Last updated: September 28, 2026
In 2014, I was scrolling through Facebook when I saw a photo posted by Midwest Dachshund Rescue that stopped me in my tracks. His name was Kai, he was four years old, and the second I saw his face, I just knew he was my dog. I had felt that feeling once before when I found Lola. Sometimes you can look at hundreds of dogs and think they’re adorable, but then there’s one where something just clicks. There wasn’t really a pros and cons list or much deliberation involved. I applied for him almost immediately.
Not long after, on February 20th, I drove to Milwaukee to meet Kai and his foster family. He was timid, shy, and definitely not the type of dog who was going to run into my arms and immediately decide I was his favorite person. I knew bringing him home would require a little trust on both sides, so I trusted the process. At the time, I was still living at home with my parents, and our house was already very much a dachshund house. At one point, we had four of them under one roof. My original plan had been that when I eventually moved out, Lola and Diego would come with me. After Lola became disabled, though, Diego was scared of her. We later adopted Michael, who bonded closely with my mom and Diego. As it turned out, Kai was the missing piece and the perfect fit for Lola and me.
It took Kai a little while to settle in. He needed time to understand that he was safe and that this was his home now. He wasn’t instantly comfortable with everything or everyone, and I never expected him to be. We gave him the space to figure things out on his own timeline, and slowly, his personality started to emerge. Kai was just an incredibly chill little guy, which ended up being exactly what I needed. Lola required a lot of attention and care because of her disability, and Kai was perfectly content not being the center of the universe at all times. He didn’t need to be in my lap every second. He was happy lying at my feet, hanging out beside the couch, or simply being somewhere nearby. He wanted to be with you without necessarily needing to be on you.
Unless, of course, you had food. Kai LOVED food. Treats, meals, snacks, the possibility that something might fall on the floor — these were all extremely serious matters to him. Food was one of the great joys of his life, and he was never particularly subtle about it. His favorites included blueberries and banana. He also had his own funny way of playing. Rather than constantly bringing you a toy and demanding that you throw it, Kai liked to put on a show. He would grab a toy or ball, toss it into the air himself, run around with it, and make sure you were watching the entire performance. He’d also roll around on it at the end of his little play session. It often felt less like playing with Kai and more like being invited to watch Kai demonstrate how much fun he could have by himself. He was always very proud of his work.
There were also little clues that his life before rescue hadn’t always been easy. For years, Kai was particularly nervous around men. Even men he knew very well could startle him if they appeared unexpectedly or approached him in a dimly lit room. He would immediately start barking as if, for a second, he had forgotten who they were. I obviously never knew everything that happened during his first four years of life, but I always suspected a man had yelled at him or frightened him at some point. Those reactions didn’t disappear overnight. It took years, but eventually they did. Watching a scared rescue dog slowly realize that he was safe was one of those things that was difficult to explain unless you had experienced it. There wasn’t necessarily one big breakthrough. Instead, there were hundreds of tiny ones that happened so gradually you almost didn’t notice them until one day, you realized the dog who used to be afraid wasn’t really afraid anymore.
Eventually, Kai even followed in Lola’s footsteps and became a certified therapy dog. On paper, he and Lola couldn’t have been more different. Lola had a big personality and absolutely knew when people were paying attention to her. Kai was quieter and more reserved, but that calmness made him wonderful at therapy work. He was perfectly happy to sit there while people loved on him. He didn’t need to perform or be the center of attention. He was just a quiet, comforting presence, and people absolutely loved petting him because of how incredibly soft he was.
Kai was a blue and tan dapple, long-haired dachshund, and like Lola, his dilute coloring came with alopecia. His was much milder than hers, but his coat never developed like a typical long-haired dachshund’s. Instead of growing the long, silky outer coat, he mostly had this incredibly soft, fluffy undercoat. He also didn’t really shed like a normal dog. Instead, every once in a while, you’d see a tiny Kai tumbleweed drifting across the floor.
For a dog who came into my life so quietly, Kai was there for an enormous amount of it. He was already an adult when I adopted him, so I never got his puppy years. I didn’t teach him everything he knew or get to shape all of his earliest experiences. Someone else knew him before I did. Someone else knew the puppy version of Kai. I got the shy four-year-old rescue dog from a Facebook post, and then I got everything after. I got to watch him learn that this was home. I got to watch him become comfortable enough to be silly. I got to watch him throw his toys around just because he wanted an audience. I got to see him become a therapy dog and calmly accept pets from strangers when there had once been people he was afraid of.
More than anything, I got thousands of ordinary days with him. Meals, treats, walks, naps, toys, little tumbleweeds of fur, and a soft dog lying at my feet while I went about my life. Those ordinary days didn’t necessarily feel monumental while I was living them. Looking back, I realize they were the whole thing.
Kai never needed to be the loudest dog in the room. He never demanded that the world revolve around him. He was just happy to be nearby, preferably with snacks available. When I saw his photo on Facebook in 2014, I thought, “That’s my dog.” I had no logical reason to know that yet, but I was right. Sometimes the dog you need doesn’t come bounding into your life demanding your attention. Sometimes he’s a scared, fluffy dachshund sitting with a foster family in Milwaukee, waiting for someone to see his photo and somehow just know.
The last couple of years of Kai’s life looked a little different. In early 2024, he was diagnosed with kidney disease. We knew it was progressive and that there was no cure, but we did everything we could to manage it and keep him feeling like himself for as long as possible. He ate renal food and took supplements, anti-nausea medication, blood pressure medication, and medication for hypothyroidism. There were vet appointments, blood work, medication changes, and constant monitoring of how he was feeling, how much he was eating, and what he needed from me.
By July 2025, I was giving him subcutaneous fluids at home every other day. It became another part of our routine together. In May 2026, his kidney disease progressed enough that we increased those fluids to every single day. At that point, he was essentially right on the cusp of kidney failure. Somehow, we managed to hold it there for another four months. Until September. I did everything I could for Kai. Literally everything. If there was something that could help him feel better, keep him comfortable, or give him more good days, we did it. Renal food, supplements, fluids, medications, blood work, appointments — whatever he needed. I knew I couldn’t cure kidney disease, but I could give him every reasonable chance to keep enjoying his life. And for a long time, he did. He still wanted his food. He still wanted his treats. He still wanted to be nearby. He was still Kai.
Eventually, though, his body couldn’t keep doing what his personality still wanted it to do. After fighting kidney disease for more than two years, his kidneys were finally failing. There wasn’t another medication to add or another treatment I had somehow overlooked. There wasn’t something I could have done differently that would have given me the ending I wanted. I had done everything I could. I’ve come to believe that a pet’s last day doesn’t have to be their worst day. I didn’t want to wait until Kai was in a crisis to make a decision I already knew was coming. After everything his body had carried him through, and after everything he had given me, the last thing I could do for him was make sure he didn’t have to suffer simply because I wasn’t ready to live without him. I don’t think you ever feel like you’ve had enough time. I adopted Kai when he was four, already knowing I had missed four years of his life. Somehow, even after getting more than twelve years with him, I still wanted more.
I’m so grateful that I saw that photo. I’m grateful I trusted my gut and brought home the shy little dog who wasn’t quite sure about me yet. I’m grateful he learned that he was safe, and that eventually I got to know the silly, gentle, food-obsessed little dog underneath all that uncertainty. Most of all, I’m grateful for every ordinary day I got to spend with him.
I knew when I adopted a four-year-old dog that I had already missed the beginning of his story. I just never could have imagined how much of the rest of mine he would be there for. I love you, Kai. Always. 6/6/2009 – 9/25/2026
