Vera - A Happy Ending

When Vera first came to us she was tentative, trying to adapt to the unfamiliar people in the house and she never seemed to be fully at ease. Every little motion or sound would cause her to stir, and she would regard other family members with caution. However, after spending a few months with us, she gradually opened up and accepted our place as her home.

Now, Vera will come bounding up to the gate whenever she hears anybody come home, and affectionately seek attention every morning when we come downstairs after waking up. She rarely barks, and even my parents have remarked that she is unusually well behaved. She will never enter the kitchen or take food without us telling her that it is okay to do so, and she loves her favourite spot underneath the large dining table. Simply by being her perfect self, she has found a place in the hearts of the rest of the family.

The thought of Vera having to adapt to a new home once more, after so many times of moving from house to house, eventually convinced us to adopt her. Seeing her totally at ease here, how she wags her tail madly whenever we call her name, makes everything that we have done worth it. Make no mistake, taking care of a dog is a huge commitment and responsibility, but letting Vera into our lives was one of the best decisions we’ve made as a family in 2017.

Written by : DC

Donut's Updates (II)

It’s been almost a week since Donut’s surgery. She’s definitely looking better now and we are heartened to see her appetite picking up. She has also started to sit up sometimes and turns herself, instead of lying down all day. All that said, we are still uncertain if Donut would one day walk again. At the back of our minds, we are still very worried that she might join the Diaper Club.

Donut, resting at the vet

Our volunteers have been taking turns to visit Donut daily and she must be looking forward to these regular patting sessions! Poor Donut must be very bored staying in the room all day by herself that she started chewing on her e-collar (she has to wear one as she has been licking her wound and chewing on her drips). The volunteers have thought of buying toys for her but we doubt she knows what to do with them as, sadly, she never had the luxury of having them as a stray dog.

What a pretty girl - her spirit and will to live is simply amazing! 

Besides giving Donut loving pats during these visits, the volunteers will also bring along food and milk for her. We initially thought she might prefer blended food as it will be easier to chew but seems that this sweetie likes it otherwise! She prefers chunky chicken meat, chicken liver and beef, and will eat them on her own without us having to feed her.

Hiding all her food and refusing to eat

However, earlier this week, it was observed that she was eating her own poop. This is not a good sign as it meant that her body is not digesting the food well and is lacking certain nutrients. The vet has since started her on probiotics to make her stop eating her own poop. On this same note, she has been leaking liquid poo and the vet is not convinced that she’s pushing them out on her own. As such, we will not be feeding her milk for now, so that she can firm up her poo to make sure she can push it out on her own.

Missing her friends, her freedom and wondering why her life was taken away from her so suddenly. What did she do to deserve such fate? 

Our volunteers have also been diligently massaging the paw pads of her hind legs daily but we noticed that the feedback has been inconsistent. Some days she will withdraw her legs but some days she doesn’t. She does move around on her own sometimes, albeit whining a little due to the pain from the surgery. We are hopeful that she has some nerves intact and will continue with these massages to stimulate her senses.

Donut has come a long way and she has been a true fighter! She will be discharged next week but that comes our next concern – where will Donut go? We urgently need a foster or adopter who can take care of Donut as she embarks on her road to recovery. She would need to be kept in a small area as she needs to minimise her movements for 4 to 6 weeks.

Please do not hesitate to email us at hopedogrescue@singnet.com.sg if you can offer your home to this sweet lady. She will make your life as sweet as donuts!

Written by: Shi Hua

Give Adora A Chance

In an ideal world, all puppies would grow up in loving homes, getting treats for being good and being trained on how to be a dog. But this wasn't the case for Adora. Instead, she was severely abused as a young pup. Although she had a home, her family was very cruel to her. She was starved, neglected, and beaten on a regular basis. Her family definitely did not have the time or patience to be dog owners. In fact, everybody would have been much better off if they hadn't kept her for as long as they did. Even growing up on the streets would have been better for Adora, and that's saying a lot.

