When you head to a shelter to adopt an animal, rarely do you learn of all the trials and hardships they have overcome to reach the safe, caring hands of rescuers.
The lives of dogs before their time in a shelter can be so heartbreaking and tragic; you don’t want to know all the details of the suffering they experienced. But part of giving an animal a forever home is knowing where they came from.
You need to make sure you provide them a better life than the one they had before you came along.
Five years ago, Treya’s owner was murdered. As if this weren’t horrible enough, what she experienced afterward until her rescue is almost too terrible for words. Her rescuers at the Stray Rescue of St. Louis will never forget what Treya went through before they saved her.
After the death of her previous owner, Treya was chained up and left under a deck. Alone, she relied solely on the kindness of neighbors who supplied her with food. They kept her warm with hay in the winter. One thing they couldn’t do for her was free her from her chains.
One day, a chain became tightly wrapped around one of her paws. Treya became so desperate; she chewed through her paw. Dena Kehm Pedrotti revealed on the stray rescue’s Facebook page that it was her boyfriend, a firefighter, who found Treya on his way to work and “went back to her.” “He said this would be her last day living like this.
He called Stray Rescue, and he said Donna was there so fast! He said her compassion towards the dog was amazing!”
Donna, a rescuer from Stray Rescue hurried to the scene. The group later wrote about Treya’s journey to their shelter: “Rescuing her wasn’t easy. She feared humans from lack of socialization being isolated in her private agonizing world.”
Donna brought Treya back to stray rescue’s shelter. This poor girl had a long road ahead of her. “Once back at our trauma center, besides the obvious missing foot, we discovered she also has heartworm and a wicked case of a flea infestation,” the rescue wrote . “Her emotional wounds matched in intensity of her physical ones.”
The rescue group didn’t go into much detail about Treya’s owner before they found her, but since she had experienced so much trauma, this person didn’t do well by her. She needed a great deal of TLC and time to heal. Since she’d been isolated from both humans and other dogs, Treya was introduced to Little Pinky. Little Pinky was also saved by the rescue group.
Treya’s tail hasn’t stopped wagging since she met Little Pinky. The companionship has helped immensely with her recovery. “Her nightmare is over, and her new life is just beginning,” Stray Rescue said. she is being fostered by people who can take care of her medical and emotional needs.
“We can attest to her fortitude and perseverance. She is extremely happy living with us and our dog Stella,” Joseph Schnell, who is fostering Treya with his partner, wrote on Facebook. “We can’t wait to see what her future holds with a new family who will love her as much she deserves. Very strong dog and very optimistic thanks in a huge part of the work done by Stray Rescue.”
The good news for Treya keeps coming. She was successfully treated for heartworm. Her foster family revealed they are looking into a prosthetic to replace the paw she lost.
Treya’s story is one of many inspiring stories of dog rescue that has a happy ending. Sadly though, others don’t have such an uplifting conclusion. There are still unanswered questions that leave us puzzled: After her original owner’s death, why wasn’t Treya immediately taken to a shelter? Was it thought someone would just call an animal rescue?
This someone is ambiguous, but when you think about it, we often say to ourselves that someone else will call or help. I don’t need to; when the exact opposite is true. Others might be thinking the same.
Don’t be one of those who rely on others to save a life when you can just as easily make a call yourself. Don’t leave another animal chained and suffering any longer than necessary. It takes less than five minutes.
If you saw an accident on the road, wouldn’t you contact emergency services? What if you were the one in an accident needing assistance? Wouldn’t you want someone to stop, or at least make a call for help?
