Guam Day 59/60/61/62 - Puppy Trouble

This post spans the last four days - 4/12/2022 - 4/15/2022

Lets see, where do we begin on the story of Lucky... 🍀 

Our host family has two of their kids that live at home part time, in addition there are two grand kids that come to visit on occasion from one of their other children that lives on the island. My understanding is Arsenio and Vilma have 4 children. Anyways, the grandkids like to come over and play in the backyard, they each of a kids bike so it is common for them to ride up and down the driveway and on occasion someone will take them out on the road for a longer evening stroll. This was the case Tuesday night, one of the daughters came home after work and took her niece and nephew on a ride up and down the street. I have talked in past posts about the dog problem on Guam, with this comes the common problem of needing to protect yourself on a bike, or at least be on the lookout for dogs and be prepared. On the lookout they were, the granddaughter spotted a little shivering puppy not just two blocks from the house. Arvil the aunt/daughter, push the child to let it be, but no go and before you knew it there was a little tiny puppy in need walking around the backyard. You can see where this is going right?

I stepped outside to say hello to the family and enjoy in the evenings festivities, they are a lot of fun to be around, sometime we even play basketball out front. This evening though I saw the puppy limping around and asked, hey where did the puppy come from? Arvil gave me the story, and now we were in a conundrum, what do we do? The dog is obviously not well, covered in sores and flees, we can't just put it back out in the wild. (there was no mother in sight, we looked a couple times) After much deliberation we said well lets do what we can to clean it up tonight and we will call the shelter in the morning to see if they can take it in. 

Off we went carrying this little guy to the back of the main house, and into the sink for a bath. Like I said this puppy was covered in flees, you could see them crawling up and down its skin, and there were multiple little sores which we think were from the flees. Arvil got the shampoo from her shower, and the two of us went to town cleaning this little guy up. We weren't successful at getting all the flees, but after a lot of whining and forceful lathering this puppy looked and smelled a bit better than he was before. 

Next was feeding, this was the harder part of the two jobs to be done. The little guy didn't want to eat food or drink water. We had to resort to some milk, sugar, and a syringe to feed this little guy. It was a forceful feeding, which also didnt feel good. You had to force his mouth open and put the syringe in and then prop his head up to get him to swallow. We got just a little milk in, enough we thought to help him into the morning and then to the local shelter. 

At this point, the grandchildren were interested in the pup again and wanted to see how it was doing. They said, you are going to keep him and take care of him right? I looked at Arsenio, Vilma, and Arvil with not a lot to say. The granddaughter said: "You must take care of Lucky, we want to see him again." A little peer pressure from a 7 year old about a cute puppy will just make your heart melt. 

Joan hadn't come home yet, nor had I told her about any of the evenings festivities via text at this point. I figured we would wait til she got home to let the cat, well dog, out of the bag. Covered in flees I carefully took off my shirt + shorts, threw them outside on the washer, and went in to take a shower. (relax, I still had my skivvies on). I showered with very warm water, really had to pump up that little heater to make this work, and got ready for the rest of the night. Joan got home, and at this point I had missed the conversation with Arsenio and Vilma about the pooch. Arsenio told Joan, in a joking manner, that I had adopted a puppy. (thank you for this my pal, I will never live it down) We had much more conversation and an initial look at the pup prior to calling it a night. Joan and I were saying prayers for this little Lucky just hoping he would make it through the night. 

Day II: The great news is Lucky slept through the night and was still alive the next morning. After all three of us, Arvil, Joan and I calling different shelters we came to realize just how hard it is to get a little puppy care on the island quickly. Each place had a long waiting list. So my Wednesday was spent looking at all the possible things online about puppies that I could absorb up in a short time. How old is the puppy? How does that change its care? How do you properly feed the puppy when it doesn't want to eat? How do you keep it warm? My advertisements from the web will have likely changed to new puppy products!!! 

Arvil had to go to work, she works as a nurse at the local hospital, so that left me caring for the little guy through the day as Joan worked from home. I have wanted to get a volunteer gig, so here you go I guess. I carried the little box over next to where I was sitting outside and kept an eye on the little guy as I gave my search engine all the reason to take on new ads. The fleas on the pup were getting bad again, some new soap was in order. My next errand. 

Off to the store I went, I had a few other things to get anyways so this worked out. This was around noon on Wednesday and the supermarket was just packed. I picked up dog soap, treats, and a little bit of food too with the hopes Lucky would eat. Really getting into dog care arn't I? 

Back home I tried feeding this pup multiple times over the course of the afternoon. We tried the treats, we tried the soft solid food broken up in little pieces, ultimately back to milk and a bit of sugar. That was the only thing that seemed to work. I was getting nervous at this point as the dog had not gone to the bathroom from what we could tell since he had gotten here. We were successful at getting the puppy to drink milk about 3 times through the evening. Also we bathed that puppy once again with some flee shampoo with help from Joan. All in all we were feeling accomplished, keeping our fingers crossed that this would stay positive. 

We updated Arvil, Vilma, and Arsenio as Arvil got home. Come to find out, Vilma had been checking in on the pup all day, and Arvil had just fed it once again. So things were looking quite good at the end of day II. We put Lucky back in his box with a towel and covered him up for the night once again hoping that things would work out. 

Day III: We awoke to the puppy out of its box on Thursday morning, we couldn't find him. At this point part of me was in relief thinking well maybe he went home to find Mom. Nope, he was under the car near by sleeping away next to the wheel. We must have had a rain storm last night and the awning protecting him just didn't do him justice. Again though, good news he was alive and we had another day to see what we could do. 

I took Joan into work so I would have the car, when I returned Arvil was back home from her nursing job and was looking for the pup again. He disappeared, and once again I thought oh good, he went home. The family has one of those ring cameras so Arvil went to look at that after the two of us searched for 45 mins or so. She and I had talked that she was ready to adopt the little guy and take care of him. She had had a call with the rescue league and they said with an puppy in his condition they would likely euthanize. So we gave up and she went to look at the camera. I went in to do some other things, thinking if Lucky does turn up, he is in good hands with his future owner. 

Over the lunch hour I came back out to see if by chance they had found the dog, and sure enough, the camera told the story. Lucky had gone into the plants and laid down in the dark cool shade. Arvil and Vilma had fed the pup with some pedialite hoping to revive him. Lucky laid in box sleeping away through the day. His belly looked worse, with the sores growing pustules. He was looking rough, but hey he took a bunch of pedialite. 

I left the pup alone with Vilma and Arvil for the rest of the day, once again a bit relieved that the puppy had a home and longterm I wasn't going to have to figure out how to take care of him. Guam and post Guam. 

Joan and I got back after Holy Thursday mass and grading some dinner out at a sandwich place. This is where I will pick up the next post, Savage sandwiches. As we got in, we saw Vilma and Arsenio working to feed the pup some more Pedialite, once again through a syringe. Lucky was just hard pressed to still take the fluids. Arsenio was won over at this point helping take care of the pup and feeding him. I think he had a soft spot at heart for Lucky, he just didnt want to take on a third puppy. Things went well and we put Lucky back in his box. We found evidence that he finally had gone to the bathroom, which was really good news. A little clean up and we tucked him in for the night. The whole family pretty excited to be pitching in, this was a win. 

Day IV: I awoke this morning and went and checked on Lucky, sadly there was no movement and I checked for any sign of life this morning really hoping he would move, no luck in Lucky. I though well lets get Joan to work, and then come back and check once more in case. It is Good Friday after all, sometimes things come back from the dead on this miraculous day. Joan and I drove to the office, and I dropped her off, really not excited to get back I did drive back to 129 M street with a small hope for Lucky. Vilma opened the gate for me as I drove up and I stopped to talk, she said she just found the pup and he was no more. My head fell, heartbroken I drove the car in and went in to take a nap. 

So here we are, a bit of mourning, on a gorgeous day in Guam. Puppy parenting is really hard it turns out, especially with a pup that is 4 - 6 weeks old.  All of us are a bit saddened, even Vilma who isn't a big dog lover was close to shedding a tear. 

 It is Good Friday, so as I reflect we have a lot to be thankful for, even for the short time we had with this pup. We know Lucky is in a better place.