Adora collapsed as soon as she realized she was safe

And when they finally had enough, Adora's owners decided to abandon her. They took her far, far away from their home, and dumped her. By that point, Adora had been reduced to skin and bones. She was so weak and ill that she could hardly walk. But Adora did not give up. Clinging on to life, and her newfound freedom, she slowly wandered the streets looking for food. Read her story here.

Adora the day she was found. Rescued and sent to the vet immediately

Eventually, Adora found her way into an HDB estate. A kind lady saw her, and was shocked at her appearance. She could count every rib and see every bone protruding from Adora's frail body. That's when the lady called HOPE Dog Rescue for help, and we got to meet Adora. We brought her to the doctor for a check up, and started her on her long journey to recovery.

Adora had been so starved that her stomach couldn't handle more than a few bites of food. For many months, her meals had to be broken up into tiny amounts and fed to her throughout the day, before she finally started putting on weight and getting stronger.

Adora as she is today. She resembles a whippet / hound.

One year later, Adora still bears the mental scars of her abuse. She doesn't know why she was beaten, or what she did to deserve it. She doesn't understand that the cruelty she faced was not her fault. She has yet to learn what happiness is, because she's never had a happy day in her life. She's angry. She has a tendency to snap and bite when you make sudden movements, probably because that was how she used to try to defend herself against her abusers. She also has food aggression. But once you get to know her and she begins to trust you, she won't bite any more. Adora just wants to have friends - human or dog, doesn't matter.

If Adora was a human child, her parents would have been fined and jailed. But she's a dog, and we don't even know who her abusers were. There's no justice for Adora. If you feel angry on her behalf, or sad that this happened to her, please consider fostering or adopting Adora.

Give her a chance. All she wants is a friend, someone that she can trust, to help her overcome her insecurities, her fears, her sadness. Help her to forget her past abuse, and to understand that she now has a new life. Simply put, Adora needs someone to teach her how to be happy and show her all the good things the world has to offer.

Adora is very small, weighing just 14kg and definitely HDB approved

We plead for someone to foster or adopt Adora and help her on this healing journey. Without you, she will remain a miserable dog for the rest of her life.

To foster, please fill up this form.

To adopt, please fill up this form.

For enquiries, please email hopedogrescue@singnet.com.sg

Written by: Elena

Donut's Updates

Donut dearie is still under observation at the hospital. The poor girl is not out of the woods yet and has been having diarrhoea on a daily basis, but she remains positive and responds well to our volunteers’ visits. 

Minions attending to our sweet Donut

She always shows us an appreciative and sweet face when we visit and seems to have some senses in her hind legs as she would sometimes sit up and try to shift her body around and shows slight movement in her hind legs. There was once the vet literally pulled her leg and she immediately withdrew her leg with a pitiful expression, as if saying “hey! What are you trying to do? It hurts. Stop it please!” This gives us hope and makes us believe Donut still has some nerves intact and might be able to walk, pee and poop with control, in time to come. 

Such a sweetie pie 

Trying to stand up, but she could not

However, Donut has also shown signs of not having any senses left in her hind legs, such as leaving her legs in an awkward position and not having the urge to change it. As such, we do not know how things would pan out and whether Donut does have some senses left in her hind legs.

Donut is on a urine catheter 

Where food is concerned, we were initially rather worried as Donut’s appetite had been quite poor and she had to be syringe fed. We soon realised that the problem did not lie with Donut’s appetite but with her eating habits. As a stray, she is not accustomed to eating from a bowl and would only eat from the floor or the grass. Little wonder then that Donut would eat when we place her food on the pee pads or on the floor but not from her food bowl. She seems to like KFC chicken, home cooked chicken, beef and chicken liver and has been eating them without us having to blend them. We hope she continues to eat well.

