Hello - I've really struggled with the decision to do this but here goes. My name is Heather, and over the summer we had not one but two medical scares with our 1 year old puppy Ripley where we ended up at Cornell Vet Hospital. The first visit required an MRI, x-rays, ultrasound and a spinal tap amongst bloodwork and other tests which ultimately identified that she had inflammation in the nerves around her spine and that she has an autoimmune disease. The second visit only a couple months later, she was not keeping food down and we again had to visit Cornell to get x-rays and ultrasound to identify a blockage that required emergency surgery to remove and a 2 night stay in the hospital because our girl Ripley thinks she needs to eat EVERYTHING - in part due to the prednisone that she's been on to treat the autoimmune disease since the initial visit.

 

Due to these two vet visits and with follow up care we've needed, Ripley is now nearly a $10,000.00 dog!! Thankfully, I was able to get a small amount of financial aid from a fund that Cornell has for portion of the expenses from the first visit, but it still left me with a fairly large bill from the first visit and did not help with any part of the emergency surgery expenses needed at the second visit. I don't have pet insurance and am now working to pay off the bill for the remainder of her medical expenses.  I'm now drowning in debt even more so than I was before this all happened. As a single parent, I pretty much make just enough to pay the bills without a whole lot of extra left over. I'm not one to ask for help, especially not for money or a handout, but I never thought I'd own a dog that was so expensive - especially not at 1 year old!  We lost our old dog last October, (he was old and sick and it was his time) and losing another dog was just not something I could do or put my daughter through and so here we are with the monstrous vet bills because she's our fur baby and we love her to death.  I've managed to budget and figure out a way to be able to pay more than half of the total bills but I really could use a bit of help trying to pay off the remainder especially before an extravagant amount of interest starts being added to the total still due.

 

All money raised will go directly to the debt I now owe from the vet bills. I'm sure there are more worthy causes, and people worse off than me, which is why I've really struggled with the decision to do this, but I'm trying to learn to actually ask for help before I completely drown so to speak, so if you have the means to give a little something to help with the cost of Ripley's medical care, I would be extremely grateful for anything you can give. If I reach my goal or somehow raise more than needed, I'll shut down this page (and return extra funds)!! If you can't do anything financially, please just share this link and hope and pray that this adorable girl has no more issues moving forward because I certainly can't afford another vet visit anytime soon and poor Ripley has been through enough!! Thank you so much in advance.