DeeDee's Unbroken Spirit

Being kept in a shed and bred over and over couldn’t break DeeDee’s spirit

Animal Advocates gets many calls begging for help for severely abused and neglected dogs. But we also rescue puppymill dogs. DeeDee was one of those calls.

AAS’s puppymill breeding investigation method is this: We make an appointment to come and view the puppies. Then we get a few volunteers together, all with cameras in their purses, and while one of us tries to snoop and take photos, the others of us keep the breeder distracted by wanting to see every pup, over and over.

It’s hard, but we must keep smiles on our faces when we see the wormy, sick pups, with feces between their toes.

We can’t often buy more than one or two pups or the breeder thinks we may be intending to use her dogs to breed in competition with her.

We’re almost never allowed to buy the mother dog because it’s they who produce the profit. But if the mother dog is old, or sick, or too worn out to breed again, then we might be allowed to buy her.

Paying a vet cuts into a breeder’s profits, so a dog either keeps producing, or it is sold, or put down.

DeeDee’s story was very different. We offered so much money that we were sold the four puppies for $300 each, but had to pay $600 for DeeDee.

In our opinion, that was a cheap price to pay to save DeeDee from being kept in that shed, producing puppies until worn out. And cheap to prevent her pups from possibly being sold to abusers who would breed them in turn or chain them up as guard dogs.

One of AAS’s amazing volunteers took DeeDee and her four pups into her home, and with the help of her son, raised them until they had had their shots, were housebroken, and were socialized with other dogs – the only right way to raise puppies. It takes commitment to the pups, commitment to AAS’s ethics, and commitment to waiting, no matter how long for homes with equally committed families so DeeDee’s pups would always be safe and loved. It takes Animal Advocates’ commitment too. We paid for all the deworming, the vaccines, and DeeDee’s spay.

DeeDee wasn’t socialized to other dogs; she was angry at male dogs and tried to attack them. So our volunteer again did the right thing: she kept DeeDee instead of keeping an adorable, easy puppy.

Jan gave DeeDee fifteen years of the best life any dog can have. She kept her away from dogs, she took her hiking, and best of all, she took her swimming.

DeeDee was a born swimmer, as you can see at her little video clip below. Jan told us that DeeDee lived every minute of every day like it was the best minute in the world.

There are more Animal Advocates' True Rescue Stories here.