She loves being pampered and hand fed. She hasn't learnt to eat from a bowl

Our volunteers have been taking turns to massage the paw pads on Donut’s hind legs to fire her neurons and stimulate her senses, give Donut shoulder and head massages to comfort her and to wipe her body. Hopefully our little efforts would go a long way in aiding Donut’s recovery. We have also been trying to construct a stretcher and trolley for her so that when she leaves the hospital, it would be easier for her future foster or adopter to bring her around.

She misses her friends and her freedom

Donut is slated for discharge next week. After her discharge, she would need a foster or adopter to look after her. Please do-nut hesitate and step forward to foster dear Donut now! Donut will be eternally grateful to you and make your days as sweet as donuts. Her foster would require to keep her in a small area and minimize her movements for 4 to 6 weeks. It is not known yet if she can pee / poo on her own or needs help expressing like our 3 Diaper Club dogs.

Please do not hesitate to email us to find out more her fostering requirements hopedogrescue@singnet.com.sg Thank you! We will treat you to donuts.  

Thank you for saving me <3 <3

Written by: Weiling

Donut's Out of Surgery

Have you been wondering how Donut has been doing since our previous post about Donut? Well, nut to worry… Donut is a brave and strong girl. She has displayed an indomitable spirit and willpower to continue living and we do-nut have a doubt she will survive and live happily ever after.

We asked Pawsitive Sensations to help massage Donut’s acupoints to stimulate her poo after every method seemed to fail and poor Donut looked increasingly tired and dejected. Thank goodness it worked! We jumped with joy upon hearing that Donut pooped after her massage. She also released some gas from her tummy and started eating again. Phew!

Donut in the recovery suite after surgery

In shock and in quite a bit of pain

Donut’s poop gave us the confidence to send her for her surgery. Dear Donut just came out of the operating theatre; it was a long surgery lasting almost 4 hours. We were there to receive her as she came out of the operating theatre, conscious. She was in obvious pain as the vet had inserted steel plates to hold her fractured spine together. The vet tells us that her spine and nerves are totally severed but we believe in miracles and will continue to hope beyond hope that she will one day walk again. She may no longer have control of her bladder and bowels but we won’t know this till much later.

Her wound is extremely long and painful. What a brave girl she has been.

After the vet had left, we noticed this swollen. We never noticed previously when she had fur.

We wanted to see the xray results after her surgery but the vet said he was really tired and for us to come again in the morning. 

She will need to stay at the vet for about a week, for them to observe her recovery, after which, she will require a foster home.

We are really proud of Donut, how brave she has been and can’t wait for her to start feeling better.

If you would like to help with her vet bills or find out more about fostering requirements, please email hopedogrescue@singnet.com.sg Thank you. 

Donut

At Hope Dog Rescue, we do-nut give up on any dog. This new year, we nearly started the year on nut a very nice note by having to make the painful decision to put down a dog we rescued on the eve of new year’s eve. Her name is Donut. (Watch her rescue here)

When we found her at the factory

In too much pain to eat or move

She sure is one sweet and hole-some doggie whom we do-nut have the heart to bid farewell to. We are glad we did nut give up on her and gave her the chance to continue experiencing the new year. When you look at her eyes, they are as sweet as donuts and so sparkly and hopeful. Just like donuts, she makes us happy. So, what happened to Donut and how is she doing now?

Saturday's emergency

Last Saturday night, what started as a mirthful eve of new year’s eve feast for the doggies ended on a tragic note as what nearly became “the last supper” for Donut. As usual, we went on our weekly rounds to feed the stray doggies in an industrial estate. When we reached Raphael’s factory, we were greeted by one less doggie and informed by one of the kind security guards there that the missing doggie was injured. The kind guard guided us towards a gory scene of the poor missing doggie lying in a pool of blood. This missing doggie was Donut. We were horrified. 

