I'm Rose and this is our story of heartbreak, grief, love, chance, faith, hope, and signs from above.

On 10/29, she came in to work as a stray, but I wasn't working that day. For context, I'm a technician at a veterinary clinic. The next day, I came in for work and a coworker asked if I had seen her yet. Because they all know I adore senior Chihuahuas. I excitedly said "What?! No I haven't!" That coworker brought her up from the kennels and I saw her and thought "Oh my God, she's cute". I snuggled her and gave her some love. I knew she was a senior right away and figured she'd have a raging heart murmur and horrible teeth. The veterinarian who sees all of my babies took a quick peek at her....and I was right about both. She had a grade 3/6 heart and her teeth were basically only being held in by tartar. I was told that she wasn't microchipped and no one had claimed her yet.

I was already thinking about taking her home with me, but it had only been a month and a half since we suddenly lost our sweet little Willie to aspiration pneumonia. I always said that I adopted Willie and his sister, Gracie, too soon after we lost my soulmate, Moe Man, to CHF in 2022. We adopted them only 2.5 months after we lost Moe and I always felt guilty for comparing Willie to him, as if Willie should be more like Moe. But truthfully, I loved Willie for who he was and it wasn't his fault that I adopted him too quickly after Moe. Now this girl came to me only 1.5 months after Willie, even less time. And my heart is still so broken. I've barely had any time to grieve Willie. Life has been so busy lately and we didn't plan on adopting another dog any time soon. Going from 2 dogs back to 3, especially when this new girl would need a lot of TLC, was really not something we could handle.

We also werent financially able to handle her. We had barely started paying off the $5k of debt we went into when Willie was hospitalized because we were trying to save him. We were not mentally or financially ready to adopt another. But something was holding me back from saying no. Was it that fact that she looked EXACTLY like our Baby Buggie from behind, who passed in 2023? Was it the fact that she was "creamy colored", just like Willie and Buggie were? We always called them our "Creamy Babies".

I told our clinic manager that I wanted to at least think about it, so she posted her on our Facebook page in hopes of finding her owner because she was clearly well-fed and clean, even needed to lose a few pounds. I visited with her over my lunch break and took videos and pictures to send to my husband. He agreed that she was adorable and it was too soon, but we'd obviously take her if we needed to.

Days went by and no one claimed her. I searched all of the Lost Pet Facebook pages I could, but no one posted about her. I mostly stayed away from her kennel in the back because we were so busy and I was trying not to fall in love with her anyway. My clinic manager told me she was going to make it easy for me and call the county to come take her, as we had waited the required amount of days for her "stray hold". The county would come take her to their shelter to be adopted out. I was sad and told her to give me a little more time.

She was a senior, needed xrays, bloodwork, a dental, needed to lose weight, and needed to be spayed. Who out there, other than us (lifetime senior Chihuahua caretakers), would actually do all of this for her? Who would take care of her as well as we would? Who was more equipped? The truth? Hardly anyone. We have always gone above and beyond for every single one of our babies and this little girl deserved that in her golden years as well.

I thought about it hard for a couple days and then I was sitting with Willie's sister, Gracie, eating ice cream (Willie's favorite) and I just busted up into tears. I miss him so much and the grief was overpowering. I decided his loss was still too raw and told my clinic manager the next day that it was just too soon after Willie. I was still hurting too much and I didn't want to blame the new girl for not being him or let her adoption keep me from grieving him.

The day after that, a Friday, the clinic manager asked us to give her a rabies vaccine because the county was coming to get her on Monday. I helped the doctor examine her and for some reason she didn't hear a heart murmur this time. She did, however, clearly have a bad collapsing trachea. We gave the rabies vaccine and I gave her some love and put her back in her kennel. After spending 5 minutes holding her for her exam, though, I felt horrible that she had to stay in a kennel for the weekend, lonely and sad. I figured, why not at least take her home to have my husband meet her and give her some love, just to see how it goes?

My manager approved and I took her home for the night without telling my husband. He already knew I had been thinking about her, but he also knew I told my manager we weren't ready. He really wasn't surprised at all that I brought her home and he immediately wanted to hold her. We gave her a toy and they played HARD that night. Her collapsing trachea was bad, but she just wanted to keep playing! We kept her in a larger pen in the guest bedroom because we didn't want her to meet our other 2 girls and stress them out unnecessarily since she was only visiting for the night. She was, of course, a sweetheart and already loved us. Especially me. She wanted to be stuck to me like glue.

The next day, I took her back to work with me and talked about how she did with my coworkers. I kept saying I wasn't sure yet, even though they were all joking around and saying "she's definitely coming home with you". My coworkers and I even started trying to think up possible names for her because most of our babies are named after certain themes. I wanted more time to think and this girl deserved a home for the weekend, so I asked my manager if she could spend the rest of the weekend with us. She said yes.

So, the new girl spent the weekend in the pen in the guest bedroom and we'd go in and visit her and my husband would play with her. I ended up calling her a "Fattie Pattie" because she was so chubby and silly. It stuck. Her new government name was Patricia. We kept noticing little mannerisms of hers that were EXACTLY like our previous babies that had passed. She was so playful like Goosie, who passed in 2020. She also knew exactly when mealtimes were and would not be quiet until you fed her, just like Goosie. She "did the spins" when she was excited, just like Willie. She looked so much like our Buggie. Her face looked like Willie, Buggie, and Moe Man all combined into one. She was clumsy and kind of air headed like Willie. She loved to look out the window like Moe Man. Every moment we spent with her was a new uncanny familiarity discovered.

I told my husband we really couldn't afford her and all he said was "HE will provide". I kept praying hard for my angel babies and God to give me a sign to tell me whether to keep her or let her go. We found a large, rotten canine tooth in her pen that fell out, which further showed us how badly she needed care and how expensive she would be. Sunday night, we decided to see how our other 2 girls, Gracie and Daisey, would do meeting her. They met, Daisey was mostly annoyed and aloof, as per usual. She's our original baby, so she's gone through this with 6 babies we've brought home after her. She was meant to be an only dog, but definitely didn't get her wish lol. Gracie was a little confused and annoyed, but was so used to being around Willie, she seemed to not mind very much. She mostly just didn't want this new girl up in her face. Valid. No one fought and there was a moment where Gracie and the new girl almost played together. They did the little "stare at each other and stomp/paw at each other really quickly" for like 2 seconds before Gracie walked away. It was adorable and melted my heart. New Girl just wanted someone to play with.

We spent some time with all 3 girls in the kitchen and I just couldn't stop crying. We really couldn't afford her and I missed Willie so much. I was so torn about this little girl. I knew Gracie was still grieving her brother, too, and it was so hard to see her around another dog that wasn't him. She loved him so much too. I. Was. Not. Ready. But here she was, how could I keep her from having a good home with us just because I wasn't ready? Did Willie, Buggie, Moe Man, and Goosie send her to us? Was SHE the sign and I was just to upset to see it? I thought back to my husband saying "HE will provide". I felt like I was being torn apart inside. It wasn't fair to her to adopt her when I was feeling this way. Even if we couldn't keep her, I owed it to her to try to get her placed in a rescue that was used to senior Chihuahuas, with a loving foster home, instead of in a kennel at a shelter. I knew of a bunch of Chihuahua-loving rescues.

I reached out my first couple contacts to see if they had any ideas, even to see if I could foster her and get her care covered while we decide whether we want to keep her. I reached out to the rescue we adopted Willie and Gracie from. I didn't hear back, which was strange, but I knew it was a BIG ask for someone to take her on even though we might still be the ones adopting her. I mean, I was basically asking someone to pay for us to spend time with her, right? One of my contacts had some ideas, but nothing concrete yet.

That day I asked my manager if the clinic would at least be willing to cover bloodwork and xrays for us to see what we were getting into. I figured the answer would be no, and it was. I decided I had to do it in order to make a decision, so Fattie Pattie was moved to my account, so I'd at least get the services at a discount. The doctor did a more thorough exam then and, for some reason, she did have a heart murmur, but now it only sounded like a grade 1/6 that only came and went. The doctor asked if I still wanted to do xrays, knowing that I had to pay for them myself, since her heart really didn't sound that bad. I said yes, absolutely, since I knew many other things could be caught by doing those xrays.

My coworker and I took one lateral view and were about to move onto the next when I saw something and said "wait, go back to that xray!" And there it was. It made my heart sink and my stomach drop. I said "Is that a f*cking microchip???" Excuse the language, but I just couldn't believe it. My coworker replied "Yes, it is". I immediately took her off the table and went to scan her and sure enough, a 9 digit number that could ruin everything popped up on that scanner.

