In 1986 our 14 year-old mixed lab dog was sitting next to me on the floor about midnight, he got up to walk into my 4-year old son’s room as he always slept next to my son’s bed. He couldn’t get up, his back legs were paralyzed. We suspected the worse and my wife took him to the vet (I couldn’t) the next day—the situation was permanent and he was put down. We adopted two mixed yellow lab pups a week later. They got away from our yard three years later and didn’t make it back. We were devastated for months and months. We advertised immediately with large paid ads in the Bismarck Tribune (ND). We parked my pickup truck with a large banneron each side (TWO YELLOW LABS MISSING–REWARD) at a busy intersection every day for weeks and weeks. The worst time of my life. We couldn’t sleep, if we heard any noise outside in the middle of the night, I’d get up and pray it was our dogs. I’m embarrassed to admit that this was more devastating than my brother’s death from a motorcycle accident. Nothing compared to it. I’m a bit embarrassed about how my dogs seemed to be more important to me than my brother’s death, even though I loved my brother as much as anyone can love a brother. But I knew where my brother was. I didn’t know where my dogs were, what they went thru, did someone shoot them, did they suffer, are they still alive, tied to a short chain, abused??? I don’t think there is anyone in Bismarck or Mandan, ND that did not see my truck parked with our banner on it.

My wife is reading Rescuing Sprite and tells me there are some similarities to what we went thru. I don’t believe I will be able to read Sprite. I will try. We did adopt two mixed black labs, brother & sister and they lived for 13 and 15 years before having to be put down. I did not get nearly as close to these two dogs, though they meant much to me. I did not want to be so close to another animal that something like that might happen again. We presently have had for 4 years a mixed breed 40 pound dog named Tuffy. Not knowing what happend to your pets—-forever, is very difficult. Wrecks your life for a long time. My wife and I hadn’t thought about our “lost dogs” for many many years, until Mark’s book came out.

Marly from ND