All in One Week's Time: A New Home, a Chewed-Up Husband and a Grandbaby (A True Story)

Oh joy, we had finally sold our house in the city of strife (another hub for another day) and moved to our new home in the country. Oh, how serene. We were so looking forward to just coming and going back and forth to work and home, minding our own business and keeping a low profile, after what we had been through living in the city of strife. So, now we are here, on our very first day!

The front garage was full of unpacked boxes, so I started unpacking the dishes, as we would need them right away. My husband was outside setting up invisible fencing for our dogs, a little Jack Russell named Cookie, and a half Chow/Shar Pei named Bear, who was ten years old. Obviously, our new home did not have a fence to contain the dogs, so we thought the best thing to do until we could get a fence was try the invisible fencing out.

Earlier that morning, my husband went a few houses down to a person who groomed dogs, as Bear’s hair was so thick, the collar would not fit. Bear wagged his fluffy tail and went to this other family’s home, who had numerous dogs, and Bear was just as happy as he could be. Our children grew up with Bear, and when we sold our house in the city, we did not even have to worry about Bear bothering any of the people who came to look at our house when it was up for sale.

Now, Cookie, the little Jack Russell, who thinks she is a big dog, apparently, can be ferocious when she wants. One time in the city, for some strange reason we had an otter to get into our back yard. I am assuming that was due it having had rained so hard for so long, the large drainage ditches running through the neighborhood were overflowing, the otter must have come up through the sewer system. But sure enough, Cookie chased that otter with its large fangs, and where was Bear during this whole time? Well, he was back in the corner of the yard scared to death.

So, anyway, back to the putting up of the dishes. My husband had already returned from getting Bear’s neck shaved. My husband put Cookie in the front garage until he could get Bear ready to go. Well, while I was standing on a kitchen chair putting the dishes in the cabinets, I kept hearing this faint sound in the distance. What is that sound? Well, I continued on with the putting up of the dishes, and there is that faint sound again. I thought again, what is that sound? I stopped putting up the dishes and strained to hear and it sounded as if someone was screaming for help in the distance.

I stepped down from the kitchen chair and walked towards the back French door and opened it, and sure enough I could hear “HELP, HELP.” I walked out on to my deck and down the stairs and followed the sound of the screaming, which was coming from the side of our new home. As I turned to go in that direction, my eyes saw the most horrific sight I’ve ever seen in my life. It was like something straight out of a Stephen King novel or movie, as I saw my poor husband flat on his back, covered in blood, and Bear on top of him, also covered in blood, attempting to chew my husband’s right arm off of him!!! It was just like that movie Cujo.

I just froze and then screamed, “Bear!!!” And Bear looked up at me, but that was not the Bear I knew, his eyes were like the eyes of a demon or something. I knew right then if I even tried to walk over there, I, too, would be chewed up! Thankfully, I had my cell phone in my pocket and it had really great reception that day. Praise the Lord!!!

The Sheriff, local police chief, Fire Rescue and the Paramedics showed up just within five minutes, which is a miracle, as most of them are volunteers and happened to be on duty that day! If we were still in the city, my husband would have bled to death by the time anyone showed up.

Once they arrived, I ran out of the front of our house to the side where my husband was lying and just dropped on my knees on the ground before the Lord and started praying out loud for His mercy.

They could not get Bear off of my husband no matter what they tried. They even used a Taser weapon on the poor dog, and he still would not release from my husband. Then finally for some unknown reason, Bear just let go and jumped right through the invisible fencing, which was still on, and started running around the neighborhood, all covered in blood, where children were at play. I will not go into details about that for the sake of all animal lovers.

Turns out what happened was, when my husband turned on the invisible fencing, poor Bear just happened to be standing right in the zone, without any warning, and they believe he had a seizure in his brain.

Be warned, if you are thinking of using the invisible fencing, be sure your dog is not an aggressive dog breed. We read that in the instructions, but in our minds we NEVER thought of Bear as an aggressive dog, as the whole time our children were growing up, their friends would come over to our home and swim. When we had our home up for sale, the realtors and people interested in buying our home, would walk right back into the backyard with not one peep out of Bear. So, we were shocked to say the least. Although Bear was not an aggressive dog, he was a breed of dog that is considered to be aggressive.

Our other dog, Cookie, the Jack Russell,

does just fine with the invisible fencing and

we have never had any problems with her.

Finally, the paramedics decided to take my husband to a hospital in another county, as that hospital has an infectious disease specialist. So, I ran back into my house to get my purse as I was going to ride with him in the ambulance. When I came out, everyone was gone, including my husband in the ambulance. I had no clue where or how to get to that hospital in the other county. The neighbors tried to tell me a ‘short cut” of how to get to the Interstate to go north to the hospital. I was so upset, that I really should not have been driving, much less trying to find my way around county roads that I have never been on before. After driving around and around to no avail, I realized I was getting nowhere and tried to make it back to my house or a familiar road. Once I finally got back to my street, I asked another neighbor the simplest way (no so-called short cuts) to get to the Interstate, and then it was no problem.

On the way to the hospital, for some reason, I started thinking about my husband when he was on the ground bleeding, and how calm he was, after having to call for help. I was just wondering what was going through his mind at that time. So, later I asked him just that – what was going through his mind after being chewed up by his own dog of ten years and how was he so calm. My husband is not known to be very calm. Anyway, my husband said that he while he was in the ambulance and earlier, he had been thinking about Jesus and his stripes that he bore for us. He thought, if Jesus could bear that for him, he knew he could bear those wounds and scars, and then he was so peaceful about it all.

