Mom Doesn't Like Dogs

Mom doesn't like dogs, at least that's what she'd say to me when I was 6 and still naïve enough to ask for one. 'In our Haitian culture', she'd say, 'Dogs are not for pet. They serve. They help herd the sheep. They yell if there are thieves and intruders in the house. But das et!' For as long as I can remember this has been one of our central conflicts. The idea of having a dog for 'fun' was foreign to her; a wholly American concept coming from her increasingly American daughter. Over the years, I'd tiptoe my way into her good graces, putting on my sweetest voice, to stealthily broach the topic. But Mom was never one to budge on any of her strongly held positions.

The dog fight was just one of many fronts in which we'd find ourselves on opposing sides. The melodrama of our mother-daughter dynamic kept us tightly bound in frequent misunderstanding. Mom didn't understand my urge to break through the safety nets she built around me at home and in church. And I didn't understand her perpetual insistence on 'right way to be'. She preferred me to be a 'classic' quiet kid with soft girlish giggles and polite sensibilities. But I was adventurous and rambunctious, preferring to play rough with the little boys. My father was the other recurring source of tension. He was just Dad to me, but to her, was the man who'd left her to raise me by herself after having an affair with her best friend. That betrayal had shattered my mother before I ever really knew her and left behind a fog of resentment that seeped through the walls and clogged the airways of every tiny one bedroom we shared. At night, I'd pray that some magical being could just sprinkle us with fairy dust and transform us into Lorelai and Rory from Gilmore Girls. But with the absence of any nearby fairygodmothers, I set my sights on a dog, one with the kind of family-healing properties I'd seen in movies like Airbud and Beethoven.

I learned to keep a lot of secrets as a kid, seeing it as the best way to avoid conflict with Mom. I carried this habit long into adulthood, keeping parts of my life, particularly my love life, a secret from my mother. And so when I was 25 and met Mark a stocky quick-witted Psychology teacher, I was hopeful for a real future together. But I'd sooner tell the cashier at the CVS about him before I told my own mother. When Mom brought up the topic of my love life, I'd swat away her questions with silly answers. " You know it's time. You're 25 now. You can find a nice man, give me some grandbabies. I need four." To which I'd respond : "I'll go to Costco and see if I can I can pick one of those things up. Can't make any promises though." But after what unfolded those two years with Mark, I started to re-evaluate which secrets I kept. My image of true love had been decimated by Mark's frequent bouts of cruelty, insinuations that I was weak, and manipulations and deceptions obscured by intermittent kindnesses sprinkled in between. The end of the relationship found me lying naked on his bed as he told me he didn't love me. The shame and anguish of that relationship had buried itself deep in my nervous system and had thrown me into rotating carousel of panic, depressive, and dissociative episodes. But I still couldn't bring myself to tell Mom.

A few months after Mark and I split and a few days after my 27th birthday, she paid an unexpected visit to the apartment I lived in at the time, a cozy Upper West Side duplex I shared with two roommates. I was home alone that day and woke up to the sound of the sharp buzz of the doorbell. Thinking it was a delivery driver, I pushed aside the pile of clothing sitting on top of my comforter and walked over the guitar lying facedown on the floor and made my way to the door only to see my mother standing in hallway. We locked eyes for a brief second before I started to panic.

"What are you doing here? I told you not to come".

"You said you passed out. You don't expect me to come. I have to come check on you. Are you ok?"

"Yes, I texted you that I was fine now. You didn't need to come. You can't just show up here!"

Her worry was warranted. The stress of the past few months had found enough force to swiftly knock me off my feet that afternoon. I regained consciousness quickly and texted Mom just in case of another episode. But after several glasses of water and some deep breathing exercises, I decided I was fine and texted her again, wanting her to think so too. But as she proudly declared from the hallway, "I'm a Haitian mother. You are my child. I'm not going to just stay at home". I should've figured as much. As Mom began to walk in towards the door of my bedroom, I quickly slid my body between her and the door, blocking her entrance.

"You don't need to come here. I just got back from Colombia. The room is messy. I don't feel well. I can't do this right now."

