A few weeks ago, I sat in my hallway and sobbed. Hot tears rolled down my face as warm blood quickly trickled down my arm. Baxter, my four-year-old rescue dog, guiltily sniffed my cheek before scurrying over to his kennel.
My adrenaline was fighting my instinct to pass out at the site of blood while my heart ripped open. I was hurt both physically and emotionally and was paralyzed with indecision over which to tend to first. The blood dripped onto the floor and my inner clean-freak took the reins.
This was the first time in over a year that Baxter had bitten me, and the first time that he’d ever drawn blood.
I was devastated.
After I first adopted Baxter I knew pretty quickly that we were going to need professional intervention. He was a wild and stubborn dog that bit anything that stood between him and what he wanted to do. He was a liability, but I was unwilling to admit that my decision to get a dog had been impulsive and poorly planned. I had made this ill-advised commitment and I was going to follow through.
Within a few weeks of Baxter’s adoption my arms were a consistently bruised and, on many nights, I cried in the living room too scared to go into the bedroom that he had claimed as his own. Dog walkers quit, dog sitters bailed early, and often.
Baxter was an anchor around my neck. On business trips, I worried that he’d bite or scare a sitter causing them to abandon him until I could fly home. I limited outings with friends to three hours so that I could go home and make sure he wasn’t destroying the house. Not knowing better, I went to dog parks to release his energy and wondered if that would be the day he’d get into a dog fight that I couldn’t get him out of.
Soon, our world became very small. I couldn’t have anyone over, and I was too scared to leave. I became a slave to my dog, and yet, I loved him. I enjoyed our long walks and his protective hugs. My heart filled to bursting when he laid his soft little head on my chest in the mornings. No matter how badly behaved or scary he was, I knew that I needed to stick it out.
That fall, my grandmother passed away after a long battle with several illnesses. Unable to find someone to watch Baxter overnight, I arranged for a friend to walk him twice, and I made an eight-hour round trip to her funeral. Too insecure to make my needs known, I insisted to my boss that I didn’t need to take a full day of bereavement. I took business calls the entire way to Connecticut and wrote my speech in the pockets of silence in-between. The part of the day I didn’t spend driving, I spent setting up for and cleaning up after the funeral. Then, emotionally exhausted, I drove four hours home to Baxter.
By the time winter rolled around I found a place to send Baxter to get rehabilitated. For five weeks he trained with professionals. While he trained, I regained some freedom, and then diligently studied the literature that the trainers sent me. I learned to set boundaries and to advocate for myself and my dog. I learned that dogs, like me, thrived in structured environments. Once Baxter came home, we were both ready for a fresh start.
What followed, was a winter of transformation. Baxter’s training provided both of us with the freedom to do what we wanted. We worked together patiently and learned to trust each other. As spring finally rolled around, we were inseparable. Baxter had perfectly filled a void in my life that I had been struggling to fill for years. My heartbreaks healed, my anxiety tapered, and my self-worth was derived from the love in Baxter’s eyes. I ate to fuel my body for adventures with my dog, not to attain a certain body type. I solely exercised with Baxter, no longer obsessing over miles and minutes, but focusing on fulfillment and naps. I put on long forgotten hiking boots and went on solo off-grid adventures with my trusty companion.
I found peace.
As our adventure-filled summer came towards an end, I opened up to the idea of dating. But this type of dating was different. I used Baxter as an excuse.
“No, I’m sorry, you can’t come in. My dog wouldn’t like it.”
and
“I’m so sorry, but I have to leave, it’s been three hours and my dog needs to go for a walk.”
At first, I thought it was because I didn’t want to risk Baxter biting some random guy. Then, after my third, failed first date, I realized that Baxter had just brought up my standards. If introducing someone to my dog was too much trouble, clearly, they weren’t worth my time.
Baxter’s high standards were met soon after those failed dates; and after a few skeptical visits, and two strategic nips, he accepted the new man in my life. As it turned out, the first guy Baxter let into our home, was the last.
Almost two years after his training, and a year and a half after accepting another person into our lives, Baxter was at it again. As I cleaned up his toys, Baxter lunged across the living room and bit me harder than ever before. I cried; and without my saying anything, Baxter knew that he’d messed up.
So much had changed since the rigid structure of Baxter’s post-training days. We’d added a new person and a cat to our lives. We’d moved twice. Life became unpredictable again and our peace was momentarily disrupted. He was scared, and I wasn’t listening to him. I was trying to work through a pandemic, combine two lives into a small apartment, and then move those lives into a new house. I forgot that only a few months before it had been just the two of us.
My tears transitioned from sadness to guilt. My arm throbbed, and the Band-Aid couldn’t contain the blood. I was heartbroken that I’d let my dog down and that biting me was still an option. The next night, I sat warily on the couch and looked across the room at Baxter. Slowly, he walked over to me and gently put his head on my arm. Instantly, all was forgiven.
The love that we share with our pets informs the kind of love that we will accept into our lives. Baxter taught me that love with boundaries and communication was more sustainable than unpredictably volatile love. Love with clearly expressed needs and predictability is safer than conditional and reward driven love. Most of all, love that forgives and doesn’t carry yesterday’s grudges into today, is the one that we will still have tomorrow.