left with the dog he didn't want

I had many dreams for my life planned out at a young age, and almost none of them have come true. Most I am happy about, and others I am learning to be okay with.

Like many raised female girls, I had traditional dreams of marriage and kids by now. I didn’t dream of a career. I knew I wanted a family, to write, and maybe have cats. Something easy to take care of, before the real responsibility of a child.

I have always wanted to be a mother. I feel I am meant to care for and devote my time on earth to someone besides myself. I believe I am pretty good at taking care of myself. I take myself to the movies, compliment myself in the mirror, make myself special treats, and take long baths when I need them.

Not to mention I have been a mother already to many man childs. It feels less popular these days to want kids, but I still do. I am an ever-full watering can that must pour into someone or something or I’ll drown in the water around myself. For five-plus years I was pouring all my water down the drain of a relationship I shouldn’t have.

The final straw for the relationship ending was when we were in one of our happier months, and my boyfriend decided to get a dog. I never cared for dogs much, had a few dogs I loved growing up, sure, but I was more of a cat girl. I already was satisfied with a cat I got at seventeen years old. One just showed up in my front yard a few days after my birthday. Her name is Echo, and I was very content with just her to take care of.

For some reason in 2018, all of his roommates were getting dogs. I thought it was idiotic because it was. All of his roommates were on the same college soccer team, busy schedules, traveling all the time. Not to mention the fact that the apartment reeked of blunts, and was borderline a trap house.

So when I got a random DM on Instagram asking if I knew anyone who wanted a puppy, I sent it to my boyfriend at the time. Thinking he would pass it on to his soccer team since they were all obsessed with getting pets. I never thought he would then claim he wanted the pitbull pup. But he said it was his dream dog, he grew up around pit bulls, and wouldn’t take no for an answer.

On September 25th, 2018, we drove to pick up, Sage, a three-month-old pitbull mix. I stated sternly that this was his dog, and he would primarily stay with him. I was working and in school full time, my first semester at a University after transferring from a community college. I didn’t have the time to be taking care of a puppy. He agreed that it would be his dog and he would take care of him. I hoped, like I always did, that he was going to stick to his word.

The first couple of months or so, he did. He bought his food, toys, crate, etc, and went with me to the vet appointments. I was very proud of him because many around me doubted his ability to take care of this dog. But then it all started to crack like it always did.

I would be called more to come get the dog. Then he would take longer to ask for him back at his apartment. Sage started to feel like he was more my dog than his. I was going to the vet alone, walking him alone, and buying the dog food. I started to get very attached to Sage and worried he wasn’t being provided the best life at that apartment. Sage was an easy puppy, easy to potty train, and happy to sleep in his crate. But once he got older and started showing signs of aggression, we started fighting more. And by the new year, my ex wanted to give him up.

I couldn’t believe it, in my head that was never going to be an option. Sage loved us to death and gave us both kisses every time we saw him. Slept with us in between our legs, trusted us, and felt a part of me.

To summarize many arguments, I ended up taking the dog.

I took full responsibility for Sage at the start of 2019 and we broke up for good on July 15th, 2019. This was with the much-needed help of my therapist because I was completely codependent with that boy for a long time. I am far separated from that version of myself but trust me, she was crushed. I fully had the names of our children picked out, I followed him to college, and I built my entire life on a boy. I didn’t imagine a future without him ever since I was fifteen years old.

I think at that time I believed we would co-parent the dog. He did love Sage, I do believe that, it’s impossible not to love him. My ex just always had commitment issues, and I should have known better than to believe he could commit to anything for long. I mean he would threaten to break up with me every other month.

So no, he did not care to see Sage or provide for him after we broke up. He would sometimes reply to my many Venmo requests for his bills. Since he said he would help me when I was low on money. But unless he was using Sage to hook up with me, which I fell for more times than I want to admit. My ex was no longer a part of his life. Within the last few years, he even stopped wishing him a Happy Birthday.

At 20 all of a sudden, I was single, for the first time since I was a girl, and financially responsible for myself, a cat, and a dog. That summer before my senior year of college was filled with so much anger and tears over what my life had become.

I had resentment for Sage for a long time. Like a woman who gets a matching tattoo with someone they now hate. It might be a very beautiful tattoo, but you got it with the hope you’d be friends forever. Now it just serves as a reminder of loss. Maybe I was losing my mind but sometimes I would look at Sage and swear I saw my ex’s eyes.

And I hate to even admit that, but I think it’s important to talk about. Choosing to keep a dog that was never supposed to be mine was not an easy feat. Sage is one of the hardest and most rewarding challenges of my personal life.

Plus, he is the opposite of a normal dog, in every possible way.

