Imagine That

“We can make special accommodations to your home to help,” the vet told me as I held my dog’s limp paw in my hand. Her big caramel brown eyes stared up at me. Was it my imagination or were they wetter than usual? Or were those my tears I was looking through? “Obviously, she won’t be able to use her back legs anymore, so we will set something up for her to use. Do you live in a one story house?” 

I stared in disbelief. How could this have happened to my sweet puppy? Well, she is no longer a puppy, at eight years old, she is certainly no longer a puppy, but she acts like a puppy for sure. She loves to take long walks, hikes through the woods, she will swim in the lake with us for hours. She fetches sticks and plays tug of war with all the vigor of a two year old german shepherd. Car rides are a favorite treat for her. How will I get her into my car if she can no longer use her hind legs? 

“Home modifications are quite simple, actually,” the vet continued. “You can install a ramp at the front door and at any of your exits and entrances that the dog will be using. You can get lifts to bring her up and down the stairs in your house. There are systems that you can use to get her around your home. Your house isn’t carpeted, right? You will need to remove all throw rugs and area rugs.”

None of these seemed like simple fixes to me so far. It sounded like I needed to find a new house or hire a handyman (or several) to make these “modifications” around the house. Lifts? Ramps? Tearing out our carpets? Are our doorways wide enough for her to get through? My mind was wandering. I needed to focus.

The vet continued, “You need to make sure all coffee tables, end tables, floor lamps, any extra furniture at all is put away. These will all create obstacles for your dog to have to navigate around. Oh, and make sure that there aren’t any shoes or toys or any other objects dropped on the floor or those can jam up the mechanism on her cart also. You want her to have the freedom to be able to move around using the go-cart as much as possible. It’s important to keep her mobile.”

I love my dog, but maybe the car that hit her should have finished her off. This sounds like torure. She has to have a wagon dragging behind her for the rest of her life? She has to rely on her front legs for all her strength? And, more importantly, she has lost all her freedom to roam? She can’t run and play? She won’t be able to easily get in and out of the house? All the rugs that she would lay on are going away? 

I head home to start making the preparations. I feel numb. The house feels empty as my dog isn’t there to run and greet me with her tail wagging. There aren’t any wet kisses today. No happy barks hello. As I kick my sneakers off on the doormat the thought occurs to me, I won’t be able to do this anymore. Oh, and I won’t even be able to have a doormat either. My poor puppy. How will I tell my daughters? This all happened so fast.

I glance up and see the wall of photos. The pictures that feature all the adventures we’ve taken as a family. A family that includes our dog. The hikes when we have to keep her out of the water as she seems to be drawn to every puddle, ditch, pond that she can find. Kayaking when she has to sit up front and know what’s going on the whole time. Snowshoeing when she loves to chase snowballs and eat the snow. She has been a part of our family history. My daughters have known her for most of their lives; they are barely older than the dog. 

There are photos of our family trips also. Last summer we took three weeks to travel to as many National Parks as we could out west. We fit in quite a few. The pictures smile out at me from The Grand Tetons, Bryce Canyon, Arches National Park, Glacier National Park, Crater Lake, and Mount Rainier. We already had our next big trip in the works for next summer. We may have to put those plans on hold for a bit. The girls will be disappointed. 

As if on cue, my daughters come charging down the stairs at me. Sadly, we do not live in a one story ranch home. We have a two story house. What a realtor would call a colonial house with a center staircase and front door entrance. I always found the entrance cozy and comforting. The dog comes to greet the visitors upon entering. And, like right now, my daughters will clamor down the stairs to say hello and try to talk over one another to tell me all about her day. Or tell about one another and what she did or didn’t do.

But now that I am thinking about all the shoes and action, it’s actually kind of a crowded front door entrance since the stairs are right there when you walk in the front door. Already my thinking is shifting. 

“How’s Roxie? What did the vet say? Where is she? Is she in the car?” my middle child asks. She is twelve and is usually the designated spokesperson for the group. She stands on the bottom step with her hands on her hips. Ready to challenge me if I say the wrong words in the wrong order. She is the one who will ask the most questions. She has always been the inquisitor: How much blood? Where did it gush from? Can we see it? Did it more spurt or ooze? Did the vet take x-rays? How many x-rays? Can we see the x-rays? I am convinced she will someday become a doctor herself. She has an avid interest in everything medical. She asks all the questions and never winces, it seems like the more information she has, the better she can handle the situation. I don’t know if I have enough information for her to handle this situation.

The fifteen year old hangs back at the top of the stairs, as if afraid of the answers. Her eyes grow big and round. I can see the tears threatening to overflow but she won’t release them. In recent years she has learned to hold them in until she is behind her bedroom door. Tears are a private matter to be shared only with her childhood stuffed animals as an audience. 

My nine year old sits in the middle, elbows on her knees, chin in her hands, staring at me intently. Daring me to open my mouth. Or is she just scared. I want to reach out and hug all three and never, ever let go. She is my baby. She breastfed the longest. She stayed on my lap the longest for bedtime stories. She is the proverbial baby of the family. She appears to get away with things, because I’ve realized that most “things” are the little things that never really mattered anyway. You want cookies for breakfast? Okay. Have the cookies. Does it really matter if you have the cookies at 8 AM or at 8 PM? When you eat the cookies doesn’t matter. Afterall, people eat panCAKEs for breakfast all the time. 

