A Dog

"I really want a dog."

I've been hearing that constant refrain from my daughter for the past several months. I wanted a dog, too. My husband was willing to tolerate a dog. But how to get a dog? Buy from a breeder? Go to the humane society? What kind of dog? Puppy or not?

Finally, last Friday, my daughter had the day off from school, and she and I went to the local humane society. I had gone on-line a few days before, and had identified a dog that I thought might work for us. She was a 4 year old black Lab mix, and was described as friendly and good with children, and only medium sized. I didn't tell my daughter about my research, I just let her look at the dogs and see what caught her eye, or her heart.

She looked at the puppies and the little dogs, then we went into the big dog area. There were some really loud barking dogs at the entrance, and that kind of intimidated my daughter. But we continued down the line of kennels, and eventually came to Chica. That's the dog my daughter was caught by. Chica was also the dog I had identified as a likely candidate. We went back in, and asked to meet Chica.

When Chica was brought into the dog run to meet us, she didn't immediately connect to us. She seem very stressed, and wanted out. She wouldn't look at us, and the whites of her eyes were very apparent. But after a few minutes, and a couple of doggie treats, she settled down, and began to connect. When she licked my daughter's face, I knew we were going to be okay. We went back in and did all the paperwork, gave them a credit card, and took Chica home.

Chica settled in pretty quickly in her new home, especially after I bought a crate later that evening. Everything seemed pretty easy; she didn't chew on anything, she followed me around, she'd come sit at my feet when I sat down. She was fairly calm for a Lab, the only challenge being that she would pull on the leash until she practically choked herself. She was smart, and learned commands quickly.

But then, on Saturday, she started to cough. Her appetite was a little off. By Sunday, she was coughing worse, and her appetite was way off. I called the humane society, and they said it was probably kennel cough, and as long as I could get her to eat, I could probably wait until Tuesday to take her to the vet, since Monday was Memorial Day. They gave me suggestions of things to try to tempt her to eat, and I was able to get her to eat a little bit.

But then on Monday morning, my mom instinct said, this is a sick dog. I called the animal hospital I had been planning to use, but they were closed. They gave a number for an emergency clinic, and I called them. They told me it sounded like kennel cough, and I should bring her in. I did, they examined her, found a mass in her abdomen that they weren't sure if it was a bladder or not, but gave me antibiotics and a cough suppressant for her, and said if she wasn't better the next day, I should take her to the vet.

The next day was today, and she wasn't any better. She woke me up at 4 am with her coughing, and she seemed even sicker than the day before. As soon as the vet opened, I called, and was given an appointment for 1:30. I gave Chica another dose of the antibiotic (her third), and worried. Every time I left the house this morning, I was afraid I'd come back to find her dead, that's how sick she seemed. But she didn't die, she was just miserable as she laid in her crate. All I could do was rub her head and coax her to drink a little water.

When I took her in this afternoon, her fever was higher than the day before, and it was clear we weren't dealing with a simple case of kennel cough. The vet today felt the same mass, and was sure it wasn't her bladder after I told her that Chica had relieved herself just a half hour earlier. She did an ultrasound, and found an abscess. She said it was probably related to the spay surgery Chica had just had 9 days earlier, when she came into the shelter. The abscess really needed to be opened up, but the problem was, Chica was too sick for surgery. We decided to leave her there overnight for IV fluids and antibiotics, and hope that would improve her enough for surgery. The vet also wanted to take some X-rays, because she was concerned that Chica may have developed pneumonia.

So I left Chica, and went home to meet my daughter's school bus. I explained where Chica was, and that she was very sick. My daughter asked me if she would get better, and I told her the truth: I didn't know.

A little later, the vet called. The X-rays had confirmed that Chica had pneumonia. That complicates things a great deal. Putting a dog with pneumonia under general anesthesia is risky; the vet said that you'd really want a ventilator around if you're going to do that, and that her animal hospital doesn't have a vent. She could refer us to a specialist who would have one, but it would be expensive and still far from risk-free. If the abscess ruptures, then that's really bad, so not doing surgery is probably not going to work, either.

So, our options are not great. Transport her to a specialist, have the operation, transport her back to our vet for post-op care, spend probably at least $4000, and still maybe she dies. Have our vet do the operation without a vent on hand, much riskier, and still probably $2000. Or put her to sleep. The contract with the humane society says that if an adopted dog incurs a major health problem within 30 days, they will take the dog back and refund the adoption fee ($90). It's not explicitly stated, but I would assume that they would then put her to sleep.

Rationally, I can't justify spending that kind of money on a mutt I've known less than a week. I could buy a purebred puppy with an impeccable pedigree for that kind of money. But that doesn't stop my heart from breaking.

Earliest Memories

“What are your earliest memories?” the therapist asked.

I thought a moment, trying to separate out the real memories from the snapshot memories. As the oldest child, and with my father away in the army, my early childhood had been copiously documented.

“I have a vague memory of burning my arm on an electric heater, probably when I was three,” I replied.

“What do you remember about it? Do you remember the pain?” she queried.

“No, I don’t remember the pain. I can visualize the room, and I can see the heater, and I can remember the mark it left on my arm. Another early memory also involves getting hurt; I remember getting a splinter. When I was about three and a half, we lived in another state for a few months, and we had neighbors, unlike in our old home, where we lived out in the country. The neighbors next door had kids who were older than me, and I was in the yard playing. They had a tree in the back yard, and had put a 2x8 plank up into the tree, so you could walk up the plank to climb into the tree. I remember doing that, and getting a splinter in my left hand. I don’t remember the pain from that, either,” I recalled.

“Do you remember the other kids? How many were there? Were there any adults around?” she questioned.

“I know there were other kids and that they were older, but I don’t remember them at all. I don’t remember any adults there. I don’t know if my mom was out in the back yard or not. I don’t remember crying or going to her.”

“Any other early memories?”

“Another memory from that same few months in Texas is that I used to watch The Lone Ranger on television. I would come in from playing and turn on the TV. I can see our old television. I don’t really remember much about the room it was in, nor do I have a clear picture of the house we lived in then. I remember my bedroom, but that’s about it.”

“Did anybody watch TV with you?”

“No, my brother was only a year old; he was too young.”

“Do you notice anything those memories have in common?” the therapist prompted.

I contemplated the memories. Two had involved mild injury, which probably imprinted them on my brain, but not the third. Other than they had all occurred before I was four, I couldn’t see a common thread in all three of them. “Not really,” I answered. “Injury is the only thing that comes to mind, and the Lone Ranger memory doesn’t involve that.”

“What strikes me is that you’re alone in these memories. You don’t remember anybody else with any clarity. You know that there were other kids around in one of them, but you don’t remember the kids themselves. It suggests to me that you were probably pretty self-sufficient from a young age. Not necessarily lonely, but not needing other people a great deal.”

“Interesting. I see the same thing in my daughter, always have. She was the two year old telling me ‘Go away, Mommy, I’m busy!’ The child who is always happy to have a playdate, but seldom asks for them. She enjoys playing with other kids, but is pretty content to be alone. Lucky, since she’s an only child.”

“How did you feel when your two year old said ‘Go away, mommy!’”

“There was a moment of pain – she doesn’t need me! But that passed, and I was glad to have such an independent child. What’s harder is that when she’s so self-sufficient and self-contained, it’s hard to know what’s going on with her. There’s a wall there, and it’s been difficult for me not to want to batter it down sometimes. It doesn’t do any good; the more I push her to tell me what’s going on, the more she retreats.”

“Just like you did with your mother?”

“Yeah. My mother couldn’t let go, though. It was remembering the pain of my mother trying to batter down my wall that eventually made me stop doing it with my daughter. I could see myself locked in, I could tell I was doing to her what was done to me. I remember one time, I don’t even remember what I was trying to find out from her, but she was crying, I was frustrated, and I had tried every trick I had learned from my mother, to no avail, of course. I hated it; I hated that I had done those things, that I had tried to shame her into telling me, that I had gotten locked in and wouldn’t let go, that my sweet child was crying and I had caused it for no good reason, and I stopped. I just won’t go there anymore. I will not become my mother!”

“But can you feel some empathy, or at least sympathy, for your mother? Can you see how frustrating it was for her to have this self-contained child? How it might feel like rejection, make her feel inadequate?”

“Ouch. I don’t like feeling sympathy for my mother. I really don’t like feeling empathy for her. I don’t want to share anything with her.”

“Do you think she did the best she could with what she had?”