I asked my husband if he wanted to move out of that house, as our first memory in our new home is a very bad one for sure! And he said, no, that he loves our new home and we are here for a reason.

Oh, to top it off, our 17 year old grey-striped tabby cat never moved with us. She started freaking out several weeks before we even moved as she could sense something was going on when we started packing everything up and moving things around. She was an indoor/outdoor cat, and on the day we had the moving truck, she went outside and never returned that day. My daughter was so upset and said that we could not move without Kitty. My daugher had moved into an apartment in the city. So, that night we came back to the city to try to find her, and we saw her, but she did not want to come to us. So strange. Finally, we caught her, and she just scratched us up, we had to let go of her. Even my daughter tried to place her in her car and she just scratched my daughter up too. My daughter came back to our old house everyday to try to get her, and finally the new owners of our old house said Kitty was crying at the side kitchen door wanting to come in. So we set a cage trap and finally caught her, and she went to live with my daughter in the apartment. We learned the hard way that older pets do not move well to say the least!!!

My husband had to stay in the hospital for two or three days receiving IVs of very high-powered antibiotics to prevent infection. One night I came home very late to get some clean clothes, etc., and the whole house was dark and when I opened the front door, I heard a beeping noise and then the words, “Warning intruder alert!” I thought, now am I the intruder or is there one already here? The previous owners had supposedly had the alarm disconnected, and it had never gone off before then, but of course we had only been at the house a couple of days. Since we just moved in and had nothing on the walls or anything, and with the 12 foot ceilings and hardwood floors, everything seemed to echo and creak when I walked. We did not even have a chance to get the cable turned on or anything yet. I was so thankful Cookie, my dog, was there with me. If there had been a real intruder, she would have been going crazy barking. So, it was about 3:00 a.m. and I had to figure out how to stop the alarm, as I did not have a code or anything.

I called the alarm company and they said I had to disconnect it myself. I found one box where the battery was in the laundry room, and that was easy to disconnect, but the beeping kept on and on. Then the alarm company told me I had to go down into the basement as it must be wired into the electrical system in the walls. Well, we do not have a basement, but our home does sit up high, and it is just a creepy space underneath the house that one can walk in, but with no lights and spiders, etc. – NO WAY!!! I just happened to look down in the back foyer to the garage area and noticed a black little box in the wall socket, and that was it, thankfully. Only thing is, it was live electricity going through those wires. I somehow managed to get it unplugged without electrocuting myself. Praise the Lord!

Note: Since the writing of this article, I can’t believe our first Granddaughter Scarlett is now four years old, and we have since been blessed with another granddaughter named Lily, born April, 2010, who is now two as of this writing!

Story Continues:

So, off to the city to see my sweet granddaughter.

During labor, something went wrong and her little heart rate went too low, so she had to stay in the NICU for newborns for a couple of days. When the nurses where trying to hook my granddaughter up to all sorts of things, she was fretting a little, and so my son (whose voice she already knew) came over and talked to her softly and she claimed down right away. That was so sweet to see. It happened every time she started fretting from what the nurses were doing, she would immediately calm down when she heard my son’s voice.

That’s how it is when I hear our Heavenly Father’s voice, I just calm down immediately.

So for a couple of days or so, I had late night drives back up to our new home, and hour away.

One night I was so tired and the last stretch of road from one town to my town, there are train tracks along the left side of the road, but the tracks never cross the main road going from one town to our town. In the distance, I could see that a train was coming, and in my head I started singing that Johnny Cash song, “I Hear That Train A Coming” and I knew that whenever a train crosses a side street junction, it blows its whistle.

It was so dark down that stretch of road, and I was so tired from that whole week, that I really was not thinking too clearly and my eyes were so blurry, and when the train and my car were about parallel to each other, guess what, the train must have crossed an intersection and blew its horn. Boy, you talk about waking me up and scaring me to death, as when you are that close to a train and it blows its horn, it is almost deafening!!! For a minute, I thought that the train was going to cross the road in front of my car, as I could not see the little side road in that pitch darkness. So I cried out “Lord!!!” and closed my eyes. Then a few moments later, feeling a little dumb, I opened my eyes, as I was still alive. Ha.

So, this is my story of what can happen in just one week’s time – a new home, a chewed-up husband and a grandbaby. How so very sweet of the Lord to bless us with our beautiful first grandbaby at the end of that week! He is sweet like that, you know.

When I went back to work after being off that week due to the new home, chewed-up husband and a new grandbaby, everyone commented that usually major events in our lives happen over a period of time and not within just one week. That was a little over four years ago, and we have loved living here.

I have learned to not tell God (after I think I’ve had a little bit of a tough year),“Well, God, I know this next year just has to be a little easier!” No, no, no ---I do not even say one word about that, as He just laughs because He knows through trials and tribulations our character is being developed and we are becoming stronger and stronger – just to prepare us for the next trial and to glorify Him, once we have made it through the trial. I once heard Kay Arthur on Faith Radio say, “Suffering is the pathway to glory.” What? But I understand perfectly what she means by that statement, now.

“Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you will be mature and complete, not lacking anything. Blessed is the man who perseveres under trial, because when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.” James 1:2-4 (Emphasis added.)

Wow, not lacking anything ---I know I have a long way to go to be perfected, and I am ready. I am just so glad He is not finished with me yet!!!

We are only here for a very short while,

so when He is ready to call me home to

my true home, Heaven,

I can only imagine how that will be!!!

@ Copyright Faith Reaper July 13, 2012 (All rights reserved)