It's been said that “dogs are a man’s best friend,” but we all know the love college students hold for their pets transcends this very simple statement. Our favorite hello and our saddest goodbye, dogs have been with us through thick and thin, good and bad, through our awkward middle school phase and our college transition. While we attempt to repay them for their unwavering devotion through expendable toys and an unhealthy amount of treats, the way we truly show our love for dogs is through our heartbreaking stages of missing them when we’re gone.

1. The Goodbye

Every college student is familiar with that heartfelt goodbye with your favorite furry friend. Maybe, if you’re lucky, your dog will press their nose to the window as you mournfully pull out of your driveway on your way back for the semester. However, more likely, your dog will just give you a few limp tail wags before curling up for their umpteenth nap of the day. They say that absence makes the heart grow fonder, but we all know our feelings for dogs increase exponentially whenever one comes into view.

2. The Denial

Returning to your dorm room after break is always more bitter than sweet, but for those first few days, you can forget the time and distance separating you from your pooch. After all, your mom still remembers to send you pictures whenever they’re doing something cute, and that’s almost as good as the real thing, right? It takes a while for it to sink in that your dog is back to being an agonizingly long car ride away.

3. The Doubt

The next step in your dog-specific depression is those flickers of uncertainty, the dark thoughts that plague you before you fall asleep every night. What if they don’t remember you? What if they stop loving you? What would you do if you returned, open armed, only to find your dog suddenly indifferent to your arrival? You know the only way to answer these questions is to have a heart-to-heart with your pet, but as you listlessly toss and turn on your school-issued mattress, you know that is currently out of the question.

4. The Countdown

The same way long-distance lovers count down the days until they are reunited, you know how many days, hours, minutes and seconds there are until you’re busting down your front door and opening your arms for an onslaught of canine attention. Every day when you wake up, you can rejoice that you’re one step closer to your reconciliation. There’s bound to be a few (happy) tears from you, and a few (hopefully happy) barks from them.

5. The Desperation

You start treating every dog sighting like most would treat the appearance of a celebrity. You’ll do anything for their momentary attention, going so far as to sidestep in front of classmates and pedestrians alike just so you can utter those magic words: “Can I pet your dog?”

6. The Nostalgia

Alongside class and club activities, staring mournfully at pictures of your pup is one of your major hobbies. You wistfully scroll through the multitudes of snapshots you have stored for this exact situation, showing them off to anyone within earshot. You might be trapped amidst midterms, but there's always time to take a trip down memory lane.

7. The Fantasies

Your dream dog is added to the long list of things you fantasize about in class, and instead of taking notes on the lecture (oops), you write the name of your future pet along the margins. The pages of your notebook are starting to look reminiscent of the ones you had in middle school, but instead of rewriting your crush's name in sloppy cursive, you're brainstorming names for future beagles. Maybe one day you’ll have that adorable corgi named Buttons, but for right now, you’re stuck on your painfully dogless campus.

8. The Dog-napping

By this point, you’ve developed a new mindset of “desperate times call for desperate measures.” While taking a dog from the arms of its owner is almost as frowned upon as taking candy from a baby, it's starting to seem like the only option. Maybe people would take your desperation a little more seriously if you were actually a hardened criminal, but as of right now, your only crime is loving dogs too much.

9. The Optimism

As you keep telling yourself, you’ve made it through the hard part. The next break is approaching quicker than you’ve originally realized, and you admit grudgingly, dogs aren’t one of life’s necessities. You can live without dogs for the time being. However, this way of thinking is always short lived, because the next time a dog is running along the sidewalk to greet you, you’re filled with that joie de vivre only a waggling tail can bring.

10. The Home Stretch

The last few days are always borderline agonizing. When you’re slogging through the endless marathon of finals week, you're only sustained by late-night French fries, your caffeinated beverage of choice and the thought that you’re going to see your dog. As hours turn into minutes, you can barely contain your brimming enthusiasm and understandable impatience. The same way children get those pre-Christmas jitters, you’re feeling that pre-pup excitement.

11. The Reunion

The dog(less) days are over! You're powered by the thought that, any minute, you’ll be pulling into your driveway and seeing the same furry face in the window. Step aside, Mom, Dad, brother and sister; you go straight for your dog, basking in those few seconds of undivided attention before they become more preoccupied with yet another nap. Were those long months of waiting worth that one sloppy kiss? Almost definitely.