“Unfortunately, I do. It wasn’t what I wanted, not even what I needed, but it was all she had to offer.”

“So why do you keep blaming her for something she couldn’t do anything about?”

Ah, that is the question.

Kick Her When She's Down

I thought about not answering the phone when I saw the number come up on Caller ID. I didn’t want to talk to my mom. But I thought it could be my husband, calling to make sure I was okay. He was still out there at my parents’ house, with our daughter, and I know he was worried about me.

He had reason to be worried about me. I was clinically depressed, had been fighting this depression unsuccessfully for 5 months. I was supposed to be back in Tennessee with our daughter, while he came back home to work, but then my meds stopped working again, and I began to crash.

Sending me back early, even though it meant I would be at home alone, seemed safer. In the best of situations, with much to distract us and all my wits around me, spending a week with my mother is a challenge. Spending a week with her when I was spiraling back down into the pit of a horrendous depression, out in the middle of nowhere where they lived, was probably more than I could handle.

So he put me on the plane, and stayed there so our daughter could have some time with her grandparents. And I wouldn’t totally be alone; I had friends who would check on me, and I made an appointment with both the therapist and the psychiatrist. But I knew he was worried.

I answered the phone. It wasn’t my husband; in fact, he and my daughter were out of the house, off playing miniature golf. It was my mother. She wanted to talk about my depression.

She didn’t understand. Why was I depressed? What had happened? “You’re a strong person, you’re not like Granny.” Granny, her mother-in-law, had twice been committed for depression. “You’re too strong to be depressed. It doesn’t make any sense.” She started getting angry. She demanded an explanation, but I didn’t have any to give her. Soon, it became clear to me what was really behind this harsh interrogation: she was afraid that I blamed her for my depression. Her best defense had always been a strong offense, so in her fear, she attacked.

I was devastated. I wanted to curl up in a ball and cry, and I did as soon as I got off the phone. All the tears that had been dammed up inside me for the last few months came gushing out. I cried for all the times she had yelled at me, for all the times I had felt not enough, yet too much at the same time. I cried for letting her do it to me again.

This attack hurt more than the others. I was already wounded, and she kicked me when I was down. This wasn’t about some offense I had committed. I hadn’t gotten depressed to hurt her or embarrass her. I was suffering from an illness; that it was a mental illness didn’t make it my fault.

If this attack wasn’t really about me being a bad daughter, then maybe the others weren’t, either.

Treasures in Heaven

As I mentioned in an earlier post, after many years away from church, I went back to church, though not to a Southern Baptist church. About 7 years ago, I started looking for a church, and found one I was comfortable in, an Episcopal church. I found there a Christianity that resonated with me, one that was more about the journey than the destination. Doubts were expected, not discouraged. And I found people who cared about me, who were there to help me during a very rough time in my life.

Then we moved to another state, and had to leave that church behind. We looked around a bit, and started attending another Episcopal church not far from our house. I really like the rector at the church, but am beginning to accept that the church itself is not where I’m supposed to be. I’m back to feeling like I don’t fit in. While not uniformly so, this generally of a more conservative, evangelical bent than our old church, and frankly, despite the evangelical feel, less friendly. We’ve been attending that church almost two years now, yet most Sundays, I can stand around during the coffee time and no one will speak to me other than to nod a hello. It’s not that we haven’t gotten involved, either; my husband sings in the choir, and I’m teaching Sunday school.

I can be difficult to get to know, I’ll admit. I’m a reserved person and an introvert. But while the lack of friendliness is an annoyance, what’s really convincing me that I don’t fit in here is not that. It’s that when I sit in Sunday school teacher meetings, what I hear doesn’t resonate with me.

An example. This Sunday, the lesson for the kids is the Prodigal Son. Our Sunday school director sent out email today to the teachers, as she does every Sunday, to let us know what’s going on this Sunday, anything we should be aware of, especially things that impact the time available to us. But this week, she included a little theology in her email.

She shared that she had always found this parable difficult to understand. She always related to the faithful son, who is unhappy that the father makes such a big deal when the black sheep son returns. Then she read the line where the father says Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. She then realized that while the ungodly might get saved and get into heaven at the last minute, they will have nothing, while the faithful will inherit everything.

