Nash (Nashie Boy)

Nash had a very exciting life and it all started when he was born. It was a normal birth as far as we know, but for some reason (we wouldn't know until much later) Pookie decided to roll two black Sharpies out of the nest. We had been on alert for the puppies when we went to bed that evening and I was waking up it seemed every hour on the hour to check on Pookie and to see if she had given birth. Finally after all night of getting up I went to sleep and didn't wake up until about 9am which is extremely rare for me to do, I am an early riser. I get up and I see one of the black puppies that was rolled out of the nest, I immediately pick it up and remove the birthing sack but the puppy had died and it was the grace of God that when I bent over to see the puppies that Pookie were feeding out of the corner of my eye I see something black under the bed about midway. I moved the nest over a bit and crawl under the bed and it was another black puppy, so again I removed the birthing sack and started massaging the heart and gently blew in his face and all of a sudden he took a big gulp of air. Nashie had made it through his first big hurdle in life.

There was something extremely special about Nashie although for the longest time I couldn't see it. He was the most loving dog I think we ever owned, he just wanted to cuddle with you and hug you which is ok, when he's 20lbs but he grew fast and grew very large close to 70lbs, but the thing about Nash that drove me crazy was that he had B.O. (body odor) he just smelled terrible and we did everything we could to get rid of that smell but it was just who he was and no amount of baths were going to cure it.

Nash had some issues though, as he grew we started noticing deformities which in the wild the dog would have never been able to survive. He had a severe over bite, it was funny to view his profile because it was just so drastic but look at him from the front and you couldn't tell that there was anything wrong with him. He also couldn't see very well due to the eyelids turning in because of how many wrinkles he had that it scratched away his protective layers of the eye. I wish we would have been more aware of all the Shar-Pei issues before we had Nash but he lived a great life considering he wasn't suppose to live.

We lost Nashie a to a horrible condition that is prone to Shar-Pei's and to think back to when he first got sick and to see my wife's ability to love and care for this sick animal was truly amazing. I am all for taking care of our dogs, giving them a good home and loving environment. I believe God gave us these dogs to enrich our lives. But my wife would not give up on this dog, she fought this horrible condition with everything she had. Unfortunately we lost the battle and now Nash is in heaven but the memory of that dog will never fade from our minds because of the unconditional love he had for both of us. He was truly an incredible dog.

This is Nash, he looks so innocent!! NOT!!!