08/30/2025
We said good bye to Douglas this week.
It was only May when we met him, after first seeing a photo of him as a thin, frightened dog cowering in the back of his kennel in an overcrowded shelter. He came to us after an adopter decided he was too strong on-leash and reached out to us rather than returning him to a shelter. His initial body score was a mere 3 out of 9. After 24-hours with us, he landed in “doggie ICU” with hemorrhagic gastroenteritis, bloody urine, vomiting, and general malaise. Ultimately he also tested positive for bordetella. While there, an abdominal ultrasound showed a mass in his bladder, and he was also tested for bladder cancer. Once stable, he went to a second foster home where he could be kept in quarantine until we were sure he would not be contagious to other dogs. This meant that in a period of 3 weeks he had been in 4 homes and 1 shelter.
Douglas survived it all while maintaining a sweet disposition.
For a short time, when a specific blood test came back negative, we had hope that he did not have cancer and could live a long happy life in a wonderful forever home, but that hope was short-lived, when we learned that his tumor had more than doubled in size in only two months.
Douglas was unphased by this news and continued to improve in every other way. He learned to walk nicely on-leash, and learned that his big-boy bark and exuberant on-leash greeting could be a little off-putting to people and dogs who didn’t actually know him. So he practiced hard to pretend to be a smaller dog so that people and dogs would be his friends. He also shed his fear and became a confident dog, happy to meet new friends, and always willing to play games with his two brothers. He gained 20-lbs, and grew a beautiful coat.
He did find his special, forever home right with his second foster and two older collie brothers who were happy to welcome him into their lives and show him the ropes, and the balls, and the tug toys, and beds, and couches, and squeaky stuffed animals, and even the grunting stuffed animals. He got to go to Gettysburg with his new family and experience Canine Camp Getaway of NY, and he managed to fit a lifetime of memories into the short time that he had simply by living each day for itself and to the fullest.
Even though we learned a few weeks ago that his kidney values indicated severe kidney failure, Douglas chose to ignore those results and live his life one day at a time to make each day special. It was only in his last few days that he started to show that he wasn’t feeling well and was not likely to rebound. The cancer was relentless and would finally have its way, and we knew it was time and could not let this special boy who had already been through so much suffer. So, wrapped in the loving arms of his mom, he was relieved of this final injustice.
This is never easy, and never seems fair, especially when the dog is young like Douglas, but it is for dogs like Douglas that we do what we do. We don’t know what he experienced before coming to us, but all appearances were that he did not live a wonderful life. We were able to turn that around and treat him like a king, even if it was only for a short time. We know that he knew the difference. We saw that whenever we looked into his eyes and saw apprehension replaced with confidence, and fear replaced with love.
We loved you too Douglas. We will miss you.
