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Rusty's Story

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Hi!  My name is Rusty.  Everybody tells me that
I’m 11 years old but I think they’re wrong.
You’re only as old as you feel, right?

I didn’t have a very good life before these nice people came and took me from the shelter.  My former dad didn’t take very good care of me and I always had very bad ear infections.  He didn’t brush me either, so my fur was very matted and I smelled.  One day an Animal Control Officer came to our house. I was out in the front yard.  I didn’t feel too good, I had 2 very infected ears and this yucky pus was coming out and running down my face.  The Animal Control Officer told dad that if he didn’t give me to her right away, she’d arrest him and put him in jail.  Then she took me to a veterinarian’s office.  I had to be given anesthesia in order for them to clean my ears.  Even I knew they were pretty bad.  After that they took me to a shelter.  The people there were really nice even though they did give me some shots.  They took care of my ears, fed me some good food and gave me a lot of attention.

They called the hotline for Golden Re-Triever Rescue of New Jersey.  Two volunteers came to the shelter right away and took me out. They said I was just “too cute” and I passed their temperament testing with flying colors.  They also saved another Golden Retriever named Jordan. I really liked Jordan too. He didn’t feel so good either, he had a really low thyroid and he needed medicine too. But I digress.

The people put me in their car and gave me a new collar and leash. We went for a long ride and stopped at McDonald’s. You guessed it...they even bought me a hamburger!  Then another couple came and the first lady said “you’re in trouble now, he’s never going to leave your house”.  I found out these two people were going to be my foster parents.

They took me home and guess what?  They had other Golden Retrievers.  I had to be separated for about a week ‘til we could all get used to each other. We’d get to go for walks together, be on supervised visits, but we couldn’t be alone together.  They took me to another vet who said one of my ear infections was gone, but the other one was still really bad.  They did a culture of the gook and found out it was a very drug resistant bacteria called Pseudomona. They had to put me under anesthesia again to flush my ear but they said my ear canal was so damaged by the earlier ongoing infections that they couldn’t even flush it all the way.  It still hurt.

My foster parents told the Board of Directors what the vet lady said, so they made arrangements for me to go to another veterinary surgeon to have surgery on my ear. It’s called ear ablation surgery. They had to remove my damaged ear canal.  I can't  hear out of that ear anymore, but I really couldn’t hear anything out of it anyway.

And do you know what?  The nice people that are fostering me said that they’re adopting me! And that my new name is Maverick.  I’m so happy. They bought me a new coat, they taught me how to play with tennis balls, they let me stay inside the house and I have 4 other furry brothers to play with.  I love it here.

I’m so grateful that the Animal Control Officer took me away from my first dad.  And I’m so happy that they called Golden Re-Triever Rescue to come get me. Life is good.

Maverick

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