Birdie came into our lives in December, 2001 after we tried for over a year (unsuccessfully) to have a baby. (I will write more about our infertility trials and tribulations in another post). Birdie's owner, Beth, had recently died of a brain tumor. Beth was a vet-tech and had a soft heart - she adopted over 5 wonderful dogs who were going to be euthanized, Birdie being one of them as her breeder brought her in to the vet as a puppy to be killed because she "had something wrong with her" - she had diabetes insipidus, the water diabetes. It's a very rare disease but with medication, she could function normally.
Ron and I were heart-broken over not being able to conceive so when we heard about Birdie needing a new home, we went to go meet her - I fell instantly in love! She was so petite and quite adorable, smaller than most Australian Shepherds. She was a little leery of Ron at first but soon grew to love him and he was nuts about her.
We went a little kookie over Birdie, as everyone should with their furry companions. We took her to obedience classes; bought yearly permits to our county's Forest Preserves, many of which have these wonderful dog parks. She went every where with us and I firmly believe that having her in our lives made us more relaxed and took our minds off of our infertility problems. The yearning for a child was so strong that in the spring, we decided to try going the egg-donation route, which is another long journey in itself. There are months and months of preparation and protocol which must be followed and we were willing to do it...however, like the saying goes, "God Works in Mysterious Ways" and something else happened...
