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I'm a : Single Gay Man
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the ASPCA here in the US runs commericals for donations that break my heart.
I was raised with pets, and my parents always said you never discard a pet, you love it to the end.
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I'm like [MENTION=14580]CellarDweller[/MENTION] . I was raised around cats, dogs, horses. and even pet prairie dogs for awhile and all were treated as family, taken care of right up to the end. I've written in here a few times about how I take in pups from the shelter during summers to rehab them so they can find homes.
There's a funny story about our local shelter. A woman started it at her house almost by accident -- just taking in strays one at a time. People would donate food and supplies without being asked. People started going there to help her clean up. Cops caught a group of teens drinking. Rather than send them to court they gave them the option of working at the animals shelter a few weeks out of the summer. Then the school started sending students there rather than suspend them. Then parents started sending kids to work at the shelter rather than put them on restriction. All that was 10 -15 years ago.
Now... anytime you go to the shelter it looks like a teen hangout, day or night. They are there with the animals all the time. They go there to actually volunteer because they like the animals.
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This is a touchy subject for me.....I have to stop myself from feeling what I feel because it gets real bad and the longer I go the harder it is to pull myself out of it.....
Bottom line...it breaks my heart....every single part of me wants to rescue all of them and I know I can't.....I can't even get my ass in the door of the pound to rescue one because I have to avoid all of their eyes and I will be crying all day...for a week....it wrecks me....
I am a very sensate person and their eyes stay with me and haunt me...I can feel their fear and it is unbearable for me....
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[MENTION=18508]East[/MENTION] it's the same for me. touchy subject. there aren't a lot of things in this life that bring tears to my eyes, but this is one of them.
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I hate it.
There is a wonderful rescue center around the corner from me that I would love to volunteer at but because of my asthma it wouldn't be a good idea. I can handle 1-2 animals at a time, but a bunch of them would irritate it.
My boyfriend and I got our cat Ivy there. She is sweetest cat I have ever had. The first time we went to look for a pet we both didn't stay long because we were getting upset about all the animals there and how sad some of them looked.
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I lived in an apartment complex once that had a huge cat problem. Apparently, people frequently move out of places and just leave their cats behind or don't get them fixed and they start a small colony. I took 2 kittens in but there's only so much you can do. I called one of the shelters about the rest and they told me I would have to trap all of the cats myself. Yyyyeah.
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Our job as caring humans is to help bring kindness and love to all animals....this thread is a good reminder to give a donation to an animal care organization as a New Year's act and to support all efforts to stop abuse of animals.
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i think one of my friends had an experience with a feral cat once. he was once attacked by a cat in an apartment building. the thing attacked him and his dog (smaller mid-sized) as they were just going down the stairs to go outside. i saw the wounds from that incident but it still seemed unbelievable to me. i'd never heard of a cat attacking a person. and there was apparently some colony type of thing going on there as well, although that particular cat was said to be owned by some older lady there.
here the animal shelters will come and take care of the problem if you report it. but they are only partially funded by the government and have to rely on donations a lot to take care of the animals in the long-term. i don't really know how that works that well.
it's really sad that people desert their animals like that or just stop caring for them. i've seen these shelters pick up malnourished dogs; i don't mean dogs who haven't been fed the last few days, but haven't apparently had proper nourishment for months on end and have developed all sorts of related health problems as a result. who the fuck are these people who do this? you can go on facebook or twitter to post about what you did in the shower that morning, but you can't put up an ad saying you want to find a new home for your pet dog? there's nothing wrong with re-prioritizing your life. it happens. and it's not embarrassing not being able to take care of an animal; they take up their share in the financial burden. but there is something REALLY wrong with not even realizing you are hurting the animal. how do you get to a place of so little awareness of what's going on around you that you don't notice, or you really just don't care?
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