In addition to being foster parents, Seth and I have a variety of critters. At present we have one dog, four cats, and one kitten (whom we affectionately refer to as Le Shittén because her antics are something else). They all play a role with the kids, particularly the dogs.
The current dog Phoebe, aka “Beans,” is an absolute mutt. She’s a Heinz 57 shelter special. We even did genetic testing on her out of sheer curiosity because we couldn’t identify a single breed in her, and it turns out she is German Shepherd, Rottweiler, Shar-Pei, bulldog, bull terrier, Bedlington terrier, Chinese crested(!), and dachshund. There’s a mix for you. Some of those combinations defy the imagination.
For a while we had two dogs, and the other one, Simon, aka “Slimy,” was a purebred Bassett hound. He was absolutely awful. He was the single most stubborn creature ever to have walked the earth, and took willfulness to new heights (pardon the height pun for the Basset hound). We had originally rescued him and his littermate sister from the Humane Society. She was nearly as awful as he was and together they were truly a force to be reckoned with.
I’m going to say something really terrible here but please try not to judge me for it: for years I didn’t really like Simon. Simon and Lucy were so bad, and they had never really bonded with us, only each other. They were never able to be house trained. They were destructive, maniacal, poop eating beasts who did a lot of damage to our property. I grew to like Lucy, who was at least really affectionate, but really struggled to find any common ground with Simon. When Lucy died of pancreatic cancer at age 3, we adopted Beans because Simon couldn’t function as an only dog. So we muddled along, with my adoring Beans and only tolerating Simon to the best of my ability. Man did that dog try my patience.
Then we became foster parents, and Simon got his chance to shine.
Simon absolutely loved children. Adored them. To his dying day he never really had much use for adults, but man did he love kids. He was patient beyond anything I could imagine. Beans is insanely patient too, but Simon was something else. He was made to be a therapy dog for kids in need.
I’ve already described how, when Kiddo came to us, she was a hot mess. There were days when she could acccept affection from no one other than Simon the Basset hound. It was to him she turned when she couldn’t stop crying. It was with him that she really learned to play and be silly. It was to him that she snuggled up at night when she felt sad and lonely. The two of them were absolutely and utterly inseparable. She would fall asleep on top of him, and he never minded being squished because she was His Kid.
When Brother was with us briefly, he was very aggressive toward the dogs. Both dogs got kicked, hard, and Beans had a knife held to her throat. Yet neither dog has ever reacted out of anger or fear toward any child. Somehow they knew that Brother was a child and that he was troubled, and they just endured it all. I know not all dogs would have behaved as our two did, and no dog should be subjected to mistreatment from anyone, but glory be, our two dogs were saints about it all. I’ve always been a dog person, but never fully appreciated their merits until I became a foster parent and I saw what they could put up with and how much healing they could do just by being themselves.
Losing Simon at age 14 – which is an extraordinarily old age for a Basset hound – was unbelievably gut wrenching. It wasn’t hard because I would miss him, it was hard because I knew it was going to absolutely shatter Kiddo‘s heart when he died.
She still carries around a favorite stuffed animal, which is a Basset hound named Slimy, everywhere she goes. She has photos of her Slimy up in her room, and has a portrait I once painted of him on her wall. She talks about him. She misses him terribly. Thank heavens she still has Beans whom she has bonded with a lot more since Slimy‘s death, but no one will ever replace that short, stubborn, long-eared dog in her heart.
Now, I don’t want to short change the cats here. I think by nature most cats are less tolerant of kids’ antics than dogs, but we have some pretty extraordinary cats. Le Shittén in particular seems to have endless patience with them. She tolerates being picked up and hauled around, squished and kissed. Our obese fluffy tiger cat Pippin is really good with the kids too, and particularly bonded with Mouse who was more cat person than dog person. She used to squeal with delight when he’d enter the room, and he’d give us “you’re lucky I love her” looks as she squeezed him round the middle with her hugs.
Honestly, our foster parenting journey would be very different if it weren’t for the pets. I’m grateful for the fun, playfulness, snuggles, and patience our critters exude every day.
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