We continued back and forth for a few more minutes. As our voices grew louder, a barking noise started to sound from behind my bedroom door. Mom asked what that sound was. I shrugged it off, reaching for the door knob . I quickly opened the door just wide enough to slide through the doorway and closed the door. Thinking I'd locked the door behind me, I made a beeline for the bed to muffle the source of the bark. "I'm fine. I promise. Please go." I yelled from the under the comforter. The bark echoed behind me. As it turned out, I had not locked the door. Mom walked right in and that's when she met Bailey, the source of the bark and the dog I had secretly been fostering for the past month.

I'd been on the list for the Animal Care Centers of New York for almost a year when I saw an e-mail requesting for a two -week foster home for a small 10-pound black schnauzer with a mean case of kennel cough. At the time, I felt like I was running on a pack of dollar-store triple A batteries and held together with old pieces of duct tape. I wasn't sure this was a good time to take on much of anything. But something told me, Bailey would be good for me. She'd taken to me almost instantly, calmly walking out the doors of the shelter and nuzzling herself into the back seat of my Nissan. I thought it was just her relief to be escaping the overcrowded shelter. But I like to think that she'd recognized something familiar.

Mom looked at Bailey and turned her eyes back up towards me. "A dog! What is this and all this mess. C'mon girl. It's time to grow up. You don't need a dog. You need a man. You need to prepare for kids. You're 27 now."

Bailey's continued valiantly defending my honor. I could always count on her to bring a pleasant bit of chaos. She went hysterical every time the doorbell rang. She had a peculiar habit of barking at men perhaps due to her strong feminist leanings. And she could never resist the urge to reach for random scraps of food lying on the sidewalk. But most times, she was sweet and gentle, curling herself up into a tiny warm ball on my lap, never wanting to be a part from me from too long. On her first night, I'd laid out an old blanket for Bailey to sleep on, prepared to enforce a strict "no dogs in the bed rule". But as I lay my head down, I could hear Bailey softly whining and pawing at the side of my bedframe. As I looked over, I met her sweet dark brown eyes gently requesting that she sleep beside me. She just wanted to feel safe. And I did too.

After that day, I didn't see my mom again until three months later. I was moving into a new apartment and she'd come to help me with the move. As soon as she walked in, Bailey immediately began to bark, eyes set squarely at Mom, Mom looking back straight at Bailey, the two of them squared up like they were a part of some old Western stand-off. As we shuffled boxes into the moving van, I asked Mom to hold Bailey so that she wouldn't follow me out the doors. Mom's distaste furrowed on her brows as she declared flatly: "I don't hold dogs!" Mom made no secret of her disapproval of Bailey and her desire for me to focus on "more important" things. But after much of my pleading, she reluctantly agreed, holding Bailey in her hands stretched a few feet away from her body.

When we arrived in the new apartment, I could feel the anxiety festering in my chest, but tried to conceal it as I handed Mom a set of blue ceramic bowls to put away. She insisted it putting them above the stove. The anxiety had reached ballooned . Stifling tears, my voice cracked, I sighed and said: "Just please, don't make this hard for me. Please put them where I asked". It had come out more emotional than it should've. And so, I braced myself for Mom to respond defensively, arguing her point of view on the proper placement of the kitchenware. But instead she softened her voice saying "Sorry, I'm trying to listen more." Maybe it was her guilt from having made me upset during her last visit or the fact that we hadn't talked since then. But evenso, for her it was a curious and quite uncharacteristic response. Mom is trying to listen? My mom? I peered at her confused, but decided not to press further and went back to unpacking.

For the next few weeks, Bailey and I bounced around between the new apartment and Mom's house shuffling stuff around. On one of the days, I'd forgotten to bring dog food with me. I asked Mom to heat up some white rice and leftover beef we had in the fridge. "I don't want to cook for dogs!", she yelled from the kitchen. I grunted loudly in annoyance. But fifteen minutes later, Mom walked into the living room carrying a small dish in her hands. She quickly glanced at me as if to say "Don't ask me to do this again" and placed the bowl down in front of Bailey. Bailey enthusiastically devoured the food. When Bailey was done, she placed herself right at Mom's feet, perching her face up and licking her lips. The seriousness had melted off of Mom's face as a small smirk formed on her lips. "Look at that. The dog likes my food!" Mom playfully licked her lips back at Bailey, who responded by licking her lips once more. Mom let out a big laugh. When I woke up the next morning, I found Bailey and my mother sitting in the kitchen, Mom leaning over the counter eating a bowl of cereal and Bailey, at Mom's feet, lying down head eagerly turned upwards. I explained to Mom that Bailey's posture was her request to have her belly rubbed. And much to my surprise, Mom bent down to gently pat Bailey's stomach. I giggled watching their interaction, Mom maintaining her covert smirk, Bailey with her tongue falling out of her mouth in satisfaction.

