I have been a big-dog lover all of my life. We used to live on the mountain side in Venezuela and my mom had a purebred German Pointer that practically raised me. Then she made friends with an Old English Sheepdog and a Doberman that I guess must've been strays because those two lived on our property for years. When "Sifrina" (spanish term for "Stuck-up" or "Snobby") had puppies I would get up in the middle of the night and sleep with her and the litter... scaring my mom half to death come morning when I was nowhere to be found but the basement.
Since then, I didn't really get the chance to own a dog, specially since moving to the States. We fostered dogs, found strays, re-homed them, but not one "stayed". So I'm not exaggerating when I say that I was dying to get married for the big bonus to be on our own and be able to have a dog!
Sure enough, Paul and I got married. We adopted a lab mix puppy from the pound and it was stolen from us while we were living on-base and he was on deployment, and I was 37 weeks pregnant with our first child. I tried searching for him and he never turned up. But from there the pound contacted us and offered us Sweetie, another lab that was up for euthanasia simply because her time was up.
Sweetie was THE perfect dog. She made Lassie look like a mangy mutt. She taught Anakin (our oldest) how to walk. She was completely housebroken, understood all her commands, and we had NO behavioral issues with her from the day we picked her up at the pound! But when Paul seperated from the Air Force, after a year of unemployment, we were forced to have re-home her and move back to our hometown. Our prospects there were unknown for us, let alone a 60 lb. animal.
Fast-forward a few more years and we find ourselves in Anchorage, Alaska. We've moved in to our itty-bitty apartment (second one since we got to Alaska) that allows us pets under 25 lbs, and if over there is a rent-increase. Yippee! Doggie, here we come!
Or should I say, here I come.... Paul wasn't too crazy about bringing one home just yet. And where do we start? What dog? Three kids later, what do I have the energy and time for?
First thing I did was look on craigslist. That was overwhelming. I saw a lot of older dogs being 'rehomed' for 'small fee' and the dogs were described as perfect angels - so why were they being dumped? It made me suspicious.
Then came my big pet-peeve (LOL, "pet"-peeve... hahahaha)... I see this ad for a litter of "Pomapugapoos" with a "rehoming fee" of $450. You've got to be kidding me?! Poma-pug-a-poos is not a breed. Not even a "designer breed". I'm not a big fan of dog breeding because of our pet overpopulation and the stress it puts on our local shelters to begin with. But that was ridiculous! And the "rehoming fee"? Like, I understand if it was the cost of food and some supplies, shots and medical bills that may have been run up and you're trying to cover some of that expense. But when I contacted this person, she said it was just for the unspayed, unvaccinated puppies. Woman, you are trying to make a profit off the fact that your mutt got loose and came home knocked up!
Even though the puppies looked adorable, I just couldn't endorse that. But we were too afraid to just bring home a dog from the pound and not know what its personality would be like. So with the help of a coworker we came up with the BRILLIANT idea to foster dogs/puppies that our local rescue organization would evaluate and pull from the pound. Then the dog would be adopted to its forever home. In the meantime, we would gain valuable experience in dog training and housebreaking, and the kids could learn appropriate doggy manners... and if a dog didn't fit with our home, it would be moved on to another foster family better suited and I could sleep well at night. Right?
Oh, we had no idea.
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