Natters Matters

God Laughs

Growing up has a lot of hard lessons. One of them for me has been learning that God’s timing and plans for me are usually very different than what I think and intend on doing. This has developed into me saying: “God laughs at me.” I do not mean that God is pointing at me and mocking me as I am tripping over myself and face planting into the mud. What I do mean is the laugh that a Sunday school teacher has when a small child bursts out an answer that she has no idea from where it came. I just mean that as soon as I think I figured out what I am supposed to be doing, something unexpected happens and flips everything on its head for better or for worse.

I could point out a lot of different smaller examples of where and when I had to learn this lesson. I will say that after having a sister very unexpectedly passing away of brain cancer, I did begin to realize that there is no guarantee of stability in plans. Another way of putting it would be that the words of the Apostle James were hitting a little closer to home.

“Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”— yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.””
‭‭James‬ ‭4:13-15‬ ‭ESV‬‬

Plans are not a bad thing. I was just learning that you cannot cling onto them too tightly.

Not to say that loosing a sister wasn’t hard, it still remains the hardest thing I have had to live through. Just this particular lesson of learning to let go of my timing and trusting God’s timing, hit really hard shortly after my husband and I got married.

Baby Fever

We started trying for a baby almost immediately. I was currently working a full time job at Walmart and feeling very trapped in it when all I wanted to do with my life was to raise little humans. We both wanted lots of kids and had come from big families so we thought that it would be quick and easy.

Like I said though, God has other plans.

Six months went by and nothing happened. I was confused and sad, but I mean, it was just the first six months. The average American couple takes about six to twelve months to conceive a child at least according to my best friend, Google.

Another six months went by, and that’s when the worries really started rocking me. What was wrong? We were both in our early twenties and relatively healthy people. Granted, we were not running marathons and eating organically, but it wasn’t like we were eating McDonalds every single meal while sitting on our butts all day.

I was scared to go to the clinic because I didn’t want them to tell me: “Yup, you can never have your own children because of the following fifty things we found wrong with you.” However, I did schedule an appointment in October, but I cancelled it last minute. I made myself stop taking pregnancy tests because every time I got a negative it just devastated me for two or three days. I tried to figure it all out on my own, but as I have said in my dog posts, Google is not ever a helpful place for me.

Stats on infertility in the US specifically

OBGYNs and Friends

I really struggled with trying to be happy and content where I was especially when the 18 month mark hit. I knew that I needed to trust God and his timing because it would be best. That little nagging worry would not stop haunting me though. What if I could not have my own biological children? What if we could never afford adoption? Then what? What was I supposed to do?

I wanted to just be able to grin and bear it with joy in trusting the Lord and his providence. The anxiety weighed me down heavily, and I could not seem to shut out the despair that was eating away at me. I was frustrated with myself. I had a lot to be grateful and happy for. I have a relatively easy life, it was just this one thing. Why could I not let it go?

Some days were better than others. I would have my good days, and then there were others where I was struggling to function. It reminded me somewhat of grief. Where it smacks in the face one day, and the next it’s like nothing ever happened.

Most people told me that everything would be fine. We were still really young, it was all going to be okay. I would often look at Josh and ask him: “do you really think that we will be able to have our own kids?” He would always say: “Yes, but even if we don’t, we will adopt.”

During this time period, Josh bought two books: “The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment” by Jeremiah Burroughs for him and “Learning Contentment” by Nancy Wilson for me. He told me that he bought one for himself so it was not like he was trying to remove the speck out of my eye while a log was in his own. I was happy about it. I love getting new books, and Nancy Wilson’s words were very helpful for me in realizing that I needed to change my mindset to a much more grateful one. You can find Jeremiah Burroughs book here and Nancy Wilson’s here.

I finally went into the clinic. I left feeling both with some hope and frustration. On the one hand, I was getting help, on the other they told me a lot of things that I already knew. What was really helpful was when both of us got some labs done and I did some at home ovulation tests.

When it comes to infertility, statistically speaking, 30% of the time it’s the woman, 30% it’s the man, 30% it’s both, and 10% it’s unknown. We got the results back to find out that we had dodged the scary unknown category, but we had unfortunately landed in the fun category of both. My OBGYN told us that we needed to see a specialist at a fertility clinic because of being in the fun both category. We simply could not afford that. We also would have had some serious ethical concerns with that specific clinic in general.

