Elizabeth Boland
2011-08-22
My family, including our four girls, were vacationing in Destin over spring break during the week of April 17, 2011. We even brought our beloved dogs, a chocolate lab named Jessie and our Havanese named Frodo.
It had been a great week, and we were spending our last day on the beach and at the pool before we headed back to Georgia the next day.
Of course our dogs were right beside us the entire time. What's a vacation when you have to leave your dogs at home? We were just getting out of the pool when we noticed the gate was opened, and Frodo, our only boy, was gone.
We weren't too concerned at first because the entire property is fenced in, but he was nowhere to be found. We searched and searched for him, but he had just vanished. Although he had on his collar and tags, someone surely snatched him up to keep him for their own. We were all devastated. Having to leave the beach the next day was truly one of the worst experiences our family has ever had. Could we really be leaving a family member behind?
We didn't leave without leaving our mark.
We put up posters, we hung signs, we walked to all the businesses in the area and asked people to keep a lookout for Frodo. We even came back the next week to look for him some more, but he was nowhere to be found.
Back in Macon, we continued to put up lost dog signs on the Internet. We even put out a pet Amber Alert. But we kept hitting dead ends. We had very little hope of getting him back because almost four months had passed by and we had not gotten any leads.
Finally I was contacted through email from Petfinder.com about a dog that was kind of similar to our dog. At first we thought there was no way this was our dog, but after we compared markings, we confirmed that, in fact, this was our Frodo.
He just had a very short haircut. He was at New Beginnings Animal Sanctuary. He had been turned in by a very sweet and caring couple, who had him for two of the 15 weeks he was missing. Frodo had apparently picked them out to care for him and they got him back on his feet and eventually back to us. After some rehabilitation, the couple turned him in to New Beginnings Animal Shelter in Niceville.
A very special vet tech, who is gifted and talented in matching missing pets with their owners, made it her mission to find Frodo's owners.
She checked all the missing dog ads in the newspapers, she checked all the websites, and eventually she found my listing for a missing dog. She sent me an email and we confirmed that this was our baby. He was coming home to us after 104 days of being gone.
It was truly a miracle!
We are so thankful to Nicole and the other employees at New Beginnings Animal Sanctuary. It was obvious that our dog had been cared for, and we are so thankful for their no-kill policy. Because of this, our sweet Frodo had a chance to make it back to his family. It was a glorious reunion. I don't think there was a dry eye in the house. Even Jessie, our lab and Frodo's best friend, was crying.
There are still good people in this world! If you are looking for a cause to support, take my word for it, New Beginnings Animal Sanctuary is a great one, and they need our support!
Source: http://www.nwfdailynews.com/news/frodo-42901-dog-family.html
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