What happened that day...

We had to fly to Honolulu, Hawaii, for business meetings on October 9th.
I dropped BuBu off around 6:50 PM at Paw Sweet Paw, 8645 Research Dr, Irvine, CA 92618, just ten minutes before closing. We waited until the very last moment — we wanted her with us for as long as possible before the trip. Everything was packed carefully: her medicines, snacks, blankets, pillow, individually packed meals, harness, and leash — every little thing she loved.
I can still see her face as the staff carried her through the boarding door. Her eyes said everything — calm but unsure. That image never leaves me.

The next morning, while I was in Honolulu, my phone rang.
It was a male staff member from Paw Sweet Paw. His tone was calm — too calm.

“BuBu got bitten,” he said. “She has… punctures.”

My heart stopped. I immediately started panicking.
“What do you mean bitten? By how big a dog? What kind of dog? How bad is she?” I asked, my voice shaking.

He hesitated, then said quietly,

“Uh… punctures.”

That was all. No details, no urgency.
He quickly added, “BuBu is at the vet in our facility. They’ll call you with updates,”
and then he hung up.

I froze for a few seconds, staring at my phone, my hands trembling.
Something inside me shattered. I knew it wasn’t just “punctures.”
I grabbed my bag and changed my flight home immediately.

Not long after, the manager, Dani, called. His voice was soft, calm, almost rehearsed.
I was screaming into the phone, “You need to do EVERYTHING for her right now!”

He said, “I will help you,” but when I demanded the CCTV footage, he said, “I’ll send it later.” He never did.
Then, in that same calm tone, he said,

“Whatever happened in the yard, we’re not responsible — because of the waiver you signed.”

I remembered that little click when booking online — the waiver no one thinks twice about.
Now it was being used to excuse what had happened to my baby.

I was shaking, crying, and terrified. I dropped my 6-year-old son off at my husband’s office and raced toward the airport to catch the 1 PM flight home.
While driving, my phone kept ringing. Dani called again — not to talk about BuBu’s condition, but about money.
He said, “RISE’s bill is too high. We’re thinking of transferring her to another facility.”

For a brief moment, I let myself hope.
If they thought she could be transferred, maybe she wasn’t that bad.

Then he called again, saying, “I’m here at RISE, but they won’t let me do anything since I’m not the owner. I’m trying to help you.”
And again: “RISE will be calling you about the bill.”

I couldn’t understand it — why was money even part of this conversation?

I’ve never run that fast in my life. It felt like I was running for her life.
As soon as I checked in at the airport, I ran — through security, through the gate — like every second could save her. My heart was pounding so hard I could hardly breathe.
I kept calling, begging for updates — desperate to hear anything about her.

As soon as I sat down on the plane, my phone rang again.
It was RISE Pet Health Emergency.
They said they needed a $10,000 deposit immediately to begin treatment.

I didn’t hesitate.

“Do everything,” I said. “Anything. Please just save her.”

A few minutes later, the ER doctor at RISE called. Her voice was gentle but heavy.
She asked, “Can you tell me what happened to BuBu?”

“All they told me was that she got bitten,” I said. “Just two punctures. The vet at Paw Sweet Paw said her legs weren’t responding, and they needed to move her to a bigger facility.”

The doctor took a slow breath.

“It’s far worse than that,” she said quietly.
“BuBu has seven broken ribs, massive internal bleeding, a crushed spine, and two punctures in her lungs. These are catastrophic injuries.”

My life started quivering. Unstoppable tears poured down in the middle of the airplane.
People around me must have wondered what was happening, but I didn’t care. The world went silent — all I could hear was my own heartbeat and the echo of her voice saying those words.

Even the vet at Paw Sweet Paw had admitted that BuBu’s spine was crushed and her legs weren’t responding — that’s why they were transferring her.
But no one told me how bad it truly was.

Later, both BuBu’s regular vet and the RISE ER doctor confirmed in their reports — and the police report — that her death was caused purely by traumatic injuries.
Even a strong, healthy dog could not have survived what she suffered.

