 7 a.m. most days and I walk him probably 7x a day.

And I love it. I love him. My pandemic pup.

What’s funny is, people don’t tell you this, but puppies bite EVERYTHING. They explore the world with their mouths. So. I got a designer dog pup to avoid ever being bitten again, and the rub is, I’m bitten a little bit every day.

We are working on the biting and nipping and he will grow out of it but Jesus, doesn’t he know I’m traumatized?

No. He doesn’t know. He’s a puppy. A baby. And it’s my job to teach him how to be.

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