I have the great privilege to live near both of my adult children. Each of the three households contains dogs as part of the family. In total, we have six dogs in our “family pack.” Cats, squirrels, and bunnies should be on the lookout when the pack is gathered in our backyard. My dog, Nikki, is the alpha of the pack—I’ll talk about her at some point, but, for the purposes of today’s article, I would like to introduce you to Tulip.

Her name is completely unsuited to her, but it came with her when my son Bryan adopted her from a Pit rescue agency. Yep, Pit. As in Pit Bull. Who knows why someone would choose the name Tulip for a Pit Bull? That might be a question to ponder at some point, but it isn’t the part of her I want to introduce you to.

You see, Tulip (who we also call Peanut or sometimes just Pretty) came to our pack with some baggage. We do not know the origin of her terror of humans, but it was bad. Really, really bad. The day the rescue agency dropped Tulip off to meet Bryan was the best day of Tulip’s life to date. She started her visit by trying to crawl under the car of the dog-foster person. Prospective adopters had already returned her four times. She was so afraid that all she would do was pace in a small corner of our backyard as close to the gate and the adjoining wall as she could get.

Pace, pace, pace.

Bryan just sat on the nearby retaining wall some twenty to thirty feet away and spoke quietly and calmly to her.

Pace, pace, pace.

And he talked and said her name and talked. And about every twenty minutes or so, he would move an inch or two closer.

Pace, pace, pace.

Talk, talk, talk.

Pace, pace, pace.

Talk, talk, talk.

For hours this went on. I tried to quell my fear that this, clearly very strong, clearly very skittish, dog might stop pacing and lunge at our patient son. I waited inside the house. And then the metamorphosis happened. Bryan had inched close enough and she sniffed his still hand. She calmed down and stopped pacing and expanded out of her corner. Six hours after being dropped off, she came into our home. It became very evident very quickly that Tulip had attached herself to our son.

Really attached herself.

I can’t say what triggered the change. Was it that she finally found a person she knew she could trust? Had she been so starved for affection that someone who treated her with compassion and kindness made her feel like she could fill that starved part of herself? Did she figure out that this patient young man wasn’t going to abandon her, again, as others clearly had? I wish she could tell us.

Now we call her the stalker. She can still do the pacing. She just does it when there is something keeping her away from Bryan. If he is sitting next to someone on a sofa, she inserts herself between them. If he leaves the house, she paces around a door or window until he returns. When she was younger, she used to chew the furniture when he went to work. She ate a sofa and a loveseat. Literally. I do not like to think about what might happen if anyone ever threatened Bryan. She has a beautiful sleek black coat and is incredibly strong. She can nearly clear our seven foot fence. She sometimes looks like a panther to me. She has a white line of fur marking her chest, and, ironically it ends at her belly with a heart shape. If you threatened my son and saw that marking, it might be the last thing you saw as she bowled you over. She sleeps as close to him as she possibly can, draping herself around his head like a scarf. When we spend family time together, wherever she is, her eyes are on him. We do not let others in the house without putting her out. It’s for their own safety.

She loves Bryan fully, fiercely, and unconditionally, and, while she can still be scary if she perceives a threat to him, she also seems to intuitively understand the need to extend her protection to Bryan’s niece and nephew—the most vulnerable in our human pack.

I learn about loving unconditionally by watching that dog love our son. I learn about protecting our vulnerable ones. I learn that even the quirkiest among us find redemption when we find the capacity to love.

I pray I can do a better job loving unconditionally. Maybe just without the pacing and stalking part.