Sadie never bit anyone, but it wasn’t for lack of trying. So legendary were Sadie’s freak-outs, my friends dubbed her the White Devil. Describing her as “high maintenance” would be like calling Bravo’s housewives of New Jersey “repugnant”—a description woefully short of the mark.

And yet.

I loved that dog more than any dog I have shared my time with before or since. I had to earn her affection, but once I did, Sadie was loyal to a fault. She was protective. And smart. Sadie appreciated my efforts to give her a better life and never forgot the abuse she’d survived before. More simian than canine, she was like a research chimp clever enough to realize the crappy hand she’d been dealt. No pushover, Sadie knew the score. Life is hard. People can’t be trusted. Vigilance is key. Be wise about whom you love, and when you do love, do it with every fiber of your being. Till death do you part.

And so it was with Sadie and me.

A few months after my second child was born, Sadie became ill. We’d been together for more than ten years, and she was suffering greatly. In our last photograph, taken hours before she died, I am on the floor, wrapped around her like a blanket, my one-year-old reaching her tiny hand toward Sadie’s barely open mouth. (Sadie was never aggressive toward children. She knew, I think, where goodness lived.)

When the vet told me I had to put Sadie down, something inside me broke. Well-meaning friends suggested maybe I should be “relieved.” She was, after all, a lot of work. Which was true. But I was not relieved.

I have had more dogs since Sadie. Right now I live with two rescue pit bulls who are joyful and goofy. They chase balls and frolic and never snarl at anyone. They are normal, good-natured dogs who don’t cause me a moment’s worry. And I love them too. But it isn’t the same. My pits will never break my heart. That distinction is reserved for Sadie. The White Devil. The first dog I dared to let inside.