On the one hand, I liked knowing that I was not crazy. We both had issues and that was all in God’s plan before we were even born. In my mind, God was teaching me both patience and contentment. I always thought of myself as a pretty content person up until this point. It really started to hit me how much I needed to work on trusting God to meet my needs. Not my wants and desires, but what I actually needed, God would always provide.

“But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all.”
‭‭Matthew‬ ‭6:30-32‬ ‭ESV‬‬

The problem with any fruit of the Spirit is that it takes time and discipline. No matter how badly I wanted it to be as simple as an on or off switch.

I tried to reorient my focus on getting a house rather than trying to conceive a baby, but that did not provide any peace and bred more discontent and dislike for our current living space. Patience and contentment were what I needed to focus on in that moment. Hence why the books on contentment came in so handy. We could not do anything more about the problem at hand except pray and trust God.

Breaking My Own Rules

About a month and half later, I was two days late so I took a pregnancy test just in case even though I knew it was a bad idea. As I expected, it came back negative. No surprise, my period had been super late before and no baby.

My period kept at bay the next day…

The next week…

I prayed, “Lord, please if this is not a pregnancy please bring my period back sooner so I’m not just sitting here in limbo.”Limbo was just the worst. The last time I was in limbo was when we were six months married, and I had been so sure that I was pregnant. It landed super close to Christmas time, and I thought that it would be a super fun little Christmas present, but nope, no baby.

This time reminded me of it all over again. Mother’s Day was right around the corner. Even though I could have taken a pregnancy test then, because my period was the latest it had ever been. I knew that if it had come back negative on Mother’s Day that I would not be able to function for the rest of the day, and I really did not want to do that to myself so I waited a few more days.

Then finally on May 11th, I took another one and just walked out of the bathroom immediately without taking another glance at it. I did not want to sit there and just watch only one line form. The timer counted down the minutes on my phone while I continued on with my morning routine praying for a miracle, and if not that, strength to stomach another disappointment.

The timer went off, and I walked back into the bathroom expecting the worst, praying for the better. No matter what I took I always got one line. Ovulation tests and pregnancy tests were no different. It always was one singular line mocking me. In a way, my period just stopping for no reason was to be expected. My OB told me that it made no sense that I even had a period in the first place. Since I had been to see her, it had been acting funky.

God Laughs

Whenever I think I have figured out exactly what God wants for me in that time, something almost always happens to contradict my perception. This time was no exception.

There was not just one line. There were two lines. Not one very dark line and a faded line, two very dark lines.

Stunned, I had to look up and make sure that two lines meant pregnant. Obviously it did, but I had to be absolutely 100% sure before I could let myself get super excited.

I looked at my phone screen. I looked at the test. Yup, two lines meant pregnant.

Poor Josh was sound asleep at the time, and I could not wait. I rushed over to the bed and started pulling him to get up. Confused he started to ask me what was going on thinking that he had slept too long. I just told him that he needed to come and see.

I dragged him into the bathroom where I had my phone still with the Google page open and the pregnancy test on the sink. I pointed it to him and waited. It took him a minute, but once he did get it, he turned to me with a big smile on his face and said, “told you so.”

Editors Note

I add this part because I feel as though it needs to be said for those of you out there who might still be in the struggle and trial of waiting for a baby. I cannot promise you that a baby will happen for you. I don’t have any secret magic cure that will make a baby happen for you today. That was not the point of this post.

I did not deserve this baby. This baby did not come because of anything me or my husband tried or did differently than the rest of humanity. We did not radically change our eating habits and lifestyles so as to super boost our fertility. God was simply gracious to us in his timing and his purposes which are always best even though they really do not feel like it in the moment. He heard our prayers and the prayers of those around us. I know though that sometimes God says no. Trusting him is the hardest thing in the world sometimes, but the greatest peace can only come from trusting him.

I know some of you have been trying for much longer than we have. I have heard the stories of couples where it took anywhere between three years to ten to never being able to conceive. I can not imagine being in that place for so long, but if you’re a Christian, your Heavenly Father knows. Jesus knows your pain. All I can tell you is to cling onto Him always, and He will hold you fast. Does not mean that He will ultimately give you what you want, but it does mean that He will always be there in the midst of the trial and the eye of the storm.

“Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me.”
‭‭Psalm‬ ‭23:4‬ ‭ESV‬‬

A Super Short Puppy Timeline… Mostly Pictures

I present to you a very short post mainly pictures, and some description of the puppies with their different personalities. All of them have been adopted at this point.

Lilo: the spunky one

Three puppies was a good amount. Labs and other dog breeds of similar size as huskies typically have an average of about seven pups in a litter.

I was really happy that we got one red one out of the mix. She was the loudest of the bunch while living with us. The boy, Klaus, was our personal favorite and had we been living somewhere else, we likely would have kept him. He was very laid back from the day that he was born and remained that way even when we rehomed him.

Lilo was a good middle between the two until she got older. Then she became the very crazy one.

We thought that maybe we would be able to tell who the dad was as they got older, but they continued to look very husky with floppy ears. My best guesses turned to lab or golden retriever, but without a DNA test I could never be one hundred percent positive.

Puppies aren’t Quiet

I feel like my entire dog experience can be summarized in, “I googled way too much,” and at the same time, “I maybe should have been a little more prepared than I was.” Based on my calculations and best guesses, Ginger was going to give birth sometime around April 8th.

Two weeks before that date, I stopped bringing her to work with me so that she could get more rest at home. Let me tell you that the last thing you want to do with a husky who has separation anxiety and a very poor functioning digestive system is to completely uproot their routine. I had more messes to deal with, and anything made of wood within her reach was chewed to splinters. She also began peeing on the carpet again which is not something that she had done since we got her. In dog language, she was ticked off and freaked out.

My prediction for my dog’s due date was off by nine days. On March 30th, I woke up and watched her pace around the apartment panting as if she had been running. She started gathering her toys and placing them at the foot of our bed. Around noon she had decided that the tight space underneath our bed was a safe place to birth. She parked down there and did not want to come out for any reason whatsoever.

Puppies did not come about until late that night about 8:30pm. I was expecting yellow puppies from either a golden retriever dad or a yellow labradoodle dad so when I found that she had quietly given birth to two black and white puppies, I was scratching my head. They looked exactly like husky puppies.

We did get to watch the third and final puppy be born. Let me tell you that the experience of watching an animal birth is both incredible and disgusting at the same time. When a woman give birth, it is usually a process that is accompanied by multiple helpers. When a dog gives birth, she did not research Google or talk to her fellow momma dog friends about what their birth experience was. God just wired it in their brains to find a place to nest, push the puppies out, pop the amniotic sack, and eat all the afterbirth mess. Not only that, but for the first three weeks of a puppy’s life, they are unable to pee or poop with out stimulation. Momma dog has to do that by licking them and eating everything that comes out of them.

If you have ever had to bottle feed puppies or kittens abandoned by their mothers or where the mother dog died, you know how much gross work it is to keep the adorable little pups alive, and you really appreciate all the work that the momma animal does.

No one taught my dog how to do that. I certainly did not stand their with a slide show presentation telling her: “So Ginger if you don’t stimulate your babies, they will bloat up and die.” God simply just planted that in her brain, and honestly, when I cleaned out underneath the bed much later afterwards, I was very surprised with how clean it was.

Another naive thing I believed was that the first two weeks of puppies lives, they are little lumps who do nothing but eat and sleep. They never make any noises or high pitched squeals when they wandered five inches away from mom and can’t find their way back because they are 100% blind and deaf. I should have known better having been around tiny baby kittens most of my childhood. They are quite loud for their size.

The difference between child Natalie and adult Natalie was that adult Natalie lived in an apartment, an apartment with other adults who had headaches and wanted to live in peace. She did not want her landlord to get constant complaints about baby dog noises from her apartment. Child Natalie had no such worries because she lived on a farm house and the neighbors also had lots of barn cats.

Having tiny baby animals in Natalie’s life again, however, did make her feel like a child again. It would be a lie to say that I did not spend much of my spare time just holding them and watching them. I knew they wouldn’t be able to stay with us until they hit the eight week mark.

Thankfully, I have really gracious parents who still live on a farm house that were willing to take them in when the time came which it did much sooner than I expected.

