I've had pets my whole life.  Usually quite a few at a time.  As I've gotten older, I've learned to limit the quantity of pets so I can spend quality time with the ones I have.  Plus there's a little less up keep for me, which is nice.  I've always been a dog person.  Cats are nice, but dogs are so much better!  I've had several dogs during my 28 years of life, and have truly loved them all.  I bond very deeply with my animals.  I was an only child growing up, so I spent a lot of my spare time with my animals and became very attached.  And I guess that has just stuck with me into adulthood.  I had 2 male dogs for a very, very long time.  Bro for about 13 years and Taylor for about 11 years.  They were my boys.  And as old age and medical problems took them away I really never thought I would want a dog again.  But then about 2 years ago, my mom adopted a crazy hyena looking dog named California from a rescue site.  She was soo skinny, I felt like she would break when I pet her.  She was scared and untrusting of most people and wasn't very socialized at all.  She wouldn't even come near you long enough for you to pet her more than once at a time.  But over that first year she blossomed into a smart, goofy, loving, sociable dog and completely won my heart.  She LOVED people.  She loved toys and car rides.  And eventually, she loved to cuddle.  She became my napping buddy.  About 3 weeks ago she started acting a little weird.  She wasn't eating as much, she was lethargic, you could just tell she didn't feel very good.  But after about 3 days she perked up again.  We thought, ok she probably had a cold or something.  Then last week, she started the same thing except this time she stopped eating completely.  She lost a drastic amount of weight very quickly and just looked miserable, so we took her to the vet thinking maybe she had a stomach issue.  Unfortunately, that was not the case.  The vet did some blood work and informed us that Cali had kidney failure and from the test results was only at about 25% kidney function.  She said Cali's heart was not functioning properly either due to the high level of poisons building up in her body and that she was concerned if we took Cali home for the weekend that she might have a heart attack.  Which forced us to make a heart breaking decision............to put Cali to sleep.  It was hard to even process.  I mean, we took her in for a stomach bug and you're telling us she's dying??  And worse yet, we only had about an hour and half to make a decision before the vet closed for the day.  My heart just sunk.  In my head, I understood what the vet was saying and I knew what decision I would have to make.  But in my heart I was just torn apart and wanting the vet to run the blood work again because it had to be wrong...it just had to.  When 6pm came, which seemed like it happened way too quick, we took Cali to be put to sleep so she would not have to suffer through her body slowly shutting down.  In 2 years Cali completely won me over and as ridiculous as it may seem to others, she really became a part of our family.  I can't think of her without crying.  I can't look at her toys or her beds without missing her like crazy.  I know when Monday comes it's going to be so hard to fall asleep without her cuddled up next to me.  I miss you Cal Cal.



As weird as he was, I think Michael Jackson really said it best.........


Ok, I'm really not that crazy cat lady or anything.  But I do love my animals and feel Cali deserves a written, permanent reminder in my life through my blog.  :)