Meet Maxie, the 15 month old Yorkshire Terrier! He came to us as a foster dog and his pure love and joy for life made it impossible to not make it a foster fail and adopt him just 3 months ago.

His first year of life was rough, being left in a crate up to 18 hours per day, receiving zero training nor socialization. Over the past 3 months, Maxie has shown his want to improve, learning over 25 commands and started training with a professional that other dogs aren’t so scary.

Due to his reactiveness to dogs, it made walks and training in our very dog friendly neighborhood too much for Maxie to handle. We decided to spend the time and money to break our lease and move to a quieter neighborhood for the newest member of our family.

Unfortunately, on the first morning waking up in the new apartment, Maxie showed signs of severe illness, throwing up several times, diarrhea inside when he always makes it outside. His usual hyper self was extremely lethargic and he was declining to walk and eat his favorite treats. We took him to the emergency vet and his bloodwork showed that his GGT liver enzymes were unreadable (over 5000 when the normal level for dogs is 10-125). We stayed overnight with him as the vets gave him fluids and medicine with an IV, but the morning results came back even worse and they recommended immediately taking him to specialty care. We did just that and he’s been hospitalized here for 3 days. They have continued the treatment with liver medicine, fluids, vitamin K, and something to try bringing his appetite back. His bloodwork hasn’t changed yet, but he finally ate food for the first time in 3 days which is a great sign, though the vets tell us he’s not out of the woods yet and hospitalization needs to continue.

We weren’t sure what caused this, but the vets were confident that toxicity was the most likely cause given how rapidly he deteriorated. In between visits at the vet, we retraced our steps on our first walk together in our new neighborhood and that’s when we discovered a few mushrooms growing. We took pictures and posted them in a Facebook group for professionals to identify potentially toxic fungi, and in minutes, several of them replied identifying the mushrooms as Death Caps, the most deadly type of fungi in the states each year. We can’t believe these are growing around our new apartment complex and we’re now going out of our way to warn any neighbors we see outside with small children or pets.

We simply wanted to make Maxie’s life better, but in just 3 months, this tragedy has left us with nearly $11,000 in medical bills. We hoped that moving neighborhoods would make Maxie’s life easier, but in less than 24 hours it has nearly killed him. As a result of the three days hospitalized, all the medications and testing, we are asking for financial help to get through this, especially knowing the bills will likely continue to increase as he remains hospitalized longer. Any amount truly means the world to us and to Maxie, and even if you can’t donate, we would really appreciate if you shared Maxie’s story. Thank you for reading this far and your interest in our little foster fail ❤️.

PSA: Use Facebook Group called “Poisons Help; Emergency Identification For Mushrooms & Plants” if your pet or child ever consumes something that you aren’t sure may be toxic! This group is phenomenal and one that even professional vets trust and use!

Update as of 12/8/2025: After a total of four nights hospitalized, Maxie’s bloodwork finally showed signs of his GGT and ALT liver enzymes dropping! Along with him regaining his appetite and showing no signs of other organs being affected, he was discharged this weekend to continue his recovery at home! We’re so grateful to have our little furry monster back home and that he’s showing signs of progressing towards a full recovery. To everyone that has donated or shared Maxie’s story, THANK YOU SO MUCH! We’re so lucky to have our village show up to help us and know that we will always be there for you all as well. The unfortunate part is the extra night hospitalized and medications have brought the total financial burden to over $13,000, so any continued sharing of this is truly appreciated! The help received so far has allowed us to breathe a little bit easier and that is precious when going through a time like this. I will update again after he goes back for more bloodwork on 12/10/2025.