The Vet (Part 2)

So remember how I said that I thought my dog being in heat would not in anyway hurt her spay appointment. Ha! How naive of me, I was so wrong!

After being my dog’s biggest creepy stalker and watching for pregnancy symptoms like a hawk for about three weeks, I just was not 100% sure if Ginger was or wasn’t pregnant. I called the vet, hoping I could just reschedule it only two more weeks out just to give me some more time to observe. I really did not want the puppies to die in a spay if she even was pregnant. They told me that they could not spay her until six weeks after her heat. She was about a week off.

The poor secretary told me that I would have to reschedule it another month out. The bright side to this was that I would be able to know for sure if she was pregnant by that point.

Most people wish that their dog could talk so they could tell them just how much they love them. I honestly just wanted my dog to be able to talk so she could tell me if she was pregnant.

Me: “Hey Ginger did you have a fling with that one dog?”

Ginger: “Yes I did, and you can expect puppies in your apartment in six weeks lol.”

In reality though, asking my dog such questions would only result in her staring at me with a confused look on her face wondering if I wanted to take her outside or if we were going to work again.

I will warn you that if you don’t handle bodily functions well, the next few paragraphs might not be a fun read. If you are someone who has owned animals that have birthed little minions or are just really not bothered by these kinds of things, read on.

The main things I was watching for her was 1) to get fat 2) produce milk and 3) discharge. Yes, none of that is especially fun to think about or look for on a dog, but according to my new best friend Google, they were dog pregnancy symptoms.

She did not get fat.

Ginger has been super skinny since I had taken her in, and I really did want to get her to fatten up a bit. Unfortunately my efforts were thwarted by constant diarrhea and her pickiness. When I say picky, I mean, I could not get this dog to eat anymore than a little bit of whatever I gave her. I tried white rice, eggs, chicken broth, different dry food, pumpkin, peanut butter, and lets just face it, there was no way that we could afford to feed her the raw diet. Thus, I stared at my dog wondering why she had chosen the path of the anorexic even while possibly growing babies in her belly.

Produce milk? Well that’s complicated because they do not technically produce milk until the last week of pregnancy. Granted, her nipples had not shrunk back to their proper size since she had been in heat, but sometimes that took months to go down after being in heat one time.

Discharge? Like clear discharge from a dog’s vagina? Yup… I would come home and find her laying on her back with a big, stringy blob between her legs. After this started happening, I just called it as she was pregnant.

So what did I do? I called the vet… again to cancel her appointment and try and reschedule again. Only this time they did not let me reschedule and told me to wait until the puppies were born.

Puppies… my dog was going to birth puppies in my 80% carpeted apartment.

The Vet (Part 1)

I grew up with girl dogs. I love girl dogs and boy cats. Granted, there is nothing inherently wrong with boy dogs. I struggle with them wanting to pee on walls and every other tree, but other than that, I am just biased towards wanting a girl dog because I grew up with them. My husband had the same experience growing up so we ended up with a female husky.

The thing that sucks about owning a female pet of any kind though is that getting them spayed is not cheap. Nothing at the vet is cheap, and this is why my frugal self does not like going to the vet. I do take my dog to the vet because I need her to have her rabies shots for my safety and to have her in my apartment. She needs her distemper and Bordetella in order to come to work with me.

Regardless, setting up her spay appointment was not something that I was super enthusiastic about doing, but I did schedule it right away when I got her. I hit a minor speed bump though when I called in late November, and they said that I could not bring her in until February… late February, two months later.

In case you don’t know, a female dog can go into heat anytime after she turns six months old… at which was the exact age I acquired her. This was one of those things that I really, really should have asked her previous owner if she had already been in heat because I basically had to just stare at my dog awkwardly watch for signs of going into heat.

You might say, “what’s the big deal? You live in an apartment. It’s not like she’s wandering around through the neighborhood getting to know all of the other dogs.”

I would say back, “You don’t understand. I work at a facility which has plenty of dogs who are not fixed and the one place that I can let her run around unsupervised has an intact male labradoodle currently.”

Also, if you read the Potty Training stories, you know that whenever she is left alone at home too long, my apartment and sanity suffer for it.

My husband had the smart idea of calling another vet.

