Ten Days After Sandy Childhood Dog's Death Led Me to Unexpected Love

When the universe gives and takes in the same breath

Six months ago, my childhood dog passed away. I loved her more than I knew I could love anything, then ten days after she passed, I met the love of my life.

Seventeen years ago, in my grandparents' backyard, I chose her out of her sisters the way all children choose things — without reasoning, without hesitation. Moving through the three puppies — one white with black patches, one completely white, and Sandy, the oldest, white with brown — what I truly wanted was for one of them to choose me. Beginning to clap, I raced through my grandparents' backyard. Only Sandy followed.

Undeniably, she was one of us.

While Sandy claimed her place in our family, one seemingly waiting for her, my seven year old heart found itself overwhelmed. I had never known a love like this, one that consumed me in this way. Gathering my new puppy into my little arms on a warm July day, I sat in the corner of my outdoor playhouse, holding her close to my heart. She wiggled in my arms as I wept for the day she would pass, counting the years on my fingers; the day I began to dread turning twenty two. She squirmed the entire time — restless, uninterested in being held still. I loosened my hold and put her down, watching her chase her tail three times before catching it, then tearing through our backyard like she had somewhere to be.

I didn’t know why I did it; what overrode my childlike love. I just opened my arms.

Sandy's Fierce Loyalty

At only thirteen pounds, she protected our family with the confidence and fierceness of a much bigger dog. One night at two in the morning, when my sister and I were teenagers home alone, two men aggressively banged on our front door. Sandy barked in a tone we only heard that night, and the men ran before she could bite. She never hid her distaste for bad people, making her thoughts on my ex-boyfriend clear as she threw up in his Birkenstocks and walked back to her bed with her tail wagging. Even at ten years old she was still developing new quirks, and began doubling back on walks to bite strangers' ankles. Though only ever men — a girls girl, through and through — her next target was always unpredictable; we assumed she saw something we didn’t. Where my intuition was weak, sometimes quiet, hers was always strong and loud.

Growing Old Together

Sandy grew into an elderly dog with such grace, I barely noticed when it happened. First her sight went, and then her hearing too. Her back slowly grew more hunched, her hind legs slowly beginning to drag. Through her final days I could tell she sometimes forgot where she was, standing lost. I was afraid if I moved her on my own it would only disorient her more. So I clapped, and if I clapped loud enough — maybe she heard it, maybe she felt it, but somehow she knew I was there. Blind and deaf, Sandy followed.

Suddenly our whole lives together were summed up by clapping and following. That was how it started, and that was how it would end.

The Pain of Losing Sandy

When Sandy passed away, it felt as though a hole was torn in my chest. I had never experienced a pain so cleaving. The loss left me vacant in ways I was previously occupied by default. An autopilot I hadn’t remembered turning on, turned off.

Quietly, her death brought my family closer. My parents and I joined my sister when she was the first to leave the house again, watching her run a 5K race that we likely would have otherwise skipped. When we later returned home, we felt the first waves of sadness together; the weight of the door as it opened and none of us feared Sandy lay sleeping behind it, the empty dog bed that still lay in the corner and her small shape that it still held.

But we couldn’t be together through it all. I was alone when I read Sandy’s name on a donation card at work and had no choice but to choke back my tears. I cancelled plans with my friends, scrolling on Instagram past Halloween posts and vacation dumps, jarred by the way the world had left me frozen in time yet somehow continued to turn.

Finding Love After Loss

Ten days later, I met the love of my life.

He picked me up one night at seven. He had followed me on Instagram before Sandy passed, though we didn't find each other until after. He shut the passenger door, walked around the hood, and settled into the driver's seat. Though his eyes were blue when I had expected them to be brown, he still felt familiar in a way I couldn’t describe — that much was already clear when I told him where to pick me up; I trusted him. Maybe prematurely, maybe ignorantly — naively, but I trusted him. When I spoke I knew he was listening, and when he looked at me, I knew he saw me; where others saw potential to mold — inexperience to leverage — I saw him looking closer.

As we sat across from one another in an Italian restaurant, my body tried to remember my role. Fluctuating between job interviews and first days of school, I told him about myself. He appreciated my perspectives in ways most people didn’t — stopping me mid sentence to say wait, I like that, and silencing himself once again, eager to let me say more.

Remembering Sandy While Falling in Love

He asked me if I had any pets, and I paused, amending my answer that had been true for sixteen years. No, I told him thickly. I used to. Realizing how easily I had nearly forgotten, the question destroyed my delicate blinders. Ten days after she passed, and here I was, already feeling joy. The world continued to turn without her, and I hated myself for not turning the world back. As my chest began to flood, I changed my answer. Yes, I said*. I have a dog — she just passed away.*

This is an issue I still battle with; the fact that he never got to know her and never will, the idea that the more I know him, the less I know her, the feeling that the closer he and I become, the further she and I become.

When Sandy passed away and I felt the world cleave into two, I wasn’t prepared for what was waiting for me on the other side of the grief. It dragged me forward against my will — and I found love during the darkest time of my life, with no idea how to hold it.

Bringing New Love Home

When I brought him home to meet my family, introducing him to her ashes on the mantel, I wished she was here to tell me if I was right. To throw up in his shoes or curl up beside him, to tell me her opinion in a language only we knew. Though when I saw the love of my life standing in what would always be her home, I knew how she would approach him; slow and steady with her head and tail tucked low, hesitantly sniffing his hand as he crouched to the ground. Until she was certain he was safe, she would have sat herself between us on the couch, facing him, with her back to me. Her guard would have dropped without her noticing. And one day, without noticing, she would have curled up against him instead.