So, picking up where we left off on original “Gotcha” post…
As of today, April 20, 2019 – we have had these pups we ‘adopted’ from what was presented to us as a “Husky Expert”. We have had them now just a few days over the 30 day trial period. We know we are NOT returning these pups and she has no reason to come get them. We followed all of her “rules” and “advice”; we kept her updated via Instagram that the family contributed regular photos and videos to. She had even contacted me on Facebook messenger, where all of our interaction took place, regarding a video she saw on the Instagram account. We knew she was watching.
In these 30 days, we had learned the habits, quirks and personality traits of both of these pups. We had successfully changed Rose to Rubi, as we were NOT fans of the “Titantic” and having a “Jack and Rose” was NOT in the cards for us. Rubi was fitting. In these 30 days we had all experienced a lot of changes. Bed times and wake times were dictated by these two, at first. Then, they learned to adjust to us.
Now, let’s pick pack up on the saga…
April 14, 2019…we had our first vet visit…it was not as good. Our “Husky Expert” straight up lied to us. Rather than show my hand immediately, I wanted to give her a chance to come clean.
I reached out to her at 6:28pm, “Evening to you. Are there anymore medical records from the treatments you provided for these babies while you rehabilitated them?”
She came back almost immediately, “I do not have anything on hand. We recently purchased a house and lost a few things in between, including their vaccination records. Is there anything specific that you were looking for? I may be able to get the records from the vet again, but I’m not entirely certain”. [Apr 14 6:28pm]
I told her “We took them and waiting on lab work results…been busy, gotta schedule mass removal too it felt bad not having anything with us except the clinic papers you gave us…was hoping for more is all. Sorry about the move chaos…btdt. Just let me know what you come up with when you can. It is probably more my request than anyone else’s”.
She responded, “Has there been any growth? It was not visible to the eye when she was with me. In terms of records, I’ll ask the vet I went to. We work hard to keep things organized with their expenses for food, flea/tick medication, heart worm prevention, vet records, but we lost records from a few of our rescue/rehabilitation cases. It was very frustrating. I’m glad as their adopters that you are trying to keep track of things, and we as their rescuers try hard to keep track of what we’ve done for them. I’m generally a very organized person, as rescuing dogs requires it. Again, I will ask and see what they say. They aren’t our regular vet as ours would have been ridiculously expensive for both of them, so I’m not sure of their methods.” [Apr 14 @7pm]
I will stop here and explain what was going on on our end and why this whole conversation with her was just another example of “GOTCHA”.
The journey home that day was exhausting and the big mistake on my part was not taking time to REALLY look over the papers she gave me. I own that. The paper she gave us was a very simple copy of a treatment form with a rabies tag attached (she hadn’t even put their tags on them). Looking back, they had NO TAGS on when we got them so these were not REPLACEMENT tags – they were their FIRST rabies tags. Mind you, she said she had them for a year.
“GOTCHA moment” (no papers)
Now, we had done our BEST to follow her rules and expert advice. We were careful not to get them out near other dogs. On the trip home, we were faced with choices that had to be made and we made them, with those things in mind. We had to stop and get another crate (the one we had was clearly too small for one and the two of them would NEVER fit). We had to get beds. We also had to get them out to potty. So we stopped at rest stops for potty breaks and parked away from people. When we were faced with going into a store, we both needed to go and couldn’t leave them unattended, so we chose a Tractor Supply. It was late, little to no cars in lot, we parked far away, let them relieve themselves BEFORE we went in. They were PERFECTLY behaved. We found the crate, grab the beds and on our way. We got to the register and the very nice staff wanted to give treats. We explained to them that we JUST picked them up, had no clue if they would take them or how. They cautiously gave them treats and we learned that they were VERY well mannered, friendly and eager to meet people. They were wonderful.
“GOTCHA moment” (not aggressive)
So, we ventured out and tried a little experiment of our own. We took them to Pet Smart. We had to see for ourselves how they would act. We took the risk. Surprisingly, not one incident. Small dogs, large dogs or same size dogs…didn’t one sign of aggression show up in either dog. We were concerned that they were not eating, so we were on the hunt for food. We had done some research and felt we had to try. Turned out, they HATED the food she recommended.
“GOTCHA moment” (not aggressive/hates food)
We did our best to keep up their 2 hour a day exercise. It made us get up and that was good. We slowly took them more places but was careful NOT to put them in with other dogs too fast. We took them around people and they LOVE people and people love them. It was a good feeling to walk them and have people get all giddy over them. In the past, we have done a fair share of off road adventures in our Jeeps. So, having them travel with us was important because we wanted to do more of that with them. We took them on an adventure one time, we were looking for property. We ended up in a very remote location. Through miscommunication on my part, “Rubi” got away and ran off – still in eye sight. Not far. But our hearts burst in fear. We had stopped to see an old family grave site and she took off toward it. There was a barb wire fence so getting to her was a challenge for humans. We called her name(s) and a knee jerk name we used was one that our “expert” told us she thought was her name before. I REFUSE TO TYPE THAT NAME – WE HATED IT THEN AND WE HATE IT MORE NOW! When that name was called, folks that nearly 60lb working dog fell to the ground, legs up and tense as a board. We immediately felt sorry for calling her that. It will forever be burned in my brain. She was in total fear! NEVER WILL WE CALL HER THAT AGAIN!!
