The People Who Keep Showing Up

There's a reason we take it very seriously when a shelter volunteer or staff member reaches out to us and says, "Please help this dog."

What I Learned Sitting on a Kennel Floor

More than 15 years ago, before I was running a rescue, I volunteered at an extremely overcrowded shelter with a high euthanasia rate. Often, at the end of my volunteer shift, I would simply sit with dogs in kennels.

I would walk into kennels with seven or more dogs, and they would all press toward me at once. Climbing into my lap. Licking my face. Leaning their entire bodies against me. Nudging their heads under my hands because there were never enough hands to pet all of them.

And some nights, I knew something they didn't: morning was coming, but they weren't going to see it.

They didn't know they were out of time. They didn't know nobody was coming to save them. They just knew that, for that moment, someone was sitting on the kennel floor with them. And all they wanted was to be as close to me as they could possibly get.

So I stayed. I held them. I kissed their heads. I told them they were good dogs. And sometimes I cried into their fur while they licked the tears off my face, completely unaware that I was grieving for them while they were busy loving me.

It took a piece of me every time.

I didn't do it because I was exceptionally strong or selfless. I did it because I felt like I owed them that much. The world had already failed them. If I had the privilege of making their last hours a little less lonely, I was going to do it.

That experience never left me.

The Privilege of Saying No

Today, The Comeback Pack is a foster-based rescue. We have the privilege of saying no when we don't have space.

Shelters don't always have that luxury. They are taking in the dogs their communities abandon, surrender and fail to spay and neuter. And the staff and volunteers inside those shelters are still doing what I did all those years ago: loving dogs they know they may not be able to save.

That's why when one of them reaches out about a particular dog, we will bend over backwards to try.

Not just for the dog. For them, too.

Because the people who keep showing up to those shelters deserve some wins. They need them. We want them to know that when they fall in love with one dog and fight to get that dog noticed, sometimes it works.

Pretty Is One of Those Wins

A shelter volunteer met Pretty and knew she deserved a chance. She reached out to us, advocated for her and — perhaps most importantly — offered to foster her herself. She made it as easy as she possibly could for us to say yes.

So we did.

Pretty is safe now. We met her at her photo shoot, and she is an absolute gem. Sweet, smart, affectionate and just an all-around wonderful dog.

But Pretty's rescue represents something bigger to us.

One dog left the shelter. One kennel opened for another dog. And one person on the front lines got to watch a dog she loved walk out alive.

That's a pretty incredible win.

If There's a Dog You Can't Stop Thinking About

So to every shelter employee and volunteer out there: if there is a dog you can't stop thinking about, ask us. We won't always be able to say yes.

But we will try.

And to everyone else: foster. Adopt. Donate. Share our dogs. Every dog we move into a forever home creates room for us to say yes to another Pretty.

Because sometimes saving one dog does a whole lot more than save one dog.

Apply to foster, volunteer with us, or follow Pretty's comeback.

Read the original post on Facebook.