Since my open heart surgery, I take a lot of medications, especially in the morning. These are medications to control my diabetes and to care for my heart and prevent another heart attack.

Sometimes, they mix poorly with one another, or with something I had for breakfast, and when that happens, I get pretty sick – fever, stomach, exhaustion, weakness and other stuff I don’t need to go into.

But they have kept me healthy.

These episodes send me off to bed for a day or two. I can’t eat anything and risk extreme dehydration, so I sleep for hours (the only time I do) and drink gallons of Diet Ginger Ale (with ginger) and ice water and wait to feel better.

And I sleep the deepest sleep. I always think this is the flu – a lot of it is going around at the Mansion – but it isn’t the flu.

I went to bed this morning around 11 a.m. and got up around 6, Maria takes the most wonderful care of me.

But this is really a story about dogs, not me.

Until recently I had what I call a Comfort Dog, and it was Red. When I was sick, he would lie on the floor next to me and wouldn’t move an inch until I got up.

Red is gone now, and I found, to my surprise, I have two comfort dogs who fill that role without being asked. I don’t know how they know. Fate came up to lie with me and be absolutely still, which she never is. And then Bud would come up and curl up next to me and lie there for hours.

When Bud came, Fate would usually leave – she isn’t into sharing or group activity. Bud stayed right next to me for most of the day. It is surprising to me that these two dogs thought to do that, they never came up to me while I was sick when Red was alive.

Do they know that I am sick? What is the process by which they figure this out and decided how to be helpful? Neither dog would move while lying to next to me, they seemed to enter into the spirit of the moment.

It is tempting to say what they must be thinking, but the truth is, I have no idea. We don’t yet know how dogs think and feel beneath the surface, we only know what we can see.

But serving and comforting humans seem to be in the DNA of good dogs. These two were are a great comfort to me, as Red was. These episodes can be frightening and confusing, especially when they relate to the heart. I feel near collapse and experience great weakness and confusion. I can’t write or think clearly.

My doctors say this sometimes occurs with people with my condition taking my meditations. My heart is good, my blood sugar is excellent. Get into bed right away, they say, eat nothing, drink a lot, go to sleep, get rest for a couple of days.

But I am barely conscious during these sudden “episodes”, but whenever I woke up today, there was always a dog right under my hand. Red never came into the bed, he supported me with his presence, so this kind of Comfort Dog is a new experience.

I am feeling better, I was able to have some soup and toast tonight, and a cup of vanilla ice cream. It is all staying down.

I fended off my de-hydration – dangerous for diabetics – and had to urge to write and capture my day, what I remember of it.

I do remember watching one episode of NYPD Blue on my iPhone, but I remember nothing about it, except for Sipowicz yelling at Kelly. And I can write now. This is how I heal.

I am grateful to have a partner like Maria, who is so loving and attentive.  She works in her studio, but checks on me every couple of hours.

And I’m lucky to have two new Comfort Dogs, both active animals able to be perfectly still for me for hours. I believe they are healing spirits.

I am grateful for dogs, for so many reasons. And I am sure they know when I am sick. Beyond that, only the angels and the spirits know.