Life Experiences

It was five years ago that a certain ‘counselor’ invaded our lives and did his best to destroy every shred of our family, including some of our extended family.  He meant it for evil, but God used it for our benefit and to teach us some strong lessons about ourselves and our family.  I am still learning lessons from that time.

The summer of 2008 (after Mike and I broke off all communication with this ‘counselor’) found me in the deepest despair I had ever encountered.  I planned my suicide.  As I lay on my bed, shut away inside my mind, Jesus came to me.  He said that I could attempt to go through with my plan, but He would not allow me to die.  I would, however, become a burden to my family in a comatose state.  I wish I could say that moment turned my whole life around and caused the despair to leave, but it did not.  I sold my car to help pay off some of the massive debt we incurred as a result of our failed ‘counseling’.  I stayed home, not daring to venture out of the house, except on the rare occasion I needed to go to the grocery store.  Even then, sometimes I would not make it past the intersection close to our home because of a panic attack.  I would turn around and come home, giving Mike the list of things we needed.  My life was lived within the confines of my home and back yard.  I communicated with very few people and was supported by even fewer.  I did manage to visit my parents in California, but not as often as I did before.  I had to learn all over how to trust people.  There are still only a few people I trust completely.

During this time of confinement, I continued to go to school.  However, I changed my major from Counseling to Religion, since counseling was not my dream, but the ‘counselor’s’.  I learned so much about my faith and God and myself.  I also learned, and am still learning, to write; which is something I wish to do full time in the future.

Some say that believing on Jesus is a crutch.  A person with a broken leg or paralyzed legs needs a crutch or a wheelchair, yet we do not criticize them for that.  Cancer patients rely on their doctors for help, yet we do not criticize them for that.  My heart was completely shattered.  I needed Jesus!  So yes, Jesus is my crutch; even still today.

My mom had a huge part in reconciling certain family members, who had not spoken to me in two and a half years, with the rest of us.  I went to California for my birthday in 2010 and, knowing where this family member worked, my mom told me that we were going to go see him.  She gave me no option.  I stood back as she approached him, unwilling to be hurt again, and she waved her arms at me to come hug him.  It was a tentative beginning, but we see each other fairly often now.  I am so grateful to my mom for her insistence.

I did several things to force myself out of my home.  I tried, unsuccessfully, to get a job.  I sold Avon.  I went to church and women’s Bible studies.  Each resulted in more isolation because of my lack of trust in people.  

In 2011, after the death of my precious Cocker Spaniel, Buster, I felt lost.  I saw that the Las Vegas Hot Diggity Dachshund Club and Rescue was in need of foster parents, so I applied.  I got my first foster dog, Butch, at the end of August.  Then our sweet Cocker Spaniel, Dudley, died.  Fostering filled the void left by my sweet boys.  Then I was asked to volunteer as the Adoption Coordinator.  This position has done wonders in getting me out of my home, meeting new people, making friends, ands bringing me out of myself.  Best of all, I get to work with dogs, which has long been my passion!

In April 2012, my mom passed away.  Her death brought with it some setbacks in my emotional health.  It brought so much turmoil with me, my Dad, my brother and my sister.  We all were hurting and tended to take it out on each other.  I am working on this, with God’s help, and learning how to protect myself while fully loving my family.  It is not easy!

Am I ‘all better’ now?  Far from it!  We continue to suffer repercussions from five years ago in respect to our addictions, emotions, relationships with each other and God, and our finances.  It is an uphill battle that we have to fight every single day.  We have to remember to not get lazy and think we are good now, because the minute we do that is when we slip and fall, sometimes crashing and burning.  I am grateful to my ‘crutch’, Jesus.  Without Him, I will never make it.

Dog Training

It’s been a long time coming, but I have embarked on a new phase of training.  It started because we are watching a friend’s dog and Zoe has become a shrew.  Zoe is 12 years old and hard of hearing, so it is more difficult. 

There are many methods of dog training and I am not a fan of the ones that are harsh.  A harsh method was used on Riley and I believe that made his issues even worse.  Once the person who was helping me ‘train’ him stopped, Riley got better.

