Beth the story of a rescue

Today we have photos for our readers, both Beth and Roxie posed for photos today.   Beth did not like hers, she says she needs a few more days before she will feel well enough to perk up and look good for the camera.    Today she still looked like a dog under the influence of many drugs.   The Paw Challenged One (PCO) said that she had some good stuff, he was going to take the drugs down on the corner and sell them, but Beth said she needed them.

Beth came in from a shelter.   She had been picked up on the street, dirty, hungry, with several health problems.  She was supposed to be named Handsome, her transfer papers listed her as male.  Her coat needs work, her nose is almost bare of hair.  She had large tumors on her stomach which may have been why she was listed as a male.  Her teeth were in terrible shape.   Her eyes are cloudy with cataracts, and her coat is coarse and thin from living outside.   Every rib and bone in her body is visible.  She is estimated to be 10 years old.  Her visit to the vet was a long day, when she arrived here last night, she was still under the influence of her drugs.   This morning she was not much better, she was still being drugged pretty heavily to help her heal without pain.  In the photo above, she was busy searching for a good potty location.  She has not straightened up since she arrived, she is still feeling the effects of the surgery.   Below, Roxie and Beth get acquainted while exploring the back yard.

What makes her so special is that through all of this, she still wags her tail and looks for attention.   She crawled over looking for a head pat and a very careful tummy scratch when she was still too tipsy to walk.  Most of the day she was laying beside the computer chair, where a hand could reach her from time to time and remind her that she was among friends.  She is so skinny that petting her is like rubbing a wash board, her coat is coarse, thin and still pretty dirty.   Then there was the problem with her eating, she was just to sick to eat.   Since her pain pills needed to be taken with food, it was difficult to keep her on schedule with pills.    She quickly learned to spit them out like a pro.   By morning she was hiding them in her mouth until she could find a place to spit them out.     All day long we tried to get her to eat, no results.  Cheese, hot dogs, peanut butter, everything was tired.   Cat food worked for a few bites, only.  Finally this evening she gave in and she ate 1/2 of a can of her food.   The funny thing is she would only eat it off of the Paw Challenged One's fingers.   They had to feed her from their fingers or she would not eat.    But the hunger strike was over, the pills were down, all is well in the dog house.    Once she had eaten, the tail came up.   That is the sign of a dog on the mend.   Tails up!  We have a special bed for her to sleep on tonight, right beside the bed.   No more outdoor nights for this lady.

Stories like Beth may help you understand why we work in rescue.   If you have not volunteered to help, just follow Beth and her story for a while, then go down and offer to help out.   We will be following her on the blog, and she will be the subject of lots of attention. We will be spoiling her silly.    It will be a while before she goes up for adoption, she has a lot of recovering to do. 

Mogley G. Retriever