It makes me so happy that many of you lovely readers absolutely adore Jo’s dog Hades. What’s not to love about a giant Cane Corso who would defend his owners to the death? I love dogs, grew up with them, and have had them as an adult. Hades’s character was inspired by none other than my family’s dog—Gibson.
Gibson, or Gibby as we called him, was our German Shorthaired Pointer. My husband bought him on discount for his birthday when I was pregnant with our middle child. He was on the larger side for his breed and had the most beautiful wild gold eyes. He was extremely affectionate, trained to leave all the spring baby bunny nests alone in our yard. But he was fiercely protective of our family and had no problem standing up to dogs twice his size or any human who came near us.
Just like Hades follows Jo everywhere like her shadow, Gibby did that with me. If I was outside gardening, he would sit at my back to keep watch over me. When we would take our young children for walks, he would walk ahead of us, to keep others away. Other people or dogs walking by our home could not come near our children, with Gibby placing himself between them and his baby brothers. If the kids were playing on the floor, he was right there next to them.
I can recall being pregnant with our middle child and how Gibby was always nudging my stomach. On one occasion, I was washing the kitchen floor by hand (this is how I clean my floors; I do not own a mop), and Gibby was belly-crawling all over the kitchen, tailing me. It really annoyed me at the time since he was getting his fur all over my freshly washed floors, but he refused to leave my side. Didn’t realize I was already going into labor and he could sense it. He was going to stick with me no matter how much I tried to shoo him away because he was concerned.
He definitely had his naughty moments. Stealing food (he once swiped my husband brisket—oh, boy), chewing on every furniture corner that was at his level, sneaking down the hall to the bedrooms to be near the kids, and destroying every roll of toilet paper he could if the bathroom doors were left open. God forbid if you were snacking on a carrot stick and not sharing it with him; he would run you down and steal it.
He was sassy, loyal, and protective. He was our fur baby.
Life is cruel sometimes. At one-year-old, Gibby was diagnosed with Addison’s disease—a medical disorder where the adrenal glands do not produce enough of the hormone cortisol that is associated with the fight-or-flight response. When his body was under stress, he would crash, known as an Addisonian crisis where he would have low blood pressure. It was extremely life-threatening for our dog.
Luckily, he had an amazing vet who lived two blocks away from us and would frequent our home when he was crashing. She kept him alive for over eight years before he developed cancer in his spleen. When the vet told us he was not a candidate for surgery, because he would not survive the trauma due to his Addison’s disease, we took him home and spent one final weekend with him before his vet came to our house to put him to sleep in his own bed with his favorite tennis ball in his mouth.
I still miss him. My husband misses him. And the kids still cry over him even three years later. We have not gotten another dog since, as we are still grieving for Gibby. Will we get another dog one day? I’m sure we will, but the new dog will have some big shoes to fill. There’s no replacing our Gibby-boy.
A reader caught on that Hades represents Maceo in his beast form and Runt represents Josephine—very good observation. They do indeed mirror Maceo and Jo. Hades is big, strong, loyal, aggressive, and protective like Maceo, where Runt is small, blue-eyed, sassy, and loves Maceo just like Jo. Can we say puppies?
Attach are some images of what Hades looks like and what our Gibson looked like. Enjoy!
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