“GOTCHA moment” (poor pup)
The day before the vet appointment, my husband and his new pals took off on a 5mile hike. It was definitely a few hours. Upon returning to the vehicle they were both struggling from what we thought was exhaustion.
“GOTCHA moment” (what we didn’t know)
We arrived at the vet with the only paper we had in hand. Their rabies tags were on. We had even gotten them name tags. They looked at the lump on Rubi and agreed that it needed to be biopsied. Before we left, they wanted to do one more test that they recommend on all rescues – heart worm. They came back positive!
They had to do more tests and get back to us. They needed to determine the stage they were in and from what preliminary results showed, they were in Stage 4. (read here)
“GOTCHA moment” (not healthy at all!)
Having gone on the hike the day before and all the exercise we had been doing with them could have killed them! Folks. We felt absolutely horrible. Sick at our stomach. The vet explained to us that they were at the stage where they should not have even been sedated to be altered and we most certainly will NOT be doing a biopsy on Rubi’s mass until heart worm treatment is over. This treatment was going to cost us THOUSANDS and take about 6 months. Would require very strong doses of medication administered at the vet, daily medication, and visits to the vet almost monthly. Of course, we were wanting answers from this “Husky Expert” and when we shared the tales with the vet, it was clear that we were lied to. They had not been on ANY heart worm medication because unbeknownst to us, she was suppose to have given us their medication IF THEY HAD BEEN ON IT.
“GOTCHA moment” (duped by the expert)
They clearly had not been seen. I had one piece of paper in my hand. I had to do some research. I turned to the computer and found that suspiciously the clinic she visited was about an hour and a half from the home address listed. Why would so go THAT far, just days before we got them? I also noticed that at the bottom there was a question about rabies vaccination. It was checked indicating that she had no records so she authorized them to give them a shot. The fact that they didn’t arrive to us with a tag on was a clear indicator but of course their collars and leashes were subpar quality too. I also learned that they should have been given medication after their altering surgery which we were NOT given when we got them. I was advised that she may have declined the medication. Yes, I called the clinic. They didn’t have anything more than what I had on them. They saw them for the surgery only, as that was their main reason for being there. I pointed out the distance she drove and it sounded like they hadn’t put much thought to it. Being as they are a clinic that often do the procedures for rescue groups at a discount, she may have used that to get the procedure done. The cost would have been about $200 total. I then began calling every vet within about 50 miles of her address listed. No one had seen these dogs or her and no one had heard of a vet closing because of a hurricane (as I was told on Feb 3).
“GOTCHA” moment (fake life)
Now, she didn’t know all of this when I finally reached back out to her with the news from the vet. It had been 4 days. On April 18, 2019 at 8:25pm, I had finally worked up what I was going to say to her. Again, I communicated with her on Facebook messenger:
“Good evening. I have an update for you. I had hoped you would have reached out to us by now with some records – which I do not believe really exist anyway. Frankly, that does not matter now. Sadly, today, we received confirmation that these two are infected with heartworms. Rubi’s condition is more advanced than is Jack’s, she even struggles to breathe at times. In the event you do not know, it takes about 7 months for larva to mature into heartworms, once a dog is bitten, by an infected mosquito. We have had them all of about 60 days! Being as you NEVER told us this, you either A) did not know because you NEVER took them to the vet as you presented to us and your readers of your posts or B) you KNEW it and you selfishly denied them proper treatment and withheld this vital information from us (and anyone else that may have inquired about them). REGARDLESS, you put their lives in jeopardy, REPEATEDLY for Lord knows how long. Their condition does not permit them to have the 2 hours a day exercise you insisted on AND they should have NEVER been put under to be spayed/neutered BECAUSE of this condition…THAT PUT THEIR LIVES IN DANGER!!! Speaking of this, I find it very, very suspicious that you went 1 hr and 30mins from your home, 3 days before we were to pick them up, to get them spayed/neutered and rabies shots considering you had told me on Jan 29th that all of this had already been done. You lied…plain and simple. It is not the only thing you lied about but those other things are trivial compared to this. We DO NOT appreciate you passing yourself off as a “rehabilitator” or “husky expert”…you should be ashamed of yourself. We have spent about $800 thus far and we are looking at much more expenses ahead of us as well as a lifetime of medications. I am pretty sure you realized really quickly that we are the type of people who will take on this burden for people like you. You may have “conned” us into taking on this burden that you couldn’t handle but these does WILL come out the winners. Do us all a favor and DO NOT TAKE ON ANY MORE STRAY ANIMALS…you are not qualified. I have removed you, your husky account and your significant other from our instagram account and I would appreciate you NOT contacting me ever again. WHAT EVER YOU HAVE TO SAY WILL NOT JUSTIFY WHAT YOU DID TO THESE DOGS!!” [April 18, 2019 at 8:25pm]
I will NOT even dignify her response by posting it here. Basically, she “offered” to take them off our hands if we “couldn’t take care of them any longer” to which my response was not NO but HELL NO! I wouldn’t give them to her if she was the last person on earth. I removed her from our social media, changed the Instagram account so she couldn’t find it and never reached out to her again. While we NEVER got anything she promised us, we DID get these two babies and they are doing great now. NO THANKS TO HER.
We GOTCHA Jack and Rubi!!!!
CLIMB ABOARD MY SOAPBOX 