Run, MD! Run!

I wasn’t on hiatus if anyone’s asking. I’ve just been busy with work, that’s it. Well, I’m not at work all week, but I’m busy resting and trying to get back some sleep I’ve lost during the weekday on weekends. This proves that you can never have work-life balance. I was told that if you talk too much about work life balance, you either do not work, or have no life at all.

I’ve tried several times to write something using the WordPress app on my phone, but that didn’t do me good. I attempted to write about Rufus, our first dog, but I thought it was too long and maybe no one would read it.

Rufus is a 3-month old Shih Tzu when we first got him days after my birthday. We had him examined by a vet and was told that he needs to stay in our house for a week more before we proceed with the normal grooming and shots. We took him home and had to keep him in the carrier that we bought him with. It was the most heart-breaking sound when he cried through the night but we had to be strong to make him used to being alone at night. In the morning, we took him out for a walk around the neighborhood, we were the happiest seeing Rufus run and sniff around.

Saturday morning, I went home from work to feed Rufus. I felt bad because I had to leave him right away because I had a class that day. I didn’t place him back the carrier because I thought it’s too small for him. Instead, I placed him on his leash and left. Before I locked the door, I heard him cry. When I got home, we bought him a crate and he looks like he loved it.

Sunday, we stayed home to play with him the whole day. I loved the way he would crawl in the space between the bean bag where I would normally sit and the sofa. There he would beckon for me to scratch his belly and he would go straight to sleep.

Monday, I left early for work and went back the next morning @ 4am. Here I fed him right away but noticed he didn’t eat any of the food I gave him. I thought he’s probably not in the mood to eat. So I placed him back in his crate and went to sleep. When I wake up @9am, we found some vomit on the tray under his crate and I wondered where that came from since he didn’t eat that morning. I thought he might have just eaten something that didn’t agree with him. But when we tried to call him, he won’t move and appeared lethargic. We immediately rushed him to the vet where we found that he had Parvo. We were told that he had a 50/50 chance of surviving.

The next day, I called the vet for updates on Rufus but I was told that he wouldn’t eat and kept vomiting and his stool is still soft. I feared for the worst. We visited him for 3 days and noticed that he would try his best to still respond when although we were told that his health is not improving.

Friday morning, it was my turn to visit and I’m stuck in traffic on my way to the vet. I received a call from the Vet and was told that Rufus can’t breathe anymore, I was already crying. I told the cab driver to hurry. Just a few meters from the vet’s clinic, I received another call and this time a lady spoke to me saying that Rufus had already passed away. When I was called to get inside the operating room, I saw lying on the table the life-less body of Rufus. I cried so hard.

We were told that it’s impossible that Rufus caught the virus when he was with us since the virus had an incubation period of 7 to 14 days. Rufus may have had the virus already when we bought him. Funny because Rufus had the slip with all these vaccines showing he should’ve had immunity to this virus. We were told that the pet shop we bought him from may have just injected the vaccines themselves or probably didn’t do it at all.

The most heart-breaking part of it is that he is our first pet and we didn’t even had the chance to bathe him or had him groomed.

Now I understand why certain pet owners go to the extent of pampering their pets that it sometimes border exaggeration. Those days, no matter how few, when we went home and see Rufus jumping and barking at us made us alive once again and made us feel that someone’s waiting for us. Now I understand what made me cry when my uncle had our family dog killed for pulutan.

Rufus is just one in thousands of dogs sold in pet stores for a bargain price and probably meant nothing to the owner than a few thousand pesos. He is just one in thousands of dogs, everyday that are abused and killed because they couldn’t get a home. We’re just glad that we took Rufus out of that place and we somehow managed to make him feel loved and made us feel loved no matter how brief.