Here’s the thing, I am not arguing with his logic, what I am saying is that I am frozen into going to the same vet until they do me wrong. Vets are one of those things where I feel obligated to go to the same one. I also did not want to go to another vet only to find out that they thought I was the worst pet owner in existence because I did not give my dog fifteen different supplements, depression medication, and a raw diet as a cherry on top.

Even though it literally makes absolutely no sense for me to drive forty five minutes for me to go to the same veterinary clinic when I live within fifteen minutes of five different veterinarian hospitals. Anxiety over new things can almost never be talked out of its irrational behavior, and to be honest, I just didn’t want to go to a different vet.

Also, so what if she went into heat before her spay, I knew that I would just have to keep her away from the very horny male dogs. Easy peasy. Besides, it’s not like they can’t fix her while she’s in heat, right? Right?

Her heat lasted about two and half weeks which was a hassle in of itself. Thankfully her bleeding was not as heavy as we had expected. We did buy her doggy diapers, but they were not entirely necessary and more work than worth it to get on her and keep on her. I mean, Ginger is the kind of dog that I would spend ten to twenty minutes struggling to get winter boots and a harness on her.

So when the bleeding stops, we should be in the clear?

Nope.

Don’t be so optimistic.

I found out through some more obsessive Googling that it would be another ten days of a fertile window. So more time, of trying to keep an eye on her to make sure that no horny males found her. Neither I or Ginger particularly enjoyed this time because it meant less time to play and more time in the kennel.

Her bleeding stopped about a month before her vet appointment. A new set of questions entered my Google search… “signs of pregnancy in dogs.”

Now I need to say this.

I did not see anything happen… but again due to the nature of my job and the natural order of things with animals. I always suspected something may have very likely, quite possibly occurred between her and another dog.

The unhelpful thing about Google is that it will give you some very irrelevant and useless information about rare, but wait no, not rare, actually it is very wrong, nope, now this is a common occurrence.

One of those unhelpful things is the notion of phantom pregnancy which is rare, but also quite common in dogs, or so Google tells me. Phantom pregnancy is when a dog shows all symptoms of pregnancy and adopts her toys as pups even though the animal is not in fact pregnant.

So what did I do?

I watched closely and waited…

Potty Training Pt 2: The Bathtub

One of my favorite sayings is that you have to laugh or you’ll cry. One of the instances where I really felt this was when my husband and I both got a stomach bug at the same time.

This was unusual not because I was sick. I tend to have a knack for catching illnesses, but it was unusual because Josh was sick. He is one of those super humans who never gets super sick. To make it more unusual that we were both sick with the same illness at the same time.

Anyone who has ever had the stomach flu knows that it’s a miserable illness especially if you have kids.

We might not have any children quite yet, but our dog had eaten a dead bird while we weren’t paying attention. For some reason, that inner wolf in her only existed in instinct, and not so much in the strength of her stomach. So in the midst of dealing with our own issues, we were getting up in the middle of the night to take her out so she didn’t have diarrhea explosions topped with feathers all over our carpet.

Unfortunately although our illness cleared up in like two to three days, Ginger’s inner wolf got her in trouble with another dead bird which continued the bowel issues.

I was complaining to a coworker about Ginger’s knack for crapping all about my living space. She told me a story about finding her dog pooping in the shower. Without thinking, I said, “Man, I wish she would do that.”

As God’s Providence would have it, that night Ginger pooped in our bathtub.

She had finally snubbed the luxury of the carpet and chosen the hated corner of the bathtub.

Josh suspected it was because at this point we had given her a bath more than once. She fulfilled the husky stereotype that was not super excited about getting a bath. He thought that she had started choosing to poop in the bathtub because she hated her baths so much.

Whether that’s true or not, I’ll never know, but it was super convenient, albeit gross, for her to having her accidents in our bathtub rather than on our carpet in our bedroom closest for the third time of the night.

We are NOT getting a Dog… especially not a Husky!

In my job I work with many, many different kinds of dog breeds. I would say that among the most common to come across my path are retrievers, labs, boxers, and pit bulls. Some very odd breeds that I did not know existed such as the Xoloitzcuintli, a medium sized hairless dog.

