30
votes
Fundraising Goal
Raised
$20
Goal
$200
Entry Category:
Dog
Your Pet's Rescue StoryPure gratitude is what we see in this photo. It was taken two days after Mila joined our family, and shows a beautiful moment of freedom and joy that we were lucky to capture.
We adopted Mila on 11/25/14. She came from a high kill shelter in Miami, Florida. She had a bad cough and was labeled as "vicious," which meant she stood virtually no chance of being adopted. She was two days from being euthanized. We already have two adopted dogs, but when my wife shared Mila's intake picture with me, all I saw was a sad, dejected dog with a hopeless expression on her face; I knew we had to bring Mila home.
She arrived by transport and the first thing we noticed was how sad and subdued she appeared. She had a terrible case of kennel cough and was sick for many weeks. On top of that, she was terrified. She would bark at everybody and had big trust issues. She attached herself to my wife very quickly, but it took me nearly a year to create the unbreakable bond we have now. We suspect that it took this long because I was male and she may have had prior traumatizing experiences with males.
Mila has made our family stronger, and now she is stronger. We give her the love she deserves everyday, and she knows she will be a part of our family forever. We haven't seen the dog who was labeled "vicious" and discarded from the public's view. And most importantly, the hopeless expression she had in her intake photo has been permanently replaced with a wagging tail and frequent tap dancing.
We hope more people adopt when they can. There are too many helpless animals in the world with so much love to give. They are just looking for anyone to give them love in return.
Let's stop breeding animals and make room in our hearts and homes for the shelter pets being abandoned everyday. #adoptdontshop