My Real Life Nightmare

Well, I'm currently typing this post exactly 24 hours after my life really took an interesting turn.

Interesting in the way that breaks your heart and makes you so scared you can't even think straight.

If you're not an animal person, well, I guess this post will mean little to you. For that I say, this dog has literally licked an uncountable array of tears from my cheeks and has snuggled me at my very lowest times. She is my family. She is apart of who I am. She's even been greatly therapeutic to my grandmother who suffers from a serious case of dementia. 

My heart is heavy and I'm still entirely too shaken up to even fathom writing about anything else. I know it isn't my normal light hearted post but I just can't. I'm hurting and I'm hurting badly. 

I hope you all can stick with me through this as I try to put in words what happened.

I was spending my Cinco de Mayo Sunday at the pool when I came home to a very different dog. A dog I've never met before. A dog who was shaking and panting, as opposed to a dog who was chanting in excitement at my entrance into the one bedroom apartment we reside in together. A dog who was backing herself into a corner and wouldn't touch her favorite treats.

I knew something was wrong. Horribly, horribly wrong.

This was a fear that flooded my every thought and emotion and it was like nothing I've ever experienced. 

My baby, my first born, the one thing that kept me from feeling homesick when I was 4 hours away in my first years of college... she was sick. Very sick. And it wasn't the type of sick I could cure with snuggles like in the past. 

Before I knew it, I was driving straight towards my worst nightmare.

Panting, shaking, Ella in my lap, en route to the emergency vet. A place I'd never wish upon my worst enemies. A place you only have to visit if one of the greatest friends in your life is truly ill. 

I could hardly see through the flood of saltwater streaming through my contacts but I knew I had to try my best to stay strong for the 7 pound ball of terrified, white, fluff I had laying nearly limp in my arms. 

Somewhere along the lines the nurse asked me to take Ella outside and try to get a urine sample from her, when I got said nearly impossible sample it was red. Blood red. 

My soul died. 

My heart started beating faster than I could keep track of and I was positive I was about to fall head first into that cold, hard surface they asked me to place my terrified and sick baby on.

Before I knew it, strangers in navy blue scrubs were scooping up my sweet, innocent, sick baby girl in their hands and taking her back into the depths of their office for further tests and X-rays. 

Really, I had no idea what to expect. 

My gut told me that my baby girl wasn't doing well and it was going to be a very, very long night.

After what felt like an eternity, I was taken into a back room and being introduced to an X-ray of my helpless seven pound Maltese who appeared to have a bladder overtaken by stones.

Cold, hard, unforgiving stones. Stones on a mission to block my baby's kidneys to the point of no return.

I never knew. I never suspected. I never thought my baby girl was anything other than healthy. Her behavior never, ever said anything out of the ordinary. 

I was so, so wrong. These stones had been building for months and months... and MONTHS. 

The next 10 minutes were, sort of, a blur for me.

All I know is that I was told the stones needed to come out FAST and I could either opt for that moment or get them taken out the next morning. 

I opted for that moment. Because I wanted those disgusting stones to stop hurting my girl as soon as fucking possible. If I could have removed them with my own two hands I would have. 

Surgery happened that night. Sunday night.

Somewhere around 3am in the morning my baby got cut open and within that hour around 30 stones were removed from her tiny, little bladder. 

When they told me this, approximately 3 hours after the stones were removed, I threw up 3 inches from the nurse's shoes and was fed sugar water because the pale white color of my face convinced them I was about to faint. 

I was pretty sure I was about to faint, if I'm being honest here.
I'm a pretty balanced person like that, I guess.

Once I came back to life, the cold sweats subsided, and the room stopped spinning, it sunk in that my girl was ok. The stones were all gone, she was in recovery, and two weeks from now she will be like new.

At this moment, I'm just thankful.

I'm thankful that my girl is so strong and was able to make it through such a procedure. 

I am BEYOND lucky that this baby girl is still awake, alive, and in my life today.

I am BEYOND lucky that I can look over to my right and hear the soft sighs, and little grunts, of my little fighter as her tiny body heals while she sleeps.

She's healing and she's healing peacefully, on my watch. 

Thank God for that.

For now, well, I just hope no one else asks me how I'm doing while roaming the ice cream isle of Publix for some frozen sugar to cushion the pain I'm feeling. 

I suppose I should also express my apologies to that innocent stranger who was just trying to be kind.

He got an ear full, to say the least. My bad. Don't ask a girl wearing yoga pants and a baggy t-shirt, who has bags the size of Texas under her eyes, how she's doing. Moral of that story.

Like I said, I'm a very balanced person. Obviously.

Anyways, go snuggle your babies extra tight today. You just never know what could happen.


Huge thanks to all of the well wishes and those of you who have been checking on Ella and I. Really, I can't express how thankful I am to have such an amazing support system to help my Ella girl and I get through this nightmare.


And to Ricci, you have no idea how much this touched me. Thank you so much!