Warded since Saturday night

As fate would have it, Donut, from Raphael’s pack, suffered a similar but worse fate than Raphael and got hit by a car at 6pm in the evening, slightly before we arrived to feed the doggies there. The poor strays are always at the mercy of speeding trucks and lorries in the industrial areas. We were shattered. The poor girl must have been in excruciating pain. She cowered in a corner until we tried to leash her. Despite her injuries and her inability to walk on all fours, her natural instinct was to run away from us when we tried to catch her to bring her to the vet. It pained us to see how she wobbled in pain. After about 20 minutes of playing cat and mouse and an episode of Donut snapping from fear and distress, we finally managed to carry her into our volunteer’s car and rush her to the vet.

As sweet as Raphael 

At the vet, we muzzled Donut and used a towel to cover her head to alleviate her stress. Her body was covered in cuts, abrasions, bruises and blood. The fresh blood meant that the security guards were right in saying that the fateful accident occurred just moments prior to our arrival. The vet attempted to get Donut to stand but she could not. The poor girl must have been in too much pain. Yet, there was not once that she whimpered or protested. She is such a sweetie. At 30kg, Donut is also one solid girl. Although the workers called her Fatty, she is not exactly fat. She is just solid.

The vet cleaned Donut’s wounds and checked her injuries. The initial examination revealed a broken nail and perhaps some fractures in her legs. The vet also said Donut might have ruptured her bladder. We would need to monitor her poo and pee. The x-ray done the following morning showed that what we had initially thought was a broken front left leg was actually a dislocated spine. Poor Donut. Will she be another Matthieu, Sida or Harper? What does fate have in store for her? So many questions raced through our minds. Donut looks about 5 to 6 years old. She should still have many golden years ahead of her. Yet, this had to happen. Poor Donut.

We had initially been prepared to proceed with surgery and give Donut a chance to recover. Sadly, the vet who had done lots of research on spinal problems informed us that while he could proceed with the spinal surgery, there was a lot of poo in Donut that she could not excrete on her own due to the loss of sensation in her lower body and inability for her anal sphincter to contract. There was no guarantee that the spinal surgery could rectify this issue. What if Donut still could not poo after the surgery? She would be leading a life worse than Sida’s, Matthieu’s or Harper’s. At least the diaper club doggies can poo on their own. Imagine having to wait for someone to push your poo out for you every day. How unbearable! Our hearts really sank to the valleys when the vet broke the news to us. We could not stop crying but had to pull ourselves together and make a quick decision whether to proceed with surgery or put Donut down as it was ideal for the surgery to be performed within 48 hours. This was Hobson’s choice.

After considering the poor quality of life that Donut would have if she cannot poo voluntarily and the number of dogs that can be saved with the hefty vet bill that Donut would chalk up with the surgery that may or may not succeed, it seemed to us that the more logical decision would be to let Donut run freely on the other side of the rainbow bridge, and we nearly made that decision. We had already booked a slot for Donut’s cremation. Yet, something just did not feel right. We watched and rewatched the videos of her running away despite being in such pain and visited her at the vet. She was sprightly and alert and her eyes were brimming with hope and life. She had such a cute face and was smiling despite her ordeal. How could anyone let her go? She seemed to be saying “please do-nut give up on me! I promise to be good and stay inside the factory. I won’t go outside and get into trouble again.” Looking at her sweet face, we decided to keep her under observation and pray and hope for the best. We will focus on the Donut and not the hole.

At the moment, Donut is on painkillers and mild sedatives. She is still not emptying her bladder on her own despite having a full bladder. Her appetite is also poor. We are really worried about her. We hope she can stay strong and recover soon. Donut’s bills to date amount to about S$4,000+. If she undergoes surgery and stays at the vet for about 7 days to recover, her bills may go up to the region of more than S$10,000. Due to the long weekend, her bills would be even higher. This new year, will you help us to create a miracle? Do-nut forget that a little kindness goes a long way. Please help us to pray hard that Donut will start to pee and poo without external help soon. If it is within your means to help with Donut’s vet bills, please email us at hopedogrescue@singnet.com.sg.

Thank you! Hugs and kisses from Donut.

Written by: Weiling