In another unexpected visit, my mom had stopped by my apartment with several large containers of rice and beans, potato salad and fish to fill my dangerously empty fridge. She even offered to do a load of laundry. At another time, I'd have probably made some fuss about her overstepping her bounds and undermining my newly solidified adulthood. But with the mental toll of daily tasks feeling higher than they'd ever been, I didn't mind the extra set of hands. I simply said thank you as she began to fix me a plate of food. When Mom walked in , Bailey rushed to the door to greet her, circling her feet, licking her hands, almost losing her breath with excitement. This was how she usually greeted me. Mom turned to me and said :

"I brought food for the dog".

"Well look at what we have here. You are now delivering food to the dog."

"My cooking's better than whatever you're feeding her anyways."

A few hours later, Mom suggested that we walk Bailey. As the three of us walked down towards the Brooklyn Bridge, I told Mom how much I appreciated her help. She acknowledged my gratitude and stopped as we approached the sidewalk crossing.

"Your auntie told me I need to pray for you." This was the Haitian mom bat symbol for 'Something's wrong'. "I don't know everything, but if you want, you can tell me what happened."

I paused for a second, debating whether or not to deflect with humor or ignore the question altogether. But I decided that I didn’t need to keep this secret from her anymore. When we got back to the apartment, I sat down with Mom, rocking Bailey in my arms as I started to tell her what I'd been through the past year - the dehumanizing things that the Mark had said and done to me, the emotional abuse, the breakup, and the CPTSD diagnosis that I had received a few weeks prior. Mom sat very still as the avalanche of this disclosure settled onto her face heavy with sorrow. She let out a big sigh and placed her hand gently over my shoulder: "I never imagined that you were going through all of this." I hadn't even realized I'd been crying as the the shock returned to my body. I had never imagined it either. Bailey wiggled under my arms and started to get in position for a belly rub, breaking the tension, bringing much needed air back into the room. "It's going to be ok", Mom said to me placing her other hand down on Bailey. Before she left that night, she said to me, "I am sorry. I think you know how I felt now too. I am so sorry Honey". I let that sit heavy between us for a moment. We both understood now.

Over the next few months, Mom made frequent visits, coming to check in and bring copious amounts of homecooked meals I could never finish. Bailey would always enthusiastically scurry to the door awaiting the special dog meal Mom would always cook just for Bailey. It seemed that whenever I left them alone, I'd come back to find Mom playing with Bailey, often speaking as Bailey's inner monologue : "See I don't like the gross dog food Tabitha makes me eat. I like your food Grandma. I always like what you give me." While I couldn't vouch for the accuracy of this statement, I could see a tenderness and playfulness growing between Bailey and Mom. Bailey was family now too. The three of us went on walks together, sat on the couch to watch movies, and even date meals together. Mom even offered to watch her when I went on trips. When Bailey had gotten sick after drinking dirty water on a hike, Mom called me to tell me that she had been praying for Bailey.

"Never in my life would I thought I'd be praying for a dog. But I pray for her to get bet better."

"And you don't even like dogs!"

" Well you know...I like Bailey. I like her for what she did for you. I can see that in this time, the dog has been a therapy for you. And I appreciate her for what she's done. "

Mom was right. Bailey transformed everything seemingly overnight. Her unconditional love had brought a calming reassurance through many hard days. Our regular walks turned into adventures around Brooklyn with Bailey's curious nose leading the way and pulling me towards new smells, sites, and sounds. Perhaps, it was Bailey that had come with an assignment to take care of a human. But even more, Bailey had brought something to both Mom and me that I couldn't quite describe, something wrapped in laughter and fondness and friendship. And whatever it was, it was helping all of us. Mom ended the call saying :

"I love you and Bailey loves you."

"And you love Bailey."

"Well Two -legs or Four-legs - if they're a good friend to you, they're my friend too."