What to do?

[gooeydog]

Last summer my friend adopted an 8 month old pit bull from the vets my mom works at. The dog was found wandering the streets with it's leg all taped up with electrical tape, and someone brought it in. The techs took pity on the dog because she was so sweet, and got her out of animal control when her holding time was up, had her leg amputated, and were looking for a home for it. My mom asked me if I knew anyone who was looking for a dog, and I in turn asked my friend if she knew of anyone. The next day she came to my house and told my mom that she was allowed to have the dog, so we went to meet it. The techs seemed to be happy she had found a home (her time there was about up), and my friend took her home that day (she was spayed the next week). Since then the dog has been living (what I consider) a miserable life. The dog is dog aggressive (not too bad, and she'd be fine with an experienced owner, but my friend has only made the problem worse), and they have another dog (the psycho lab mix I posted about on the other board), so the dog is crated in my friend's room all day, except for walks and at night (she used to let the dog loose in the room, but it tore everything up and "pottied" on the floor). The dog goes out a few times a day for bathroom breaks, then back into the crate. The only time it gets any real exercise is when there are people at the school and my friend takes the dog up there and lets it run loose :roll: , as if to show them that she has a "cool" pit bull. Last winter the dog was diagnosed with diabetes, and now it has to have insulin injections twice a day. They're supposed to be within an hour (at the very most) of the scheduled time, and her feeding times are also scheduled. Last night, my friend called at 10:30 and asked if I could go give the dog it's shot because she was at a party... the dog's supposed to get it's shot at 7:00. This happens all the time. I don't mind having to give the dog it's shot, but she never even asks until it's already past time, and I'm worried about what it's doing to the dog's health. I've also been wondering what will happen if my mom decides to quit working at the vets, since my friend doesn't have a job and her parent's can't really afford to pay the vet bills for the dog. My mom just takes the dog in to work with her, so she gets discounted/free care for it. Also, this is the same person who told me she wished her dog was more like Goo (defensive with strangers), and when she takes the dog for walks, if it strains to go "visit" with someone, she yells at it and jerks it back. She's conditioning (not intentionally, but due to her lack of patience) the dog to associate people with punishment. Then she takes the dog to a nearby school to let it run loose, when the dog has absolutely no recall, and it jumps on people, and mouths when it gets excited. If the dog jumps on a little kid, knocks them down, and starts mouthing them, the news will have a new "pit bull attack" story, the dog will be dead, and the local government will be pushing for BSL again. I've tried to talk to the friend about it, but she either denies that there's a problem, or gets defensive about it. I feel horrible that I had something to do with the dog being in this situation, and I don't want to see it (or anyone else) suffer because of my friend's ignorance & stubborness. Is there any way to get through to her that she's ruining a wonderful dog by treating it this way?

[shorty]

Did you talk to the Vet about this?Can they help in any way to get through to your freind? I agree something needs to be done before it's too late.
Wendy

[Hobbit]

Your friend has no idea what she is doing to the dog by not keeping her on her shot schedule. Her blood sugar drops, she gets disoriented, becomes afraid and fear bites someone; then is put to sleep because the "responsible" (used very loosely) person was to self-absorbed to properly medicate her. Or her shot is forgotten totally or "put-off" until such a time that is more convenient for the "responsible" (again used loosely) medication person and she has a seizure, goes into a coma and dies (which may be better in the long run).

Maybe she would be delighted to give her up since she is now a special needs dog, that will utimately end up costing her money in the future?

[Guest Anonymous]

Gooey, could you possibly line up a rescue who would be willing to take this special needs dog? Then speak to this friend and tell her that the vet's office will no longer allow your mom to bring the dog to the vet and get the meds that they will be charging her. Perhaps, the fact that she may have to be paying for the insulin, visits, etc. and may not be able to afford it may have some effect and you could tell her there is a rescue or person that would be willing to take her and find a forever home with the proper care that she needs. Do not feel badly, as you did it for the right reason being that you thought she'd be getting a home and not be PTS but it did not turn out that way. This is why Pitts wind up with such bad reputations all because of irresponsible owners. Her former owners who evidently abandoned her with a serious injury and no vet care and the new owner who is causing further damage to the Pitbull image, by turning a potentially aggressive dog with no exercise or training loose out in public. It just goes to show you that dog problems are not caused by the dogs, it's caused by irresponsible breeding and irresponsible owners. I hope you find a happy solution.

[Hobbit]

[quote name='Mei-Mei']

Then speak to this friend and tell her that the vet's office will no longer allow your mom to bring the dog to the vet and get the meds that they will be charging her. Perhaps, the fact that she may have to be paying for the insulin, visits, etc. and may not be able to afford it may have some effect and you could tell her there is a rescue or person that would be willing to take her and find a forever home with the proper care that she need

This is a very good idea. I have the feeling that your friend won't be interested in the dog once she learns the costs associated with it.

Don't feel badly. Sometimes helping a dog takes a little longer than anticipated. They don't automatically get into their forever home. It can take awhile.



Yeah, Goo --- maybe itemize or give her an example of what it could possibly cost (make it on the HIGH side). Just look at this as her temporary home before the forever home. As bad as it seems, this home is a lot better than being on the street, homeless. At least she's dry and warm.

