Animal-lover Kaley Cuoco is opening up about the recent death of her beloved dog, Shirley, from cancer.
The Big Bang Theory star took to Instagram this week to share the details of her pet’s passing, explaining that she was forced to rehome Shirley in recent years because the pup kept getting into fights with her fiancé Tom Pelphrey’s dog.
“Most of you know I had [Shirley] for many, many, many years,” Cuoco said. “All of a sudden, you kind of stopped seeing her, and I started to get a lot of questions as to where she was, because it’s very unlike me to just stop posting about a dog that I’ve had since she was 6 weeks old.”
“Long story short, she’s a very special dog to me, as you all know,” she continued.
“And when the love of my life came into my life, Tom, who is also a mega dog lover, and he moved across the country with his beautiful German Shepherd, Blue, a couple years ago, unfortunately, Blue and Shirley started getting into some mega fights.”
While it seemed Shirley was “determined to kill” Blue, Cuoco was also concerned that she might end up hurting one of the other dogs in the home as well, or even a family member.
“I loved her so much, but I was really scared,” Cuoco admitted. “I didn’t want something really bad to happen or possibly a person accidentally be there and get hurt.”
When her pet handler, Tony, and his wife, Angie, offered to take Shirley and care for her a couple of years ago, Cuoco decided that would be the best course of action for everyone involved.
“They have loved her so so much, and it was an excruciating decision,” she said.
Unfortunately, since then, Shirley developed “a very aggressive bone cancer that came on very quickly.”
“She was almost 14 years old, which is an unbelievable life for a dog,” Cuoco said, breaking down in tears. “And I just wanted to share her story and what we had to do.”
