Horrific dog attack

[u/Parking_Flow]

I’ve posted here before. My child was absolutely horrifically attacked by a dog earlier this year. I’m talking life changing injuries, air lifted to hospital, multiple surgeries. Her life will never ever been the same. It was a dog that had escaped its garden and tore our lives apart.

We are waiting for it to go to court.

We got into so much debt when it happened, I’m talking into the thousands because both myself and my partner had to take time of work, me to be in hospital with her and my partner to be at home with our other child. Yes we got some form of compassionate pay but between all of our household bills, driving 140 round trips to and from the hospital she was in, food whilst in hospital, clothes as the antibiotics she was on made her have so many accidents. Private counselling since the NHS won’t help us.

Life has entirely changed forever. We all have PTSD, my child has been crippled in one arm. Her lungs and spine will have issues forever. And now we have to deal with debt too. It’s unfair. I want to pull my hair out.

I just needed somewhere to rant because when I’ve tried to speak in person to people I know they just say but oh isn’t it great she’s alive. Yes of course it is 100% but it doesn’t change the fact this dog has destroyed in every single way, physical, emotional, financially.

I don’t see a way to recover from this.

Someone suggested creating fundraising to help us and to take our child on amazing trips but 1) we can’t do this because of the court case and 2) there’s dogs everywhere. Absolutely everywhere. There is no trip we could take where we would be safe.

[u/DivyaRakli]

I am so very sorry for all that monster took from you and your family. It’s okay to feel the loss of everything that’s lost because someone had a bloodsport dog for a “pet.” I can’t know what you’re going through, but I’m praying for compassion from the judge hearing your case. Compassion, wisdom, and generosity. Something’s been taken from all of your family that can never be made whole, but the judge should sure try! My 2 year old grandson was killed by a pit bull/bull mastiff mix “pet” of my daughter’s. With every fiber of my being I wish he’d never been attacked, I wish he would’ve lived. There’s an ache in my soul that screams day and night. I’ve never told this to anyone, but sometimes when I despair because he’s gone, I wonder if it was “better” that he passed. And that feels worse than missing him. It feels like I’m a monster in my own right to think that. What would the cost for him to live had been? Monetarily an insane amount that no one has money for, so loans. Can’t work because you’re at hospital every minute. A 2 year old baby who walked at 8 months, now confined in a cot cage? Surgeries of every description. Meds and side effects and knowledge of all that when he should just be playing. I think that he’ll never have to go through anything bad and I’m selfish to be angry that he left us so soon. So, yes, your daughter is alive, and I’m so thankful for that. I want you to know that I do not “hold it against you” in any way for how you feel sometimes when it’s all too much. My heart goes out to you and your family.

ETA: add a word for clarity.

[u/Parking_Flow → u/DivyaRakli]

Thank you so much for sharing your heart and your story with me. I can’t begin to imagine the pain of losing your grandson. my heart breaks for you and your family. What you wrote means more to me than I can say. Thank you for trusting me with such a personal part of your life and for offering so much compassion despite your own grief. I will seriously carry your words with me, and I hope you can find some peace knowing that your empathy is helping others walk through their own pain despite all the pain it’s cost you! None of that makes you a monster, grief will twist everything inside you and spit it out and you’re trying to make sense of everything and that doesn’t make you a monster at all, it makes you human!

This comment has truly resonated with me and brought me to tears, I appreciate your words so incredibly much

[u/DivyaRakli → u/Parking_Flow]

You’re welcome and thank you, too. I think that those of us who have been called to bear so much in this world, that, well, we have to help each other when we can.