Our Recent Search for a Dog Rosie and I have been wanting a dog for a while but were in a small apartment with a cat, Jack, already and are planning to move as soon as she finds a new job which very most likely will not be close enough to commute to from here and could be even in another state. We thought it would be best to move first but that is taking a lot longer than we thought and have decided to start looking for a dog now since we want a small dog, anyway. We want a dachshund ideally but also want to get a dog from a shelter so most like a dachshund mix and were open to even other breeds or mixes just want it to be a small, lap dog. I didnt think it would be a big deal in terms of finding a dog once we made up our minds but that has definitely not been the case. Im very allergic to cats and were tried to “re-home” Jack but have discovered that apparently you truly cannot give a cat away. Im loaded down on allergy medication for now and I guess Ill have to start getting allergy shots for cats just been putting that off its not cheap with my insurance and requires weekly visits for a long period of time but I guess its the ultimate solution. From visiting local shelters, giving him up which was never an option is even less so since obviously every shelter is flooded with unwanted cats. Im not a cat person so this doesnt surprise me but it is shocking. If they have five dogs, they have fifty cats! The shelters near us are no kill shelters thank God dont think I could take it walking through one if they were certainly not if we didnt take one home afterward. There do not seem to be many local dogs in these shelters they seem to take in dogs form outlying rural kill shelters. Some of the none profits that have dogs available for adoption have a lot of hoops to jump through and also charge a pretty high fee more than we want to pay at this point. Some require a fenced yard and do need allow adoption to apartment dwellers. We did fill out a couple apps with a couple of the larger ones just in case. Small dogs seem to be at a premium, Im finding. Mostly there are pit bulls or pit mixes I mean its kind of stunning to me how consisted this is in every shelter that is the case. We both have physical limitations and dont think we could handle a larger dog plus were likely to end up in an apartment situation in the future whichever way we jump in terms of housing and personally the one thing we both want in a dog is a cuddle bunny. Ive always had larger dogs my whole life never really had a small dog and Rosie recalls very fondly her past dachshunds. Our dog would have to basically get along with Jack at least not eat him. The other possibility is a concern for me too in that Jack could scratch its eyes out! The one time he was around dogs, he did okay with one playing until two larger, very aggressive dogs appeared suddenly and attacked him and he had to be rescued not without suffering scratch damages to the rescuer! (Me) I went through the nearest county shelter and there was only one small dog a very old and tiny poodle mix with few teeth and diabetes and Cushing disease. She doesnt sit on her doggie bed within the kennel instead curled up on the hard concrete floor. The barking is so loud that I can barely stand it. Two families are perusing. The dogs move rapidly I have noticed from watching this shelters website, even the pits and pit mixes, a good thing in terms of conscience. I leave and feel terrible leaving that pathetic little poodle there even though we had agreed to adopt a senior if it otherwise seemed right we dont have to money to jump into those kind of vet bills. It bothers me even after talking to Rosemary who had a beloved dog die from Cushing disease and definitely is not inclined to committing to that ordeal again. I dont look for another week sort of traumatized but I notice when I do look that someone has adopted the little old, sick lady. God bless them. Then I find a dachshund mix who is a six year old girl at another fairly local county shelter brought in from a kill shelter somewhere deep in West Virginia, they say when I call. Her name is “Boo Boo” which is what I wanted to name ours and to which Rosie has tentatively agreed. Boo Boo has gum disease that their vet says will mainly require daily brushing to deal with and we agree that we can handle that. The next day, Rosie sends me some other dogs that she has found locally in an email to look at and I get back to her that Im stuck on Boo Boo and I cant emotionally consider others until we eliminate little Boo Boo as a choice. She doesnt call me a big pussy and we agree to go up to the shelter that evening when she gets off work. I think we both have high hopes for Boo Boo and I feel as though we are just going to pick her up, basically. We get there and fill out some paperwork and wait for an attendant to bring Boo Boo out to us in a “visiting room”. The shelter if very clean and has a good feel to it also being an urban shelter has quite a selection of non traditional pets from parrots to ferrets. Boo Boo is very cute and we both sit on the floor as the attendant leaves her in the room with us. She runs immediately to the door the attendant left through ignoring us. Understandable, I think, shes nervous, doesnt know us, abandoned recently somewhere in West By God Virginia. After ten minutes we get her to come to us when we call a few times but she seems uninterested in us so I ask the attendant if we can take her out for a walk. Rosemary thinks maybe she needs to pee. We take her outside for a walk and she seems concerned with getting back in more than anything else definitely does not want to pee. After a while, we take her back in since it is cold out and attendant said not to keep her out long. I let her go where she wants thinking she will go to the attendant maybe he is all she knows but she doesnt she goes back to the door leading into the kennels and when he comes and opens the door, she goes immediately to her kennel and happily jumps in playing with a toy on her kennel bed still ignoring us. Its too noisy to talk in the kennel with the other dogs all barking so we go back out into the hallway. I feel kind of in shock. It is a very weird feeling nothing I had ever felt before. A mix of guilt, disappointment and bafflement. We go outside and talk about it and decide to not get Boo Boo, after all. I think she was kept in a kennel possibly her whole life and never bonded with humans. It is possible, the kennel attendant says. He doesnt know all the details but many of the dogs like her come from puppy mills of one kind or another and she was spayed after arriving. Driving home is a long ride now in rush hour traffic and we agree that we made the right decision since we both really want a dog who is affectionate but we wonder if she would have warmed up to us over time. I feel finally like I was emotionally intoxicated and this failed Boo Boo run seems to deflate a bubble and I feel really sobered from it all. That was a week ago and weve sort of put it on the back burner now. I feel like I cant deal with another “visit” for now anyway and with money tight and Christmas coming, maybe this is just not a good time – I tell myself.
Posted on: Mon, 24 Nov 2014 01:40:45 +0000
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