Eskie Rescuers United

Benny
Benny(or "Ben-ben) was a hoot! It took a bit of work to get him to calm down enough when we were getting ready for a walk, so I could get him hooked up. When he came up the stairs, he had his own rhythm - pokita, pokita, pokita..., until he got to the top. When he started to slow down, I put it down to age. Both of the Shibas I had started to slow up a bit at 12. Then he started to flop down in the middle of walks. And he started to eat flopped on the floor by his bowl. Finally one morning, he got out to the kitchen, flopped down,and never stood up again. The vet put him on steroids and crate rest. We did that for a couple of weeks. Then one day, he refused to eat. He even passed on scrambled eggs. That was when I took him to the 24 hour clinic to see what was going on. The attending was in surgery with another dog, so I left him for his tests and went home. A couple of hours later, I got a call to come in and talk with the vet. X-rays showed that one of his vertibrae was damaged, probably due to bone cancer. And some of the blood work results weren't encouraging either. I talked with the vet for a while, and decided that it was time to let him go. They have a lovely, quiet room where I sat holding Benny in my lap. He slipped away peacefully. As a dear friend of mine said when I told her, "He can run and play with the other dogs now."........Lee Webber, February 2018

Blazer
Blazer, your young life was unknown to me, but it must have been a difficult one because it affected you for life. As your ERU foster mom I was asked to pick you up. There, an elderly lady who had found you wandering in the neighborhood had been keeping you. She loved you and took you to a vet, but kept you confined to a small garage bathroom for two years and wouldn’t let you in the house where her other little dog lived. The lady had dementia. I don’t think she realized the damage she was doing by isolating you and taking you out for walks only twice daily. She didn’t want to turn you over to ERU but her daughters had intervened. Your vet records showed you had heartworms the whole two years she kept you, but your heartworm dispensing medication was confusing to her. Even before this lady captured you, you had been an unwanted creature, shot at with the old-style barbed bb pellets that were embedded in your body. When I put you in my SUV you growled at me and then laid down in the back of the vehicle. When we got home, I left you in my SUV until you finally crept out and went into our house bathroom. The bathroom was your safe place for quite some time. My evaluation of you made you unadoptable, but I didn’t want to give up on you, I adopted you. You made me cry so many times when you hurt me with your unexpected bites, but with time, your snapping and biting stopped. Your love and some trust emerged. You finally allowed me to pick you up and then we began to enjoy road trips together. You loved car rides, traveling and were a good hotel guest. As you aged, cataracts blinded you. I did not realize you had also become deaf until the day you were in a dangerous situation, and I called out for you to stop. You didn’t slow down, so I grabbed you from behind. Out of instinct you turned and bit part of my ear off. It required surgery. I couldn’t punish you; it was an instinctive reaction. Blind and deaf, I’d let you smell my hand and lead you to dinner or wherever you needed to go. You followed me everywhere in the house and you even knew how to navigate the pet door and perimeter of the backyard. As you got older, your naps were longer. You didn’t enjoy your walks anymore. You would pull on the leash to go back home if we tried to walk you past our driveway. Whenever there was a thunderstorm and you “saw” the lightning flash you were terrified. You ran to the garage door and begged to get inside the car. You always felt safe in a car. We would ride around in the rain, and you would settle down. You began experiencing anxiety in the house, breathing difficulties and pacing. The vet’s x-rays revealed an enlarged heart and you had developed a painful growth a few weeks earlier on your anus. It was time to say goodbye. Mark and I said our goodbyes to you at the vet and then we brought you back home to join our other beloved pets in the backyard. I’m glad that with patience we could give you a home for the greater half of your life where you could give and receive love. Thank you for coming into our life Blazer. You will always be missed.…….Lori and Mark Conway, June 8, 2023

BoBo
It is with a sad and heavy heart that we have to say Goodbye to Bobo today. He had a great morning at the pet parade with his brother Bailey. It happened quick, his heart went in to overtime and he had respiratory failure. He could not get enough oxygen. So I made the hard decision to not let him suffer. Goodbye to a brave happy little soul. He was well loved and will be missed......Arlene Young, November 7, 2015

Bogie
With a heavy heart I helped Bogie cross the bridge this morning. For the last week he had been limping on his right front paw. When I inspected his paw I noticed his nails were much longer on that paw than his left paw. I assumed that was causing his discomfort and made an appointment to get it looked at by the vet and have them trim his nails. When the vet did his exam he found a large mass in Bogies abdomen and noticed his inner eye lids and gums were white in color indicating a very low red blood cell count. The vet found Bogie had a tumor in his spleen. Bogie had anal gland cancer last year and it was removed, but his prognosis wasn't very good. I knew this day would come but didn't expect it to be today........Jim Schulz, February 2, 2019

Bonnie
Back in April of 2008, I adopted an Eskie, Bonnie, from the ERU. Her foster mother was named Rebecca and lived in Spokane, WA. Truth be told, it was Bonnie who adopted me and these last ten years were truly joyous with her in my life. In December 2015 she was diagnosed with bladder cancer and only given 6 – 12 moths to live. Luckily for me, Washington State University has one of the best vet schools in the nation and one of the few oncology centers. I immediately got Bonnie into the oncology center and she went an astounding 27 months on chemo. Most of the times, you wouldn’t even know that she had cancer and life went on as normal. She was a trooper above and beyond. Sadly, this morning, I had to let her go as her quality of life was rapidly deteriorating these past six weeks......Robert Yarbrough, March 9, 2018