Photo credit: https://www.womansday.com/life/pet-care/g31254052/hairless-dog-breeds/

One breed that I had a love-hate relationship with was the husky. I loved how gorgeous they were, and the fact that they were always super good about playing with other dogs. The thing that I did not appreciate about them is that they all without exception will look you straight in the face when you call for them… and completely ignore you. Granted, some are better than others, but even the best behaved ones will have a moment where they will have a stare down with you… and they will win. They laugh as they turn their fluffy butts to your face and zoom away from you.

So I kept saying to everyone who had the the patience to listen to me talk about dogs for the one hundred millionth time today that there was no way in heck that I was getting husky… even though they are a breed that I had wanted since I was little. Nope! They are runners, and I could not take the defiance.

Here’s the thing about my life and about my job… I really needed a dog that was going to be okay with people coming in and out of our space constantly, and a dog who was going to be super awesome with other dogs. In my research… huskies were among the best breeds for it. I did not want a lab or golden retriever. I saw enough of them. They are pretty good dogs, but I wanted something that I did not get to have as a kid.

Whelp… I should have known that I was gonna eat those words.

During an extremely busy weekend where I kept telling myself that it was a really, really bad time for me to be looking for a dog. I let my obsessive brain take over in my tired pre-holiday week state… and that was a really bad idea.

I like to think that I am a person with a lot of self-control… but I really am not.

In my “just looking” at dogs, I came across a husky that someone sounded desperate to find a home for. He was gorgeous. Great with kids, and great with other dogs, he was perfect! Once I got the “ok” from my hubby, I very excitedly messaged the owner… and as things tend to go with any exchanges that happen over the inter webs, she never even looked at my message.

Another husky came up in my feed, a year old, beautiful pure white male named Thor. I fell in love instantly. I had wanted a pure white husky since one of our family friends adopted one when I was a little girl. The owner actually communicated back to me. We settled a time where we would meet up, but sadly that meeting never happened. She messaged me that he went home with someone else three days before I could come and meet him.

Josh had really wanted that one as well, and so he told me that I needed to find us a husky…

So my very tired, not thinking very far ahead brain, contacted yet another lady about ANOTHER husky. (What was I thinking?) This time it was a female husky. The other two had both been boys, but this was an unspayed, 6 month old red husky.

This picture was all I had to go off of.

The owner and I went back and forth a little bit. We set up a meeting time and a place. I could not believe it was happening. Josh and I went to Walmart and bought dog stuff even though I knew in the back of my mind that there was a chance that this owner would also back out.

The day came, and I excitedly waited. The owner had messaged me that she would be a bit late, but that was okay. I sat in my car in the middle of the County Market parking lot scrolling through Instagram when finally her vehicle pulled up…

The Light at the End of the Tunnel

One of my coworkers told me that when she worked at the shelter, they always told people who adopted a dog to remember the three threes. For those of you who don’t know what the three threes are, they are as follows:

First Three Days: Dog is just freaking out and refuses to eat or drink. It cannot figure out what is going on and will test all the boundaries. I would say with Ginger that this was definitely true with getting her to go outside. I literally cried the first time she went to the bathroom outside because it was three to four days straight of her pooping and peeing on our carpet.

First Three Weeks: Slowly beginning to finally settle in. Behavior issues begin to pop up and true personality characteristics start to show.

First Three Months: Finally settled in and begins to bond with the new owner. Figured out the family’s routine.

At first I was not sure what to think of it, but as time went on, I can say that I did see evidence of this rule proving true especially with having a routine.

I do have a routine with her which I was told was supposed to help.

The first three weeks we didn’t see too much change, but around two months there was a big change.

One of those big changes was getting her a new kennel. After she destroyed the wire kennel, I bought a much more heavy duty kennel that was also double the size.

The new kennel made a huge difference. I had been told to start feeding her in the kennel so that she would start to like the kennel. Unfortunately I couldn’t do that in her old one because she wouldn’t get two steps near that thing.

With her new kennel, however, it was like magic, and I was able to get her to eat in there immediately. Granted, she did cry in her kennel, but it had enough space inside of it where she didn’t try to rock it back and forth. She just paced inside of it which I’m sure that the neighbors downstairs would much rather hear whining rather than whining and thudding of metal against a wall.

