Chloe

The definition of Chloe is energetic, protective, scared, affectionate, and sometimes or most of the time angry. That's my dog's name. Chloe has been the best early birthday gift anyone has given me in my life. I had always wanted to have a dog but my mom never agreed, my dad was a more flexible person but still I could never convinced my mom. But one day everything changed. My mom's co-worker had a lot of chihuahuas. Her dog had had a litter of dogs but she couldn't support them anymore so she suggested to my mom that if she didn't want to adopt one. It's been 5 years now and for me Chloe is like my daugther and I can't be separated from her for a single day. These 5 years have given me experience on how to take good care of a pet since they are a great responsibility. In this blog entry I’m going to explain how I convinced my mom to keep my dog; then, I'll share the challenges and difficulties of owning a dog for the first time; and lastly, why it is better to adopt dogs than to buy them.

When my mom's coworker asked her if she could adopt one of her puppies because she couldn't support them anymore, my mom immediately said no. The next day she told me, and I convinced her to adopt a dog, but with the condition that we were only going to have it for a while and then we would find a better home for her. When they went for Chloe and I saw her it was love at first sight. She and I had a connection from the beginning. From day one we became inseparable. Obviously I was not going to give my little dog up for adoption again, so I told my mom to please keep her. Even though my mom never had pets, she had also taken a liking to Chloe so it was easy to convince her. Every time Chloe gets into a mischief my mom usually jokes that I just cheated on her and that we were supposed to only have her for a few days, so it became a joke between us.

Chloe was my first pet so it was hard to know what to do at first. When she came home with us, she was so little. We had to mush her food so she could eat it because the kibble was too big for her. If you have pets, especially a dog, you will know that in their adolescent stage they become chaotic. We couldn't leave the house for even a couple of hours because Chloe had already bitten all of my mom's shoes. I even got desperate for a while because Chloe got too destructive. I remember once my mom had just bought some heels and it didn't take two days for them to end up destroyed and bitten. But there was a reason why Chloe was behaving this way. Dogs get to a stage where their teeth are very itchy and biting into something relieves the itching, which is why Chloe became so destructive. It was new to learn everything involved with having a dog without counting how expensive it can be to take them to the vet. Right now my mom spends 300 quetzales every month to buy her premium food the vet prescribed for her to improve her health. So before having a dog it is better to think about all the responsibilities that are required to have one.

I have never liked the idea of buying dogs and profiting from their lives, especially the females. Animal cruelty also comes into this. Many people only use their dogs as machines to make puppies and profit from them. The exploitation is so much that the poor dogs get uterine cancer for the same reason. Chloe, despite the fact that her mother is a pure Chihuahua, she was different from all her siblings. Chloe is a Chihuahua mix with another dog, which means she is a mixed breed. Many people always make fun and comments that my dog is not "pretty" just because she is not a purebred. Which is super shallow and gross to me. Many people prefer to buy expensive dogs just for approval and to fight who has the most beautiful and expensive dog. This bothers me a lot since there are many dogs who want to a second chance to be happy and live without fear of being run over or that one day they will be poisoned by cruel and evil people. We must not profit from the lives of our pets. The best solution to this is to sterilize our dogs and not make money with animals that cannot make these decisions for themselves.

Although Chloe has been a great challenge for me, I would not change her for anything or anyone. She has been a great support to me in many ways. Many people believe that loving a pet as a family member is stupid. But they don't understand that animals deserve love and respect like everyone else in the world. If someone has the opportunity to adopt, believe me, it will be the best decision of their life. Those dogs will give you all their love unconditionally without expecting anything in return.