There is a show on television called “It’s Me or the Dog” and the trainer is Victoria Stillwell.  She believes in kind, compassionate training and I love her!  I put the show on my Tivo lineup and tonight she was discussing a method to get a dog’s attention and keep it when there is something that is distressing the dog.  You are supposed to have a small treat and place it up by your eyes and say “look at me” or “watch me.”  So I brought my container of tiny treats to bed tonight and every single time Zoe growled, barked, or snarled, I held a treat up to my eyes and said “look at me.”  Only when Zoe stopped growling, barking, and/or snarling, and looked at me did she get the treat.  Of course, I had to give a treat to the other dogs each time, as well.  It was pretty amazing to see the difference in her behavior in such a short time!  Last night it took an hour of petting her and yelling “NO!” to get her to settle down.  The anger she exhibited was frightening!  Tonight I never raised my voice, but used the scent of the treat to get her attention.  It took about thirty minutes.  Now everyone is peacefully asleep. 

I am not foolish enough to believe that one session on training is a cure-all, but I am looking forward to using Victoria Stillwell’s methods in other areas, as well. 

Volunteering

I volunteer for the Las Vegas Hot Diggity Dachshund Club & Rescue (LVHDDCR).   I have been fostering since August 2011 and I have been the Adoption Coordinator since October 2011.  I had to stop fostering in early 2012 because I adopted three of my foster dogs!  I cannot trust myself not to fall in love with these precious dogs and want to adopt them. 

I love doing the adoptions.  I get to vet prospective adopters and find dogs a great home.  I get pretty hyped up when the process works.  It is better than Christmas for me.  I get to take the dogs to adoption events and hold them and play with them.  I get to take them to meet their new family.  I get to see the joy a dog brings to a family. 

Volunteering with LVHDDCR has also been therapy for me.  When I began this ‘job’, I had been a recluse in my home for over three years.  I went very few places, saw even fewer people.  My social world consisted of my husband, daughter, and my dogs.  I saw my parents and my best friend about three times a year when I went to California.  I was more than happy to be home and not go anywhere.  There were times when I did not leave the house for a week or more.  My longest period of time in the house was nine days.  I would have to force myself to go out.  I usually gave my husband the list of things I needed at the grocery store and he would pick them up.  Occasionally, I would have a panic attack when I left the house.  On a few occasions, I would have to return home right away, not even making it up to the corner of our neighborhood.  It was after these occasions that I realized I needed to change something, but I did not know what I should do.

In January 2011 I had a biopsy on some lesions in my breast.  It terrified me.  It turned out to be normal, but that event began a series of events that have led me to where I am today.  The day I got the results of my biopsy, my husband ended up in the emergency room.  The doctor had him admitted and Mike stayed there for seventeen long days.  After numerous tests, diagnoses and changed diagnoses, Mike had open heart surgery to replace the atrial valve with a titanium one.  A portion of his heart was removed because it was dead.  He was also given the diagnosis of atrial fibrillation.  He will be on blood thinners and heart medications the rest of his life. 

When Mike got home from the hospital, he was under strict orders to rest and be off work for six to eight weeks.  He fought me and the doctors tooth and nail over this and ended up going back to work at the beginning of week five.  Through the rest of the year, Mike was admitted to the hospital three times and taken to ER by paramedic several times.

At the beginning of March 2011, I noticed that my dog, Buster, was not feeling well.  His face was so thin it was bony.  With all the stress of helping Mike recuperate, I had not noticed my baby was ill.  I took him to the vet and told her I wanted her to do surgery because I would not let Buster go without a fight.  The next day he had surgery.  The vet called me and said it was cancer.  He had lesions all throughout his belly.  It was really bad.  She said she could sew him up and send him home, but he would be very sick and in a lot of pain; or I could let her put him to sleep.  I was devastated!  Buster was my soul mate, my best friend.  I loved him so much.  I told her to put him to sleep and I sobbed.

The spring and summer dragged on and Buster and Zoe’s daddy, Dudley, was getting worse.  I had always thought he would go first because he had been failing the last year or so.  In August we realized that his end was near.  Our vet said he had cancer, like Buster.  He would shake and looked miserable, but he always had that twinkle in his eye when we hugged him.  The only thing that stopped the shaking was putting his fleece jacket on him, even though it was over a hundred degrees outside!  Having already lost our sweet Buster, we put off the inevitable with Dudley and we watched him suffer.  It was horrible.  On August 24th, Mike took him to the vet, thinking he would have to have him put to sleep.  The vet gave him medication and sent him home because she could see how devastated Mike was.  We had four more days with our sweet Dudley.  Finally, I could take it no more and we had him put to sleep.