Another huge thing is we began to start figuring out potty training. When she finally settled, there were less accidents. I also started making sure that she slept in our room with us. We started keeping a water bowl in our room and shutting the door at night so that she would wake us up with her pacing when she had to go outside.

She also began to panic a lot less when I had to leave for the couple hours in the morning.

At a certain point, I decided to risk it, and see if she could handle it without the crate. I don’t know what had come over me, but I tried it.

I can’t tell you how surprised I was when I came home to find her just peacefully taking a nap on the couch and not running around everywhere with my stuff broken as an attempt to call me home.

That first time was just an hour, so I tried it again. It was meant to be just for two hours, but it turned into four. I came home, and same result. She hadn’t destroyed everything.

Training had gotten much better. She finally understood what her name was and got who was the boss… most of the time. You know huskies, they’ve got a knack for looking straight at you and running in the opposite direction.

I may have not ended up with a super energetic or talkative husky, but for our current living space and lifestyle she fits in.

Does she still chew the floss container when I forget to take the time to walk her? Yes.

Does she still have accidents? Yes, occasionally, but it’s not nearly as bad as when we first started.

Does she still act like she hates us and never want our attention except when we leave the apartment? Less now. I’ve actually gotten to see some of the affectionate dog come out.

The best way to describe her is an outdoor cat born into a dog’s body. She always wants to be outside… even if she just wants to nap. She loves you… for about ten minutes and then wants to be left alone. She will play fetch… on her own time.

So for now, that catches y’all up to speed on most of what we’ve been up to as far as our dog goes, and I’m sure that I will have more stories as time goes on.

Potty Training Pt 1: The Crate

The next two weeks were a lot of work when it came to potty training.

For some reason, she would not go potty outside. I could not figure it out. She would stare at me when I waited for her to go. I would walk her outside for long periods of time, and nothing would happen. But as soon as I stopped paying attention to her inside, she would sneak into our spare bedroom or our bedroom closet.

I must have scared her really bad by mistake when she had that first accident. Whatever the case, we were desperate to get her to do ANYTHING outside.

I took her outside constantly, and nope, no matter how many times I brought her outside. As soon as we got indoors, it was her time to shine.

I cry about a lot of things. I’m a very emotional person… but I’ve never cried so much over poop and pee in my life.

We tried the “pee here” spray from the store which I had had high hopes for… but of course, she didn’t give a rip about it.

We wouldn’t have minded the potty incidents in the apartment quite so much if she had gone on the linoleum in the kitchen/dining room… but of course, she was too good for such things and had to have the luxury of soft carpet underneath her paws as she took a dump for the fourth time today. (Legitimately, she would sometimes take four craps a day.)

Thankfully, my husband is a genius and bought carpet protection from Menard’s which we put on all of the special places she had chosen for her pooping and peeing except for our closet… there we just tried to keep the door shut. It was still a pain to clean up, but at least in this case, she wasn’t destroying the carpet more than it already was at this point.

We quickly ran into another problem common to huskies: separation anxiety.

Growing up, we always had lab mixes and destructive anxiety wasn’t ever an issue. Occasionally a loaf of bread would get snatched off of the counter, but that could be easily attributed to labs just wanting to eat everything in sight. Regardless, Ginger was a whole new ball game.

The second time I left her home alone before we had to start crating her I came home to Josh’s guitars were all knocked over. She had destroyed my little fake plant and pooped in the center of the spare bedroom. Garbage had been spread through my dining and living room. Including the fruit loops that I had to throw away earlier that morning because I had mistakenly left them alone for more than a minute on the counter. Of course, now that she had been left home alone for two hours, she did not have any interest in eating them until she had ten minutes to calm down and realize I was home to stay.

Crating was another nightmare in of itself.

The first time I was super nervous, but when I came home nothing was destroyed or pooped on. So I thought, oh, she’s already crate trained.

I was very wrong in such fantastical assumptions.

I made this unfortunate discovery one day when I was home sick, and I don’t know why I did it, but I put her in the crate. I just wanted to while I napped. She did not stop crying and she loathed the crate entirely. The worst was when she would rock the crate back and forth knocking it against the wall. I panicked. What was I supposed to do? I couldn’t stay home with her. I would go insane if I had to stay home with my dog and never able to go anywhere without bringing her.