Naughty Sage behaviors:

• He eats poop, sticks, bugs, bees and everything outside

• He hates other dogs

• He is scared of every human except those he met before he turned six months

• He is allergic to grain, grass, trees, and pollen

• He likes to sleep under the covers but wakes up angry if you touch him

• He has an abnormal prey drive, where he will lock in on something and not be able to snap out of it. (Words a trainers have told me)

• He is a genius, he knows what is naughty but also knows how to be sneaky to get away with it.

• Not great with kids

• Hates squirrels, bunnies, deer, etc.

• Hates people who walk by the car when he’s in it

• Hates any bug inside the house

• Hates mouth noises that aren’t words, for example, blowing raspberries

• Hates his nails being cut or his feet being touched at all

I know that I didn’t socialize him properly, and I take full accountability for contributing to the misbehavior. I was in many ways still a child, with too much responsibility on my hands. I didn’t know shit about training dogs, I just knew that I couldn’t give him up. I don’t give up on things and maybe a professional would say I should have, but I couldn’t do it. You should see the way he looks up at me.

I look at him writing this and find words for once difficult to describe my love for Sage after six years of life with him. He’s truly not just a dog, he’s become my whole world. I was way weaker of a person back then, and Sage taught me for lack of a better word to man up. I had to be strict with my boundaries with him. He likes to be the boss of everyone, a very dominant personality. I had to learn how to be even more dominant. Yes, my life is pretty limited because of him. But the feeling of his head laying on my chest every night watching TV makes up for it.

I can’t let anyone new meet him, he shows his fear through aggression. So I rarely have people over, I can’t travel as much, can’t be out of the house for too long. But it’s all worth it to be loved so much by this animal. I had no idea animals could make your heart grow two sizes bigger before I got Sage.

He cries if I walk away from him, and gets nervous if I am not in his sight. My family will all vouch that he is obsessed with me. Who knew that was a bad thing for a dog? I laughed when one trainer I met told me I loved him too much which is why he has behavioral problems. I have never been able to love anything half-hearted.

It would be easier, of course, if I had someone to help me take care of him. Lots of things in my life would be easier if I had a partner to help. But in many ways, he has eliminated that option. Men he despises more than women. He wants me to be a lesbian, I often joke.

I still dream of leaving North Carolina but feel I couldn’t do it because of Sage. The only people he trusts are here. I can’t have a random person walk him if I am working late, or out of town. My biggest fear is him hurting someone, I know he would never do it on purpose. Sage already has a target on his back based on his breed. It doesn’t do him any good that he fits some of the horrible stereotypes about pit bulls.

I do get scared to imagine the next years of our adult lives together. I hope to settle down and build a life with someone one day. I would love for Sage to be a part of it but he just is so protective of me I don’t know how that’ll work. Do I put off moving in with someone because of my dog? Yeah, I just might have to.

Sage is as corny as it sounds, my best friend. He is the only consistent thing in my life for six years. I have lost jobs, lost friends, lost relationships, and grieved lives lost. Every time a horrible thing has happened to me he has been right there, literally licking my tears off my cheek. I know having a child isn’t the same as having a dog but I genuinely do feel Sage is a piece of me.

What does Sage love?

• Watermelon, Bananas, and Peanut Butter - Really any human food

• Chewing on sticks

• Opening presents

• Looking out the window

• Sitting on my lap looking out

• Belly scratches, under-the-chin scratches, ear rubs

• To be chased around

• To sleep with his head on a pillow

• To lick off sweat, or water once you’re out of the shower

• To cuddle

• Kisses on his nose

• Fields he can run without a leash

• To lean on you and turn his back so you scratch it

• Lick every bowl after you are done eating

• He wags his tail if I just smile at him

We in a way were both abandoned by someone we thought would be around us forever. Someone I thought I would never be able to get over, the only man Sage could tolerate besides my dad. But we’ve made it this far, and we’re going to keep making it.

I think he was made to disrupt my life, in the best possible ways. I am grateful my ex didn’t want him, because I think he was always meant to be mine. I am never alone, although lonely, because of Sage. I thought my early 20s would be filled with romantic love, adventure, travel, and hopefully babies on the way. Instead, it’s been filled with mostly me alone in my house with a 75-pound pitty in my lap.

We’ve been together now for just as long as the man who left us and I were. I understand Sage deeply, understand his fears, and why he acts out. Feels like we are both judged based on our appearance when deep down all we want is to be loved. He’s taught me unconditional love, something I never believed in before him.

As the grey hairs continue to form on his face I am reminded why each day together is so special. I know we don’t have forever, but he’s given me more happiness than I could have dreamed. Every extra laugh he gives me is just a bonus to my life.

I have always needed something to water, and now I have it. Sage might require more water than the ideal amount but he deserves it all. As the Rolling Stones said - “You don’t always get what you want. But you just might find, you get what you need.”

Love you, Sage, always and forever my best friend. <3