After Buster’s death, I was so devastated.  I saw on facebook that LVHDDCR needed foster parents so I filled out an application.  It took a couple of months, but they finally got back to me.  We got our first foster dog, Butch, on August 24^th. 

It was shortly after Dudley’s death that we found out that my mom had lung cancer.  She was thin and frail and her cancer was so bad that regular chemotherapy would have killed her, but her Oncologist insisted that she try a different therapy, one that was “like chemo, but not chemo.”  She began that the week before Christmas.  It nearly killed her!  She went off of it Christmas Eve, but still could not eat or hold anything down the next day.  It was so hard for her to even enjoy the holiday she loved so much. 

Mom was in and out of the hospital after that, her health declining by the day.  Some days were good, most were not.  Her doctor, once again, insisted she try a lower dose of the poison that nearly killed her in December.  Once again, it nearly killed her.  Hospice was called when she refused to take any more of the poison.  Exactly one month later (April 28, 2012), my dad, sister, daughter, and I gathered around my mom’s bed and watched her die.  I miss her so much!

My mom’s death has been hard on the entire family.  She was the glue that held us all together.  My sister and I no longer speak.  I have not spoken to my brother for even longer.  I talk to my dad as often as possible, four to five times a week.

What keeps me going?  My dogs; I have five now: Zoe, Ziggy, Butch, Mozzie, and Riley.  My work with LVHDDCR.  My schooling; I am studying online and have six more classes to go until I graduate.  I write, usually as a prayer to God.  My daughter, Bekah comes over and hangs out with me once a week, or more.  I see my dad and my son, David, and my best friend, Cindy, when I go to California.  I struggle with depression a lot and Cindy listens.  It has been hard.  But God reminds me that He is in control and will not leave me.  I can only take one day at a time.

Dudley

Dudley

December 5, 1998 – August 28, 2011

After we lost our sweet Puff in April 2000, I was lost without a dog.  Because we were moving, I had to wait to get another dog.  Mike started looking online for a Cocker Spaniel after the kids and I moved to Las Vegas with him.  He found a picture of a beautiful 2 year old male named Warm Springs Daring Dudley that the breeder was selling.  They had used him for stud services and for whatever reason, they decided to sell him.  We also saw that the breeder had a litter of Dudley’s puppies, but that’s another story.  I immediately fell in love with the picture of this gorgeous dog.

We went to Moapa to take a look at Dudley and his puppies.  I loved everything about Dudley!  He seemed to like us, too.  I wanted to take him home right them, but we were still living in the rented townhouse and couldn’t have dogs, so we asked the breeders if they could hold Dudley and the two puppies we bought until after Christmas, when we would be settled in our new home.  They agreed.

Rebekah and I went to pick up Dudley, Zoe, and Buster the day after Christmas.  It was wonderful having three dogs.  They were so beautiful and full of fun!  Dudley had more energy than I had ever seen in a Cocker Spaniel!  He would run in the yard as fast as he could, around the yard and up and down the hill.  I was amazed at his speed. 

I was sick when we got the dogs and then I got worse.  One night I was lying in bed, delirious with fever, when Dudley jumped up on the bed.  I thought he was an angel sent from God to usher me into heaven because I was dying.  Turns out I wasn’t dying, but Dudley turned out to be every bit of an angel.  He was a gift sent straight from heaven to this family.  Everyone loved him and he loved almost everyone.  He was the friendliest dog I have ever been around.  Most dogs pick a human in the family and claim them as their own, but not Dudley.  He was happy to spend time with each one of us.

There were only two people Dudley seemed to not care for: my dad and my sister’s friend Jane.  To this day, we have no idea why.  When they came to our house, Dudley would hide.  We would find him peeking around corners looking at my Dad or Jane.  He would go the long way around them if he needed to go outside.  My Dad would laugh at Dudley, but I think Jane’s feelings were hurt.  Dudley never did warm up to them.

When Dudley came to live with us, he was painfully skinny.  He would eat, but not gain weight.  After a few months, I found out why; he had tape worms.  All three dogs had to be treated.  Soon Dudley started gaining weight.  He was ravenous.  Then he got fat, so we had to stop free-feeding him and put him on a diet.  He was not impressed!  He never did lose much weight.  That was my fault, though, because I enjoyed giving him treats.  He loved his food and treats.

