We Don't Love The Body
What I learned from the loss of my sweet rescue pup + a french onion soup and media recommendations
I was staring past the phone in my girlfriend’s hand at nothing in particular. “We don’t love the body,” her mentor, an animal wellness expert, said to us over speakerphone.
“We love the spirit,” I finished the thought for myself.
With that, I felt a profound shift and a settling in my nerves. We were talking about saying goodbye to my ten-month old puppy, whose body was riddled with pythiosis (a disease that acts a lot like cancer.) He had not responded to treatment.
Grief took up its station in my lungs. But also, a larger life lesson I have been chasing for years finally clicked:
We don’t love the body, we love the spirit.
Initially unbeknownst to me, Buddy, my rescue pup, came to me sick with a nearly untreatable disease—as well as unconditional love for everyone, and an unyielding companionship for and guardianship of me. He was full of joyous puppy-energy and needed as many as six walks per day. He took several medications, happily ingesting them enrobed in peanut butter or cream cheese. Always hungry, he ate four extra-large meals per day. I felt the same sort of blurry exhaustion that left me running on love and worry seventeen years ago after I gave birth to my daughter.
While I did everything I could to treat his disease, he helped me heal too. In our two months together my chronic low back pain completely dissipated, my deeply entrenched toxic habit of half-heartedly wishing for death when life felt so hard became something I no longer did, and I finally felt okay asking my friends and family for help explicitly and repeatedly.
What’s particularly gutting is that Buddy’s unyielding generosity stretched beyond his time on this plane. With his death has come one more crucial life lesson for me—people love me for my spirit, not my body. When I type this for you to read, I feel silly. Yes, I knew this as an intellectual thought, but I never felt it before. It is a basic lesson that nearly every body-neutrality/positivity person I encounter in has tried to teach me, but never made stick. It is also crucial for my eating disorder recovery that I internalize this idea, otherwise I will never feel true social or professional safety in this world.
We don’t love the body, we love the spirit.
The love between a human and an animal is simpler than that between people. All the extra noise of being social-creatures falls away and leaves room for only trusting what we feel in our guts and bones. And while on the phone with my girlfriend’s mentor, I knew without a doubt that I loved Buddy’s spirit, not his body. And then I realized in my heart that that is how I feel about every being that I love.
And with that newfound felt understanding in my body, the previously too-big jump I could never make, became quite small: I love the spirit of all the people I have been turning to for help and comfort these past two months, not their bodies; (duh) and they don’t love me for my body, they love me for my spirit. (Oh!) Therefore I am safer than I knew.
I loved Buddy so much and I gave him the best life I could. He moved from a dead end shelter to a full and loving home. He received some of the best veterinary care in the country, was spoiled by doormen, huffed the odoriferous sidewalks of New York City, and also managed to catch a pigeon (and release it thankfully). He also enjoyed country life where he could sniff out chipmunks on all of his walks. He played in the snow and made numerous dog and people friends. He took long nature walks and also got to run around off leash for hours with other pups. He had a big family looking out for him, was never left alone, and was always in the care and company of a person who loved him. He turned my life upside down, shook things up, and showed me that I was okay. I wish I could have saved him. I wish I could do more than I have and I am grateful for all that I got to do and learn.
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Melissa Clark’s French Onion Soup with Grilled Gruyere Sandwiches
I didn’t want to leave you another month without something you could try in the kitchen but most of my culinary energy these last two months went to making unseasoned bone broth as well as unseasoned purees of chicken, rice, and pumpkin for Buddy. I ate a lot of take out, accepted offers for others to cook, and made several hodgepodge lunches and dinners out of random leftovers. That said, once or twice per week I would get in the kitchen and follow a recipe. There was one standout: Melissa Clark’s French Onion Soup with Grilled Gruyere Sandwiches from her cookbook Dinner in French! (I found the recipe reproduced with permission here.)
I rarely make or eat soup, but it has been a bitter cold and hard few weeks, and I did turn to soups for comfort. I had never made french onion soup before because I doubt my bowls could handle the crucial step of going under the broiler to melt and brown the cheese on top. But this riff on french onion soup doesn’t ask any more of my bowls than any other soup which appealed to me. I made this recipe for dinner for my girlfriend and our daughters on a chilly December night and it was a huge hit! I definitely want to make it again and soon.
WATCH Palm Royale on Apple +. Having finished binging the few new shows I wanted to watch (Diplomat, Shrinking, Man On The Inside) I poked around Apple + looking for a new to me series to watch and was intrigued by the colors, cast, and title of Palm Royale. Set in Palm Beach in 1969 this comedy with twists and turns stars Kristen Wiig, Allison Janney, Carol Burnett, Ricky Martin, and Laura Dern.
LISTEN to the Romeo+Juliet Soundtrack (1996). I remember dancing to this nearly 30 year old album in dorm rooms in college. I still love this 90s staple and have been streaming it a fair amount while driving around.
READ one of my favorite writers. Sloane Crosley’s essay “The Tail End,” about the loss of her 21 year old cat, came out just weeks after I lost my dear kitty last summer. Crosely’s most recent book, Grief is for People was a witty memoir on grief and love.
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I need another show to watch y’all. Please recommend a show in the comments below!
I am so sorry for your loss 💔