If you’ve ever shared your home with a dog, you’ve probably experienced the pain and sorrow associated with their passing. Unfortunately, it’s a fact of life. Our beloved dogs make their transition much too soon. I’ve experienced this many times.
Most recently I’ve felt pain and sorrow with the loss of my boys, Woody and Buzz. Woody made his transition in 2010 from kidney failure and Buzz in 2012 from cancer. I had, and still have, a powerful heart connection with both of them. As you can imagine, I think about them every day and miss the little things that made them special.
Like anyone who’s felt a similar heart connection with their dog, I’d give just about anything to have them back with me. I’m sure that you, too, would do virtually anything to have your dog back again. But, would you go as far as cloning your dog?
Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter John Woestendiek wrote about this controversial topic in his book, DOG Inc.: How a Collection of Visionaries, Rebels, Eccentrics, and Their Pets Launched the Commercial Dog Cloning Industry. Woestendiek tells the story of a former beauty queen who was left permanently scarred from head to toe from a brutal dog attack. She escaped death because her Pit Bull, Booger, came to her rescue. Booger later made his transition, leaving his human companion distraught over his death. The woman regarded Booger as her guardian and savior. She desperately wanted him back, so she agreed to pay a cloning laboratory $150,000 to bring her dog back. The result was five cloned Boogers instead of one.
These cases seem to be on the rise across the world, with cloning laboratories in Korea and the United States, among other places. These labs have become a lucrative business for cloning dogs and other animals. Though it’s a costly process, people are finding ways to fund the process in hopes of bringing their beloved dogs back. Without a doubt, cloning is controversial. However, it does show the lengths that we’ll go to bring our dogs back to us after they’ve made their transition.
No matter where you stand on this subject, it’s intriguing and somewhat mind-boggling to consider. As I previously stated, I would do virtually anything to have my boys back in my life. To see their schnauzer beards and mustaches flying in the wind as they chased each other in their big backyard always brought a smile to my face. However, I know that they, in the physical form they took while they shared that particular time in my life, will never be with me again.
It’s not necessarily the hefty price to undertake such an endeavor. Heck, in this economy, a second mortgage is almost considered the norm. What would stop me from pursuing cloning as an option is the fact that what made Buzz and Woody who they were was their essence. I believe, based on my experience working with thousands of animals, that while technology can provide the ability to clone the outward appearance of your dog, it can’t capture a particular animal’s true essence.
Some may call it their spirit, soul, energy, or life force. But, just like each of us, our dogs are unique. What makes them unique has less to do with their appearance and everything to do with their love, joy, and spirit. There’s no laboratory in the world that can create this. Only the love we have for our beloved dogs and the memories they leave us with can make that piece of them live on forever.
What about you? If you could, would you have your late dog cloned? Would you want a copy of your pup, even if you knew it wasn’t the same one in spirit? Sound off in the comments.
