It's a New Year

2016. I've been blogging for 3 years.  Things have changed a LOT in 3 years. I have changed a lot in 3 years.

Life is different now.  Jack will be 9 months old soon. That blows my mind.  Welcoming him into our lives has been amazing. It has changed everything.  He is my life now, there's no way around that. Before Jack I always kind of hated it when people said this but it's true: Until he came along I honestly did not know I could love someone this much. Or in this way. I truly live my life for him right now. Everything is for him; to give him new experiences, to teach him things (teach him EVERYthing), to make his life the best it can be.  I find myself viewing the world through his eyes now: the wonderment, the excitement. This is the best thing I have ever done.  We've had a tough few years but everything we've been through has led up to this. And I am so grateful. I am lucky to be his mom. I am so lucky to be able to witness every single change and growth. He is simply amazing and I honestly love him more and more every single day.

[I should have put a "warning: mushy" caution on that last paragraph.]

It's not without it's difficulties though. Hubs and I have come out of (what I hope is) the worst of the haze. The depression and anxiety... We're both on meds that seems to be working well enough for us and we're both still seeing therapists weekly. Soon we'll be joining one another at each others therapy sessions too. We both have a lot of shit to deal with and we also need to work on our marriage. I told my therapist that I was upset because our relationship felt like it was changing and she made a good point, saying: "Well, it's not just the two of you anymore. You've added another person into your relationship - why wouldn't it change?" She's right. It's really unrealistic of me to think that things would be the same between us when everything else in our lives has changed so much.

Which brings me to the next big topic which I honestly don't even know how broach so I'm just gonna say it: We put our dog down the week before Christmas.  I am heartbroken about it. Honestly I feel numb. He went after Jack. As in, tried to attack him :-( He has always had an aggressive temperament, even as a tiny pup, and has bitten people before.  He got much much worse after Jack came. We were living with gates and crates and separation through most of the house and had worked with multiple trainers and behavioral specialists over the years. And every single one of them (including his Vet) said it was in his DNA and wasn't trainable. We didn't want to believe them.  Then a few weeks ago he went after Jack.  I thank God that I was right there. I was on the floor between them and saw him start to bare his teeth in the way I've seen before, right before he's about to attack, and I pushed him out of the way to cover Jack with my body.  My dog attacked me instead. It was violent. It was scary. And it felt like it lasted a long time as I just allowed myself to be attacked as I laid over my son, protecting him. The doctor said if I hadn't been wearing so many layers for him to rip through (bra, t-shirt and sweatshirt) he could have very easily punctured a lung.  I have healed now but I will have scars.  In a way I am happy for the scars because despite what happened we loved that dog. And in a weird twisted way, it's something to remember him by. I miss him. I'm sad that it came to this. I'm sad he wasn't adoptable. I'm sad the aggression wasn't trainable. I'm sad we had to say goodbye.  But I also look at Jack and am so unbelievably grateful that he is safe and there's no option for an accident like that to happen again. It was like keeping a loaded gun in the house - there was no way to tell when he would go off. It was too dangerous.  I miss him though. And choosing to euthanize him brought back a whole flood of emotions and memories from when we had to choose to end our first baby's life. Sigh. It was all too similar. It's too much power. I hate the feeling.

Honestly it's hard for me to believe our pup is gone. It's been two weeks and I still feel like he's just not here right now and we're going to go pick him up later from the vet or groomer or wherever. It's surreal to see your beloved dog go from strong and healthy one moment to then have to remember that he's no longer living.  He was our first dog. A corgi.  We did a lot of research and got him specifically because corgis are known for being great family dogs, especially with small children.  Unfortunately, we got one who wasn't. We loved him though. He always had issues and we made accommodations so his life was as good as it could be despite his problems. But once Jack came it couldn't be all about him anymore. And I could no longer eliminate all the situations that made him anxious and nervous. How do you tell an 8 month old baby that you can't touch the dog, that you can't look directly into his eyes because it will make him so nervous he'll attack you? Sigh. I'm just sad.  That pup got me through a lot of hard times; through the years of infertility, through saying goodbye to Petey, through Jack's dwarfism diagnosis, through depression and loneliness...  He was always here. For 4.5 years. I worked from home for much of that time and he was my constant companion.  I miss him.  Things are lonelier around here. Now it's just me and Jack and I feel it.

Besides that things are okay.  I'm concerned about winter because I have always had Seasonal Affective Disorder and now I will be mostly stuck indoors with a baby for the next few months. I'm still battling my PPD and PPA so I'm worried with SAD added in I may have a rough winter.  Now that the holidays are over I'm thinking of looking into volunteering one or two days a week somewhere.  Quite honestly I feel sort of useless now that I'm a SAHM. I know I am raising my child and that is so significant and important to me, and I am so grateful we are able to swing it financially so I don't have to work too, but in the monotony of everyday life I get bored. And lonely. And depressed. I need to do something with myself and have a reason to put on real pants everyday and maybe even some makeup, ha.

It's a new year. It feels kind of like a new life for me now. And I don't know where this blog will go from here. It has been an important part of my past few years but I don't know if it has a place in my future or not.

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Happy New Year!