On June 25th of this year, I was checking my mail when I saw an emaciated dog with a terrible injury to his back paw wandering down the road in front of my house. I couldn't leave him there, so I brought him into the yard, grabbed my husband, and took this poor boy to the vet. It turned out that he'd been shot, and his paw was full of birdshot and infection. We vowed to him that we'd take care of his medical issues and foster him until he was healthy and could be adopted by a good family.

Chance, as we named him, turned out to be the sweetest, dopiest boy ever. He became best friends with the puppy we'd adopted two days before he arrived. Chance loves belly rubs and rolling in stinky things and aggressive bedtime snuggles. He and our puppy run around together and wrestle all day long. Chance is a very friendly dog. Unfortunately, his leg was the least of his problems.

After his leg was healed enough for him to have other things taken care of, we took Chance to be vaccinated, tested for parasites, etc. That day, we got the awful news that he was heartworm positive.

If heartworms are not treated, it's a death sentence for the dog. However, the treatment is very expensive and dangerous in and of itself. If a dog receiving treatment gets their heart rate too high, they can have a pulmonary embolism and die. It's very important that the dog remain calm and quiet for the duration of treatment, which lasts two months.

We got the boy through treatment, which cost nearly a thousand dollars on its own. Then, because Chance is such an energetic dog, we had to spend hundreds on massive amounts of tranquilizers to keep him calm enough not to kill himself. It was a very stressful and expensive couple of months.

Finally, after his treatment ended and Chance was at last free of his wormy freeloaders, we were able to have him neutered. That happened this past Wednesday.

He'll need to get a steroid shot next week because he's having some allergies, but otherwise, he's at last healthy and ready for his new forever home, wherever that might be!

My husband and I have been fostering Chance privately, which means all his medical expenses have come straight out of our own pockets. We haven't had any help with his vet bills (except for at the very beginning; the expenses from that first night when we started treating his leg were covered by a couple of generous donations from good Samaritans). We have spent $1,801.09 of our own money to help this dog, and that is waaaaay more than we could afford. Our credit card statements are getting very scary. Thus, I am requesting help at last.

Chance is a wonderful dog, and he's been a joy to foster. He will make some lucky person or people very, very happy. He's been worth every penny we've spent... but I would also like to be able to feed myself going forward. Thank you for reading this far, and thank you if you're able to donate. ❤️