Our family tends to give our pets nicknames.  Dudley had several: Lou (my mom liked that one because her name was Mary Lou), Louie, Lish, Lish the Dish, Lou the Lip, and Limmie.  I insisted that no one ever call him Dud because he was NOT a dud!  As he got older, I mostly called him Lou or Louie.  It just seemed to fit him.

Dudley had a habit that we never could figure out.  He loved to lick walls!  I would joke and say he had a plaster deficiency or that he was getting plastered.  It might not have been so bad except after a while, the walls would turn brown.  I ended up putting up poster board on his favorite spots after painting over the brown color, but he would just find another spot.  Before he died, he decided on a spot under a cabinet in the living room and he would go under there and lick away.  I can’t bring myself to paint over that area.  Louie loved that spot.

Dudley also loved flashlights and laser lights.  He would go crazy when we shined them for him.  We called it ‘playing light’.  He could play light for hours if we would let him, but we realized that he got pretty obsessed by the light.  He would pace and pant if we stopped.  It seemed unhealthy for him.  I finally had to forbid laser lights in the house because he got the most obsessed by them.  Flashlights were only to be used for short periods of time.  He still loved to play light up until his death.

I mentioned Dudley’s love of food earlier.  He was pretty funny about eating.  I feed my dogs in the morning after I get up and again around one in the afternoon.  At bedtime, they get a rawhide.  Dudley made sure that I never forgot to feed him.  Mornings were never an issue because I would feed them as soon as they came in from going potty.  However, every day Dudley would start stalking me around 11:30 a.m. until I finally fed him.  Sometimes I would have to feed the dogs as early as noon because Dudley wouldn’t leave me alone!  I would try to ignore him, but he would be right on my heels and I couldn’t get anything done.

Dudley loved to cuddle.  He would snuggle right up with whoever was watching television.  In the evening, he loved to snuggle with Mike.  He would sit up beside Mike and lay his head on Mike’s chest.  Toward the end of Dudley’s life, he spent a lot of time in the crate in my bedroom.  We called it his ‘room’.  If he came up missing, we would always find him in his room.  I guess he liked the solitude and quiet.

Dudley started looking as though he wasn’t feeling too good in 2010.  He had his checkups at the vet with Dr. Jamie and she said he was doing well, for an old guy.  Dudley and Zoe took it really hard when Buster died in March 2011.  I watched Dudley’s health diminish over the months.  In July, we realized that he had cancer, like Buster did, and the vet was not hopeful for a good outcome.  We watched his health decline, but we were in denial, because we did not want to lose him; especially after having lost Buster earlier that year.  One day Dudley would be sick, the next he would rally and look really good.  We let Bekah know that he might die soon and we tried to prepare ourselves.  One day, we decided that Dudley was suffering and we were suffering watching him, so Mike took him to the vet, expecting that he would have to be put down.  It was horrible.  Mike was sobbing; I was trying to be brave so Dudley wouldn’t be scared.  The vet gave Mike some medication for Dudley and sent him home.  We were so relieved!  The relief didn’t last long.  Each day saw my little Louie feeling worse and suffering more.  I couldn’t stand it.  Neither Mike nor I wanted to make the decision we knew was coming.

On August 28^th, Dudley was having a bad day.  I spent time cuddling with him and telling him how much I love him.  I got in the shower and was crying and praying.  It felt as though God was telling me that we were being selfish, letting Dudley suffer because we didn’t want to make a decision.  I got out of the shower and told Mike that we needed to let Louie go.  It was time.  We called the vet and put Dudley in the car.  I held him and talked to him the whole time.  After he was gone, I cried into his soft fur for a long time.  We took his body to the crematorium and the gentleman there was so kind.  He lovingly took our boy out of the car and placed him on the gurney.  We made the arrangements and brought our boys ashes home in a dog house shaped urn to place beside Buster’s on the mantle several days later.

There is not a lot that is worse than losing a beloved pet.  Especially one as sweet, gentle, and kind as Dudley was.  We were devastated.  I came home that day and lay on the bed next to Zoe and cried so hard.  I told her, “You’re the only one left baby girl.”  I have decided that we won’t be adopting any more Cocker Spaniels.  They have too many health problems.  Zoe has the same large tumors as Buster and Dudley did and she spends a lot of time alone in my room, just like Dudley did at the end.  She will be twelve years old in a few days and I worry about her.   I try to give her as much love as I can, when she lets me.  Unlike the boys, she’s not a cuddler.