ALICIA'S STORY

Alicia R. Parlette was 23 last year when she was told she had a life-threatening cancer. This is one in an occasional series of articles about her experience. For previous articles and a list of cancer resources, go to sfgate.com/alicia.

Sometime early this year, I got it in my head that I wanted a dog.

I love our family dog, Tasha, more than I could ever put into words, but she is that: a family dog. I see her only when I go to see my family, which is once a month at most. I wanted someone to dote on, to care for, to build my life around -- someone to be there in a way I had assumed, since the cancer diagnosis, wouldn't ever happen for me.

During the spring, I frequently went to Pets Unlimited, an animal shelter down the street from my apartment in Pacific Heights. Then at the Fillmore Jazz Festival in early July, I went to the shelter's open house and saw a bunch of new dogs, including a white spotted one with the saddest brown eyes I had ever seen.

Her name was Clarabelle, and I asked to meet her. I wanted a little girl dog, and at 28 pounds, she was the only female small enough to meet my landlady's conditions. Plus, she had ... something. A sad sweetness, as if she thought everyone was about to get mad at her, but she hadn't quite given up hope that, maybe, that wouldn't always be the case.

I visited her at Pets Unlimited every day for a month. Around day three, she looked me in the eye for the first time as I petted her. On day six, she rolled over so I could rub her belly. And around day 15 she gave me what the shelter staff had coined the "Clarabelle hug," putting her paws on my shoulders as I knelt in front of her, and pressing her chest into mine.

One day I stayed home from work because I felt exhausted and depressed and frustrated that cancer -- and all of my pain-killing, depression-suppressing, inflammation-taming pills -- was sucking every bit of possibility and hope out of my life. Around 5:30 p.m. -- half an hour before the shelter closed -- I forced myself to keep my promise to Clara, and I walked the five blocks to visit her, dragging the whole way.

She cheered me up in an instant. I kicked myself for not having visited her earlier. I got a hug, kisses upon kisses, and some much-needed quiet snuggle time. I'm not sure who needed it more.

On day 31, I took her home for the first of three sleepovers, an option Pets Unlimited offers potential adopters who are unsure of how the dog will react to a new home. On day 45, I took her into foster care, a one-month trial that was mandatory.

I thought about her all the time. A close-up of her year-and-a-half-old face was the background on my work computer. I opened a new bank account just to help budget for her financial needs. I planned my days -- and coming weeks -- based on how long I could (really, could stand to) leave her alone.

She wouldn't be mine until we had finished the foster process. But she already felt like my baby. All I needed were some pink booties and a Snugli.

Clara had unbelievable fear issues. The Pets staff had never seen a dog so scared, and no one would ever know what made her that way: She had been abandoned outside a Berkeley shelter after hours, tied up overnight.

Her story tugged at my heart, but the day-to-day contact with her fearful behavior was rough. She frustrated me pretty much every day; her fears made it hard for her to have fun anywhere outside my bed, the shelter or the park, where she'd interact only with her friends from the shelter.

Walks were a struggle. Meeting anyone new, human, canine or feline, ended with Clara cowering. She wouldn't explore my bedroom, let alone the rest of the apartment.

After coddling and comforting her for a week or so, I decided to try to assert some authority. Not a lot, since we weren't yet in training and I didn't want to scare the poor dog. But I did want to establish my dominance. I wanted to be her commander, her mentor, her keeper, her protector.

So I tugged her a bit on walks, and I made her lie down amid strange dogs in Lafayette Park. I walked her around the house, on a leash. I locked her in her crate almost every night.

It was hard -- it still is. I'm looking forward to training her. I'm ready to have the tools to deal with her: to jump-start her trust, then her bravery. I just want to know how to take care of her, and make life better for her.

She's so sweet and tender and funny, and it breaks my heart that right now, life for her is so hard. I wish I could safely carry her anywhere, or, better yet, I wish I could snap my fingers and -- poof! -- force her fears away.

I don't think owners always consciously pick their dogs. Or vice versa. It's not as simple as a shopping trip; it's the birth of a relationship. It's cosmic. It's gotta be.

How else would I have ended up with a dog who needs me so desperately -- not just anyone, but me, with my empathy for fear? I ache for her when she's scared, but she's also brought out in me a fighter, a mother and a teacher who insists on success, on not letting her child give in to the consuming darkness of fear: the end of life.

If not for providence, how would I have walked into the shelter that day and stared, heart open, at a dog who so perfectly mirrors me and the big struggles in my life?

She has already healed me, and she's not even officially mine. (Not until day 73, Tuesday). On the days I can't heal myself, I still willingly help her. Sometimes I spend all day pushing through a wall of lethargy. But I push. Then there are times when tending to her surreptitiously gives me the tools to heal me, too. That's where the magic lies.

E-mail Alicia R. Parlette at aparlette@sfchronicle.com.

This article appeared on page E - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle