Sometimes you have to deal with awful things for great things to come.

Our family dog’s name is Jaxx, and he got his name in a very special way. Jaxx was our second dog. Our first was a 4-year-old beagle named Lucy, a dog we rescued from South Carolina. One day, she hurt her back and couldn’t walk. She was paralyzed.

We thought that we would just buy her a wheelchair cart so she could still move around, but it didn’t work out that way. The paralysis traveled up her back and into her diaphragm, which is a very rare occurrence. We had to put her down.

It was devastating. Lucy was so young, and we lost her so quickly.

Then a miracle happened.

About two weeks later, one of my mother’s coworkers said her mother had a dog but didn’t have the time to take care of him because she worked all the time.

She felt terrible for the dog because he would spend all day in a crate and was only let out at night when the owner came home.

The loss of Lucy was so recent, but we decided that we couldn’t pass up the opportunity to give this dog a place in our home, where he could run, play, and be happy.

So my mom’s coworker brought the dog over to our house.

He was a beagle!

Lucy was a beagle, too, so we saw that as a sign.

Right away, he started running around the backyard and playing with my brothers and me like he had been our dog for years. It was then that our family decided to make room for our new dog, Jax.

He came with the name Jax and already knew how to sit and respond to his name, so we decided we didn’t want to change it.

So, we decided to put a second “x” on the end because we were his second owners.

That is where our dog, Jaxx, got his name and a permanent place in our family. The memories we had with Lucy will never be lost, but Jaxx will continue to give us new ones to fill our hearts.