I bet grouchy dog threw a fit with a new dog in his domain (kingdom)! He should be delighted to have someone to boss around. :wink:

[Rowie-the-Pooh]

Goo, I'm soo sorry all of this happened to u! First, the Lab, now the Pit.
Are you sure there is no way you can adopt her?(maybe you could?) Or you should ask rescues/expiereinced Pit Bull owners if they would like to resce this Pit(It would be counted as rescuing her from that owner!) You should do all in your power, no dog deserves this! Especially a Pit sice they have a bad name already! :evil: Please Goo-update us when you decide!




Oh yeah, maybe u should have a nice long talk with your friend? Tell her about the bad name Pit have already! Tell her about the responsibilities of dog ownership! Maybe show her some of the stuff here at Dogo! The pix, the Audio thing K posted ages ago? The stories? Take her to the pound and tell her those are the dogs that came from iresponsible owners...yadda yadda yadda...u know the story! Please goo! This dog has already entered my heart! I can't stop thinkin about her! :o :cry:




Oh, and can we have pix? :fadein: Thanx! :D

[gooeydog]

There was no "adoption agreement" from the vets, I think they were so glad they wouldn't have to have her PTS that they just assumed we knew she was a good home. At the time, I hadn't known the friend for very long, didn't realize their other dog had problems, but knew she liked dogs, so I figured they'd give the dog a good home. My mom felt the same. Right now, we take the dog in once a month to have her sugar checked, and make sure everything else is ok, and when the vet asks her about the dog, she just says "everything's fine" even if it hasn't been. If my mom or I bring up a problem she had mentioned to us earlier that week, for example, she either denies it, or makes an excuse for it (ie: the dog was puking up bile the other night because I left her loose in the room and she ate part of the table :roll: ). Before we realized the dog had diabetes, she started dropping weight really fast. She literally went from a little underweight to a skeleton in a week. I noticed that she was dropping weight, mentioned it to my friend, and she said "no she's not. She's fine". The dog was wasting away, so I kept suggesting she bring her down to let my mom look at her, and she kept replying with , "She's fine". By that point, you could see the dog's hip bones and every rib, even her head was bony. She was also peeing everywhere and was unsteady when she walked, but of course, when I brought that up, all I got was "she's fine", or some other excuse. When I told my mom about it, she suggested my friend bring the dog down so she could see if she noticed anything, but my friend said she was fine, and that there wasn't anything wrong with her. About a week after I first noticed the weight loss, I had Goo in the backyard (we were roasting marshmellows :lol: ), and my friend came running down there crying and saying "there's something wrong with Haley, she can't walk, everytime I try to get her to move she just falls over, and she looks like a skeleton". I walked up to the house to put our dogs away and she brought the dog down. I haven't seen my mom that mad in a long time (to be honest, I wasn't exactly happy myself :roll: ). The vets weren't open that late, and there's no emergency vets nearby, so the dog stayed at our house until the next morning, when we took her to the vets. What I don't understand is how a dog could be wasting away in front of someone, and they wouldn't even realize it. Even now, my friend still doesn't notice when something's wrong with the dog, and has no common sense about dogs at all. She would take the dog for walks in the middle of the day in summer, and just walk until it couldn't walk any more. Then she'd come to our house panicking because the dog couldn't stand up. I have brought up the cost of medical care (if my mom couldn't get it anymore), and she says her parents would "just have to find money, because she's not getting rid of her dog". I don't think she realizes how expensive it really is, though, because whenever she wants something, she just whines until they give in and pay for it, so she thinks they'll do the same for this. I get the feeling that if they couldn't pay for it, she still wouldn't give the dog up, but would just do what they could afford, which would leave the dog suffering. I've pointed out that the dog may be better of with someone who has more funds and time for it, but she won't even consider it. (On the other hand, I've also pointed out that if the dog jumps on someone and mouths them at the school, she'll probably be going for the "big sleep", and her response is always "they can't do that. She's my dog, not theirs." or " no they won't. She's friendly"). She has no clue about how to read a dog, even after countless "lessons" with Goo (and the other dogs), so if the dog ever does start to show signs of a temperment problem, they'll be ignored/un-noticed until it's too late. I don't see much chance for the two dogs getting along together, and have even offered them some babygates so they can keep the dogs seperate, but there's always some excuse for that ("Oh, Manson (the lab x) won't like that, and he'll bust through them".... or "they'll probably get along ok, once Manson stops trying to hump her and she stops trying to bite him in his face" :roll: ). There's no way we could keep her (Annie wouldn't tolerate her at all, even Casey doesn't much like her, and Goo doesn't really like the dogs we have, nevermind bringing in another one :wink: ), but if my friend would agree to give her up, we could at least foster her if we had to, until she found a new home. I've shown my friend all sorts of things.. websites for diabetic dogs, dog aggressive dogs, dogs that bite (more for their other dog, but still...), and none have really done anything. I don't really know what else I can do to get through to her.
Rowie, I'll put some pics of her in the pics section.

[eggrolyn1223]

:o I was a little better off than her when I came to this website, and when I saw it I was like OH!!!How did I ever do this?....but I wonder why your friend doesn't have any feelings at all(sry)? :( :o :o I hope she'll agree to give the dog up. :cry: