02/26/2023
The pulling on my leash got a little lighter today.
Although everyone said I was going to keep this guy, he went off to his true forever home.
After years of breeding, this one was the toughest. From the day he was born, he stuck out. I remember picking him up after only minutes of being born and said “This guy is going to look just like his dad with a little black eye. We’ll call him “little Rip”. At around 4-5 weeks I started noticing things with him. Once a litter of puppies become more alert, I keep a quiet house. This is because the second they hear you, they all start barking for attention😂. I would go to the kennel to visit & he would still be asleep.. with all that commotion. At around 6 weeks I’d let the puppies out at night then call them in to play with me until they all fell asleep. Then I would count as I put them to bed. I counted (& recounted as you do a million times when having puppies) and only had 7 puppies. I searched the basement & couldn’t find him. Ran back outside in the pitch black to find him at the play set. A few additional things stuck out after this and my fear was confirmed after his BAER test that he was in fact deaf. I put a hold on finding him a home, knowing it had to be the right one. Since then, “little Rip” had many names. Arfie, sonic, deafy.. the list goes on. But today he is officially ‘Bear’. How ironic is it that his new owners chose this name. I call Blu either “Blu Bear” or “Bear Bear”. Since then I have called Rip “Pooh Bear”. When they told me the name, I shed my first tear.
Anyone who knows me, knows I tend to not be an overly emotional person for anyone to see. I cried a little last night, I cried this morning in the church parking lot, I got choked up for a few seconds once Jill, Tom and Katie arrived and now I’m crying again. But I’m also super happy. They are committed and they have a support system in place to help. (They promised to send lots of pictures.) I can’t wait to watch him grow and be surprised at everything he learns with his new family.