Bleu’s Happy Tail submitted by Sarah Ziolkowski

Meet our beautiful deaf, blue eyed pibble Bleu!

My Husband and I are from West Palm Beach Florida and we work at a Drug and Alcohol Treatment Center. One day a client of ours walked in upset over a dog she found on the streets. She had been caring for it a few days with the help from a couple friends but she had little time left to find the dog a home. She showed us pictures and videos of the beautiful white dog with blue eyes.  My husband and I had always wanted a Pit bull but our apartment was small and at the time it didn’t seem like bringing her home would be a good fit for her. Regardless, we named her Bleu and we decided to give her a three day trial to see if she would do well in our home. Well before we knew it, three days turned into five days and then five days turned into a week.  We kept thinking why in the world was this beautiful blue eyed beauty on the streets alone in the first place.

After spending numerous amounts of money on supplies for her since we obviously had nothing for a dog and us working long hours (which was another issue we were worried about) we purchased a crate to keep her safe when we were away from home. At this point, we were pretty sure we were gonna keep her but no final decision had been made.

We made her a vet appointment for her first set of vaccinations and to have her ears checked out since she acted as if she had an ear infection. We also ask the vet to check her skin because she was breaking out a lot. As I’m sitting at work and my husband is at the vet clinic with Bleu, I waited impatiently to find out how her check up went. That day is when we found out she was absolutely perfect for our family. Why? Because I myself am Deaf. I spent the majority of my life letting my disability define me.

In September of 2019 I got a cochlear implant and my life has been nothing but up hill ever since. Everything has improved from my social anxiety, my relationships with my children, husband and friends improving better relationships. I started getting better job positions and everything was going in the right direction. So as I’m waiting impatiently my husband finally texts me “Babe. I have bad news. Our dog is deaf”.  My heart sank!

I kept thinking is this why she was on the streets… did her last owners think she was misbehaving when she actually couldn’t hear their commands? Did they not have the patience or time to teach Bleu or find out there might be something wrong with her? So many thoughts were going through my mind. Then I stopped asking all of those question because I realized that she is a true blessing and she was meant to be with us because I am Deaf and she is deaf. My husband and I suffer from depression and anxiety disorders and Bleu has helped us through it.

What I thought was gonna be a struggle with her being deaf really hasn’t been. She’s been such a good girl and a welcome addition to our family. She is truly amazing. We’ve had her 3 1/2 months now and we could not be happier with our sweet sunshine Bleu.