I read that today, and it just hit me so wrong. For me, Christianity is not a competitive sport. Is there really score-keeping in heaven? This feels like a jealous, exclusionary Christianity, a “we’re better than them” mentality.

The parable of the Prodigal Son says something different to me. The faithful son stayed home and did his duty, and had a good life. He had a home, a family, friends, and plenty to eat. The lost son ended up in a hell on earth, living among the pigs. He had no food, no place to live, no friends or family. He was alone, separate.

I guess I’m just not a “build up treasures in heaven” kind of Christian. I think that faithful living is its own reward. When I remember to turn toward God, when I remember to stop trying to solve everything on my own and let God have room to work, my life goes a lot better. I don’t know what happens after I die, and I don’t really care. I care about trying to live my life today true to myself and true to God. What other people choose to do is their business; I don’t want to waste time worrying about whether I’ve got more “treasures in heaven” than they do.

I’m probably being too harsh on the Sunday school director, who really is a good woman. This is just the culmination of a series of things, all of which touch a nerve that’s still a little raw even after many years away from the conservative church I grew up in.

Wedding Stress

She hated my answering machine. She suspected, and rightly so, that I used it as a barrier between us. With the wedding coming up, I was going to have to communicate with her more, and I wanted some degree of control over the interactions.

But she didn’t want to use it. Even today she doesn’t like to use my voicemail. There’s always a long pause before she finally says, “it’s your mother.” Back then, every time she’d call and get my machine, she’d just get a little more angry at me.

Her anger reached the boiling point early one morning about a month before the wedding. She called about 6 am that morning, and got my machine. That was too much. She hung up the phone without leaving a message, and called my fiancé’s apartment. He answered the phone, and admitted I was there. He handed me the phone, and she told me she didn’t have time to discuss it then, but that she would call me later that day and she’d better not get my machine.

I hung up the phone. I knew what was coming later that day. My stomach was in knots. I thought about my options. There was really no reason for me to tolerate the tongue-lashing that was coming. I was grown, living on my own, 500 miles away. I didn’t need financial support from my family. Maybe I should have let her get the answering machine that afternoon, make it clear that the balance of power had shifted.

But I didn’t. It was ugly, as I knew it would be. I took it, crying quietly. I never wanted her to know I was crying, and over the phone, I could hide it better. I didn’t talk much anyway during these tirades; it did no good. “Talking back” just fueled the fire of her rage.

This time, the threat to make me comply with her rules was to cancel the wedding. That was so tempting. Sure, I wanted to marry my boyfriend, but I didn’t care about the trappings of the wedding. It was going to be a simple wedding anyway. It was mostly going to be about family and our parents’ friends; there would only be a few of our friends there.

But canceling the wedding at this point, with the invitations already mailed, would be embarrassing. Eloping would have greatly disappointed my future mother-in-law. I suppose I could have moved the wedding to my fiancé’s home town, but then I would have had to explain to his family why we were moving the wedding at the last minute.

I didn’t want anybody to know that my mother treated me like that. I didn’t want to admit that at 25 and independent, I still turned into 15 around my mom. And as tempting a thought as it was, as much as I wanted to cut myself off from my parents right then, I wasn’t willing to walk away from my family.

So I complied. I didn’t spend the night at my boyfriend’s apartment. I was there to answer the phone. Another truce was achieved.

I did get married, exactly as planned. My father-in-law, an ordained but not practicing Methodist minister, performed the ceremony in my parents’ Baptist church. It was a simple, Southern wedding; no wedding dinner, just cake and punch, no dancing, just standing around and talking at the reception. I enjoyed my friends, and I was happy and relaxed. The blowup with my mom was not forgotten nor forgiven, but it wasn’t going to ruin the day; I’m a Southern woman, I can ignore things with the best of them.

I still look back and wondered whether I should have called her bluff, stood up to her back then. I don’t know what would have happened, and it seemed unfair to drag my sweet, gentle husband into that mess then. Besides, I thought then that it wouldn’t happen again, that my being married would change things. It did change things; my mother made it clear that I was now “his problem”, not hers. But the real problem is that my very different life is threatening to her, and that’s not going to change, and so it was inevitable that there would be more blowups.

Fortunately, I married a good guy, Southern enough to understand me, but not so Southern as to need or want to stay in the South. Three thousand miles is a good distance for me.