I ran back to the card on her kennel with her info on it and the area where we would write a microchip number was blank. The first thing we do when a stray comes in is check them for a microchip. If she had one, we would've written it there. Since it was blank, one would assume she didn't have one, correct? Although most of the time in that spot, we'd write "no" or "none", but not always. I was shaking and tearing up with anger. I looked the microchip up in a universal system to see if it was registered, but it wasn't. We knew the manufacturer was AVID, though, so I called them. I was on hold for so long, fuming and crying, my coworkers were asking me what was wrong and all I could say was "she has a f*cking microchip". I was so mad and sad and upset that my coworker who originally took in the stray must have completely neglected to check her for a microchip, THE number one first thing you do! Either that or she didn't scan her right?? Needless to say, I was PISSED. I've gone through all of this stress, sadness, confusion, brought her to my HOME, had her meet my husband, meet my GIRLS, come to love her, for nothing?! All of this pain, for NOTHING?! The second I saw that microchip on the xray and felt it shred through me, I knew I wanted to keep her. She was MINE. And now I couldn't?!

A representative finally picked up, they said the microchip was not registered to anyone, but it was purchased by The City of Aurora. A city about 20 minutes away from our clinic. I felt a slight amount of hope that maybe since it wasn't registered, we'd never find her owner. Maybe the city didn't keep a record of the animal they implanted it in? Maybe, just maybe, they forgot to record it? I called the city. They transferred me to the shelter. Choking back tears, I explained the situation to them and gave them that 9 digit number. They had to look in their old system for it. But they had record of it. My heart sunk again. They said her name was "Itti Bitti", she was a 12 year old, tan, intact female Chihuahua. Yep, that was her. I died inside. They said she was brought in as a stray on 9-11-14 and they had her birth date as 9-11-13. The owner came to pick her up that same day. Full on crying now, I asked for the owner's information. I wrote down his name, address (which was in another town, farther away), and phone number. I asked if they ever don't give a pet back to their owner, and explained that she was obese, her teeth were rotting out, and her nails were curling into her paw pads. They said sometimes they don't, but every situation is different. I thanked them for the information. I hung up.

I told my coworkers she had an owner. I took a few minutes to try to collect myself, to no avail. I searched a Facebook page dedicated to lost pets in the city his address was in. She wasn't posted. I moved to the breakroom computer, which was a little more private, you know, in case I started yelling at this man or in case he told me he was coming to get her and I had a breakdown. I made the call. I dialed the other 10 numbers that had the potential to ruin everything. It rang once. Twice. A recording from Verizon picked up saying that the number had been transferred or disconnected. My heart did the tiniest jump of relief. I'd never been happier to hear a disconnected number recording in my entire life. I told my manager. I told my lead technician. She said that I've done my due diligence, there was no response on our Facebook post, I've searched all the sites, and his number is disconnected. We've waited the required stray hold days and she's considered abandoned. It's my right to keep her if that's what I want to do. My heart actually lept then. All of THIS was the sign I was praying so hard for. She was ours. She was home. That's one hell of a sign, if you ask me.

I immediately called the microchip company back and got her registered under our names to make it official. She was never actually registered to her previous owner, so it was a simple process. I brought her home that night, again without telling my husband. I pulled up in the driveway and texted me husband to "start recording". I could kind of see him through the window on his phone. I picked her up and walked in with her and said "Welcome, home, Pattie". And that was that. He was her Daddy, I was her Mama, and she had 2 new sisters.

We played. We gave her a little squeaky cloud toy someone had donated to the clinic after their sweet little baby that I helped care for passed away. It's become her "emotional support cloud". She's very happy now. She loves to snuggle. She loves to be brushed. She loves belly rubs and face pets. She loves treats. We think it's an absolutely hilarious coincidence that her old name was "Ittie Bittie" and now it's "Fattie Pattie" before we even knew what her old name was. We yell "Patricia!", for those familiar with that popular "Vine". Mama calls her "Pattie Cakes" a lot.

Now there's just the problem of paying for her. Fattie Pattie costs:

1. Her bloodwork and x-rays. ~$200

2. A dental cleaning with likely full mouth extractions, desperately. ~$700

3. Spay ~$500

4. The rest of her vaccines ~$100

5. We also would LOVE to do a DNA test and Age test to see if she's related to any of our other babies and confirm her age, as it sounds like the birthday we were given was just an estimate. This is just for fun and the last of our concerns. ~$220 if we get a Black Friday deal.

6. This is just our hope to get this debt taken care of and truly enjoy our time with our new family and be able to heal after William. His hospitalization bill was ~$4,900. Only extra funds after Pattie is taken care of, will we pay off Willie's bill. If anyone is kind enough to help with this, it would be much appreciated.

If you made it this far, thank you so much for listening. Even taking the time to read her story is so appreciated. ♥️ Patricia deserves to have the story of her new life out there!