I did a lot of panic googling at this time, and one of the things that the inter webs told me was that it can take up to six months to crate train a dog.

Six months…

It wouldn’t have mattered had our living situation been different. When you live in an apartment complex and you really, really don’t want to get a noise violation… it’s a whole other deal.

Despite my worries… noise was not the one I should have had high on my priority list.

Crate training and potty training are not a great combination… especially when the potty accident happens in the crate… and then the dog proceeds to dance in it.

The first accident was bad. Poop smeared everywhere and dried onto the bars. I immediately took her outside and then we hit the bathtub.

Second time was easier to clean, and she hadn’t quite trampled it everywhere. A

Accidents weren’t bad compared to what was coming…

She was strong enough to bend the bars and escaped one evening. As predicted, she did tear up the room and found a big bag of stuffing which got destroyed. The worst though was the carpet… she tried to dig herself out of the room and tore the carpet to shreds in the process.

Thankfully we were able to figure out the problem and did a temporary fix.

But that’s all it was, a temporary fix.

Another night, she did not escape, but I took one look at this kennel and realized that it was not worth salvaging.

See everyone tells you. Don’t get a husky. They are so much work, and even though you know that they are right, you get one anyways because you want a pretty and fun dog. I was like, “I can handle the energy.”

Energy was not the problem with this doggo. Just the minor things like poop on the carpet and destructive separation anxiety. Everyone wants to live in a home that smells of dog crap and destroyed flooring.

I was exhausted and very stressed out trying to keep this dog under control and not give up on her. I did not want to give her up. I don’t say that with the most noble of incentives. Money was a big incentive, meaning we’d already dumped a bunch of money into her. Also, despite all of the issues we were having, I still loved having a dog around and really did not want to go back to not having one.

But I thought…

The owner pulled up, and I got out of my car with money in my pocket not really sure what to expect.

I was surprised by the fact that her owner had brought her kids along. Immediately I had the feeling of dread that they would start crying and calling for the dog… but such anxieties were misplaced. They were quite content just playing on their iPads while their mom handed me all of the dog’s food bowls, food, toys, papers, and bedding… when I was just expecting the papers.

My brain was going a kazillion miles per hour, and I had a lot of questions that I should have asked, but I didn’t. The owner brought the dog out on a brand new leash and collar. My first thought was, “holy cow, she’s tiny.”

“Yeah, her parents were both super small.”

Now I’ve seen quite a few huskies… so when I say, this one was small. I mean that this was the littlest husky that I have come across that wasn’t a mix with something else.

Anyways, I brought her into my car and was overwhelmed by the fact that I actually owned a dog.

We drove back to the apartment, and this is where the anxiety and common sense finally woke up inside of me.

I walked her around the building a few times to make sure that if she had to go potty, she had the chance to. However, as soon as I brought her into the apartment, she ran into the living room and began to poop.

Panicked, I was definitely not the smartest and chased after her and brought her outside again… and she refused to poop in front of me.

Alright, one accident, no big deal, it’s still the first day.

Then a second issue arose, she wouldn’t eat… like anything… at all.

Naturally as anyone in my generation does. I quickly googled to see if all of this was normal for a dog who was rehomed. Yes, this was all very normal for a dog who was going through the transition process of one home to another.

The third issue was the breakdown point for me. I was looking through her shot record and realized something… her distemper was not updated. For anyone who hasn’t brought their dog into a boarding facility before, there are two (sometimes three) shots that are absolutely required before you can bring your dog in with the others: rabies and distemper.

Thankfully I had the rabies certificate in hand because otherwise I would not have been able to even get her into our apartment building.

I communicated with the owner, and the records that I had were correct. The distemper was expired… I called the vet clinic in a panic, and they couldn’t get her in for another two weeks.

Say what now?

My little plan was falling to pieces… which anyone with two eyes could have seen coming.

I thought I was bringing home a potty trained, up to date shots, big husky… but life is full of disappointments.

But I wasn’t gonna give up just yet… thankfully, my husband’s work ended when my work in the evening began. So for the next two weeks we were just going to have to tag team it which we did to the best of our ability.

Did I mention that this all was the kick off to our Thanksgiving week? After this experience I would not recommend getting a dog during the holiday season.