When I landed at LAX, I drove straight to RISE — numb, shaking, heart pounding so hard I could barely hold the steering wheel.
As soon as I walked in, a staff member recognized me and led me through the bright hallway toward the ER.

I stopped halfway inside the ER corridor.
I couldn’t move.
I wasn’t ready to face the reality waiting just a few steps ahead.
My whole body was trembling — I was terrified of what I might see.
I stopped to catch my breath, wiped away my tears, and whispered to myself, “Don’t let her see you sad.”
I wanted her to feel only comfort, not fear.

Through the glass, I saw her — my tiny girl, surrounded by machines, breathing with effort inside an oxygen chamber.
I froze in place. I couldn’t walk in right away.

When I finally did, I knelt down so I could wipe my tears again, so she wouldn’t see me crying.
Then I leaned closer and whispered,

“I’m here, baby. I love you. You’ll be okay. We’ll go shopping again, okay? We’ll go walking.”

She looked up at me, fully conscious — and in her eyes, I saw it: “I’ve been waiting.”

The doctor gently closed the incubator door to preserve oxygen and suggested I go home and rest.
But I refused.
I told them I would wait in my car, right outside.

Hours passed. The night was silent.
At 3:00 AM, a nurse came running out of the building. She knocked on my car window and said softly,

“The doctor asked me to bring you in quickly.”

I ran inside. The doctor said BuBu was breathing hard and she thought it was her moment.
From that point until the next day, I went in and out of the ER — whispering, holding her paw, praying for a miracle.

Then the sun came up.
The world started to brighten like a regular day, as if nothing had happened.
I sat in the lobby, coming in and out, staring at nothing — just waiting.
Time felt endless. Every minute stretched like a year.

Waiting seemed like forever — it felt like waiting between life and death.
I went back to my car and called my husband in the late afternoon.
When he picked up, he was already crying, his voice shaking, asking, “How’s BuBu?”
He was helpless and scared.
I don’t know how long we cried over the phone — both of us breaking apart.
I screamed through tears,

“I don’t know! I don’t know! Why did this happen to BuBu? Why?! What am I gonna do… what am I gonna do!”

By evening, she lay outside the chamber with oxygen tubes resting against her tiny nose.
Her eyes were half-open, her strength fading.

The doctor looked at me gently and said that even if BuBu survived, she would never be able to walk again on her own.
Her tone was soft, careful — I could tell she was trying to help me understand, to prepare me, to let her go.
But I couldn’t. I insisted, “We need to do everything.”
I told her,

“I’ll be her legs. I’ll do anything for her.”

The doctor then carefully explained that BuBu’s lungs needed to be pumped by a machine because the bleeding inside her lungs couldn’t be controlled in their facility.
They needed to transfer BuBu to a hospital in Los Angeles that was fully equipped to handle it.
She warned that even with that, there was no guarantee it would save her.
But I was still so hopeful. Having an option gave me something to hold on to — because I couldn’t let her go.
Not like this.

As they prepared her for transfer, I noticed a worn purple towel covering her.
I don’t know why, but it immediately grabbed my eye.
I wanted her to have her own blanket — the one she loved, the one that smelled like home.
My heart tightened.
I took my sweatshirt off and gently put it on her — just so she could feel me close.
Then I went home to grab her pink bear blanket — the one she’s been so attached to ever since she was an eight-week-old baby.

On my way back — just two blocks from the hospital — my phone rang.

It was RISE Emergency.
The doctor’s voice trembled.

At 6:45 PM on October 11th, she said softly,

“I’m so sorry… BuBu has just passed away.”

I screamed. Over and over.

“No! No! She can’t go like this — not like this!”

Everything went dark.
I ran inside, collapsed on the floor, screaming “no” under her bed.
She was still warm.
Finally, she was in my arms again — but not in the same way.

BuBu held on for more than 24 hours after the attack.
She waited for me — for her mama — to come home.
And she did. 💛