The girls are waiting for me to answer them. 

Where is the parent handbook for this situation anyway? 

I tell the girls all the information I know. I try to reassure them the best I can. I enlist their help to prepare the house and we order a pizza made to order with their favorite toppings. No one wants to eat anyway. When the delivery person arrives with the pizza and rings the bell there is no barking. We throw the pizza out and all head to bed early. 

After weeks of anticipation and preparation, Roxie is able to come home from doggy rehabilitation. She has semi-adjusted to her new mobility restrictions. Our house is not as adapted as we thought it was, so things are broken and dented. We need to move and remove new obstacles all the time. It seems we are now living in a empty space; all furniture is pushed to the perimeters of rooms and nothing extraneous is in sight. 

We trade the car in for a van. We needed a way to be able to bring Roxie home. She wouldn’t have been able to get into the car. Not with her wheelchair. The girls think the van is fun and new. They like all the new gizmos and gadgets. The windows glide down with a push of a button. There are video screens on the backs of the seats. The side doors open with one click. It’s four more years of car payments. 

Roxie is on special medications due to her injury. We have to make sure she takes these medications on time, three times a day. We have to closely monitor her. It’s not an easy task as we are all gone during the day. We are also having a hard time keeping track of who is giving the medications when. We try keeping a notebook. It’s going well, except when it isn’t. She stops eating. She eats too much. She won’t go outside. She wants to go outside all the time. She has a seizure. We call the vet. The vet says to monitor her. We say we are monitoring her. He tells us to stop giving the medications. He tells us to give her different medications. He tells us to give her more water. We are doing everything we can. It is never enough. 

Every night I get her out of her dog wheelchair. I get her settled on a warm blanket near the bottom of the stairs. I am not strong enough to carry her up the stairs to our bedroom where I know she would love to sleep, but she seems content to sleep near the front door. She can hear us from there and still feel like she is protecting us like the big brave dog that she once was. In the morning, it is the reverse, I get her back up and into her wheelchair and bring her outside to take care of business. It’s not easy in the snow. But we learn to navigate and problem solve. We are survivors. 

One weekend afternoon I look down to see Roxie looking at me with her big caramel brown eyes. My oldest had just finished brushing her and laid down with her on the floor. The girls still use her as a pillow when we are watching movies. She is a beautiful part of our lives and I can’t imagine life without her. It kills me to see her this way. I know she would love to be outside chasing squirrels. I know the girls would love to be throwing sticks for her to fetch. We all miss the outdoor adventures we once took together. We live on the edge of panic. All the time. 

The UPS driver drops a package at the door and she lets out a soft bark to alert us to the person on our property. She is a shadow of her former self. One more seizure and the vet tells us to change the medications again.

The girls have quit their sports teams and after school pursuits.They know they need to be home after school to be with Roxie. They are aware of the fact that at any moment, I might not be able to pick them up from a practice and leave them stranded. It has happened too many times. So eventually they quit. 

They leave the volleyball, the lacrosse, the swim teams behind.

 They lose the sportsmanship and camaraderie behind. They lose friendships and bonding. 

Concerts become another stress as we never know when an emergency will arise on the planned night. The girls often feel underprepared and don’t even have the proper attire as we have been so distracted with Roxie that we have forgotten to go shopping for the black bottoms and white tops. Eventually the girls drop out of band, orchestra, and chorus also.

 Again, they lose this sense of belonging to something bigger. They lose the school experience of being a kid. We are worried about Roxie. We love our dog and want to make sure she is okay. But the constant vigil is taking its toll. The oldest graduates from high school and vows that when she moves away for college she is never, ever moving back into this house. The pressure to keep the dog alive is too much. She feels the responsibility as the oldest. She isn’t wrong. I have over-relied on her. She is my extra set of eyes, my extra driver, my right hand in a pinch. I can’t help but feel a tinge of jealousy that she is able to spread her wings and fly away.

My youngest has developed such severe anxiety that I can’t get her to leave her bedroom on most days. She barely attends school anymore. I don’t know if she will get out of middle school. She used to talk about school dances, proms, and basketball games with friends. She saw her sisters going and doing all of those normal high school activities and she was so eager to grow up and do these things.Now she is a ball of nerves. I don’t know how to help her. I am too focused on wondering what the next emergency will be with the dog. 

My middle child is just like me. We like to be the mediators and make sure there is peace and harmony in the house. It’s been so long since there has been peace and harmony in the house. She tries new recipes that she thinks we will all like. She tells us funny jokes and stories. She tries to draw her younger sister out of her bedroom now and again with a movie or a game of Risk. I pray that she is okay under that façade. As a middle child myself, I know we are good at wearing our masks. We want everyone around us to be happy. The only way we can be happy is if everyone around us is happy.

We can’t be happy unless Roxie is okay. Will Roxie be okay today? 

Our family is on high alert all the time watching for signs of seizure. We are watching Roxie for any sign of distress or pain. We watch her for any sign of discomfort and need. The vet tells us that the next seizure could lead to a heart attack and death. We watch and hold our breaths. All day, every day. For three years. And counting.

And now imagine, just imagine that this isn’t the family dog.

It’s the dad.