Life is Precious.

This is actually my holistic block where I post lots of fabbo things about workshops I am doing and food for thought posts. Today I am doing a post on animal rescue. I can see the eyes roiling already. YES/.. I can see you through the screen you know :) But I am not going to bang on about donating or anything, so do grab a coffee and read on.

All my life I’ve tried to help animals. My mother will attest to the amount of times I brought home sick pigeons, who miraculously had flown away by the morning, according to my mother. Which was a kind lie, as the birds invariably died in the night. From bird rescuing, I moved onto domestic, cats and dogs, as I got older. I’d feed the stray cats in my area, give love to the dogs that ran loose in the streets, because back in the 70’s, people were allowed to open their doors and let the dog out, as they would their cats. I was a member of FOAL farm from a very young age and I was also gifted membership to Redwing horse sanctuary, which I still donate to 40 years later So really, I suppose I can say that all my life I have been a rescuer of animals. Now I am an Holistic Therapist. I help humans, but on the back of that, it allowed me to take care of the animals of this world. This blog, isn’t to brag about what I do, because it is a tiny, tiny drop in the ocean to what others do. This post is to explain what anyone can do to help a living, sentient being. Because I often hear, ‘what can I do to help’ as if whatever you do will be insignificant. NOT TRUE. There are many rescues calling out for help. Their cries are often drowned out by the many screams for help. The smaller rescue voices become lost in a sea of begging letters, that people invariably chuck in to the bin as soon as they come through the letter box. Many animal rescues are not government funded and they rely only on peoples kindness. Which is hard in a struggling world, where many just put their comforts first. The £10 you spend on fags and a can of coke, will keep a dog in Romania alive for a whole month!! Now here comes the next question…why should I hand my hard earned money over to charities, rescues, especially over seas ones? I could say because it makes you a nice person, and it does, but it’s mainly because you are actually SAVING a life of an animal that deserves, just like you, to live and be loved. That is the basic reason. From somewhere deep in your soul, you know its fundamentally wrong to see a badly treated, injured or abused animal and do nothing. If you don’t feel this way, you would not waste your ‘valuable’ time reading this post. If you are religious, Dog spelt backwards, is GOD!! Now that’s food for thought. The next time you give thanks to god for what you have, think about what he has given you via the animal world. Guide dogs, hearing dogs, bomb finding dogs, drug finding dogs…oh the list in endless. How come these dogs are worth saving or being thankful for, but this one isn’t.

This is a picture of my rescue boy Charlie. Taken to be euthanized purely because he was causing a problem to the owner and they couldn’t be bothered to sort it out. I was helping out at a rescue at the time and Charlie came to me, through them. I can't praise South East Dog Rescue enough for all the work they do. If you live in Kent, Please offer your help/donate food and bedding to them. They are a no kill rescue and need all the help they can get. My question now is...does a dog really need to be killed because it peed on your sofa, ripped up your curtains, ate your best shoes? Haven't YOU done similar things? Peed in the drawer when your drunk, spilt red wine on your white sofa, broke the heel of your Jimmy Choo shoes…do you need to die for that? Of course not. Because you are a human being and your life is valuable. I can’t see why myself. No life is more valuable than another in my book. Its just humans have more rights and animals have very limited ones. I fund raise and donate to many charities. I manage to do this because I work my butt off and because deep in my soul I know, the little bit that I do does save lives. It breaks my heart looking at all the animals I just can’t save. I send their little souls a prayer at night and ask the universe to keep them safe and give them the love that they were denied on earth. Its all I can do for them now. My wonderful, supportive husband, who I probably drive quite mad with my constant rescue schemes, often tells me, that I can’t save them all. If I saved 100 today, there would be 200 more to save behind them. He is very right of course, but my spirit is often heavy with pain for those who I could not reach in time. I work full time to pay my bills, then at the weekend, I run workshops. This enables me to teach humans, whilst their course costs, then goes to fund animal rescues. It works out quite well really. I’m not wonderful, or an angel, or anything else that gives me a label. I am just someone who cares a great deal for the voiceless of this world. I will go that extra mile, work that extra hour, give my last penny, if it saves even ONE life or it makes a slight difference.

So how can you help? Money is tight for some, we live in such a materialistic world that it is fast becoming a struggle for many people to survive themselves. Many people cannot think further than their next holiday or new car, or what they can get for themselves, to make themselves happy. It is a sad state of affair's that I have to admit to myself that a huge majority of people just do not care about the animal world. But money isn’t just what rescues need, they need your help. TIME, is free, offer some of yours to walk a dog, clean a cat cage, give an animal comfort. Because, trust me, animals are terrified in shelters. It's loud, often cold, they are alone and disorientated. Often missing the family that dumped them off. I know a lot of people have genuine reasons for giving up their pets, but if you have to walk this path, be responsible, make sure your pet will be loved and safe but the person that you are giving it to. Animals cannot defend themselves, they rely on you to take good care of them. Charge for your pet, home check the person, ask for a police check, ask who knows these people, ask for references. All this will ensure your pet will not end up as dog bait, abused or worse. If you place your dog in a kill shelter, the chances are, another dog will be destroyed that day, to make room for yours. That is not something I’d want on my conscience. So try every avenue, think long and hard before you march off to dump your family member, because that’s what they become when you take them on, into a high kill shelter. Battersea euthanized a third of its shelter animals this year, have a read here. Why? Because their intake is huge and no one wants a shelter dog. Let’s get a beautiful pedigree, or designer dog, that will probably arrive with all sorts of ailments, because many are interbred or over bred. A Cockadoodle , Labradoodle, Chiweenie……etc..are MONGRELS!!!!! They are not ‘posh’ dogs. They are breed mixes, therefore mongrels. So why not get a pedigree from a rescue/shelter. If that’s what you want to have. There are many types of breeds in rescues as I write this. So here is a list of how you can help rescues, especially the smaller ones. 1. Ask your friends over for a coffee morning and sell a few cakes you’ve made. If like me, you are rubbish at baking, buy some from tescos. You can get lovely tea cakes for a fiver. Sell them for £2.00 each, take back your outlay if you are really short of money and send the rest to the rescue. Trust me, even £5 can help a lot. 2. If you have a wide friend’s base on Face book, sell a few of your unwanted items on there. Then paypal the money to the rescue. 3. Organise a jumble sale 4. Ask your friends to donate your birthday gift money to the rescue instead. If you need help for ideas, please do come and find me on Facebook. If you can foster dogs, approach your local rescue or contact one of the rescues I help out. Friends for Life. are dying for fosters in the uk If you want to help in anyway but don’t know how, find me on facebook and join my little group of lovely ladies, who are currently helping to make coats for the freezing dogs in shelters, fund raising, donating. Contact your local shelter and volunteer your time. Do something nice for a voiceless animal who is feeling lost and alone. 5. Be a foster mum or dad I will finish this blog with what I began it with....What Is Life? What is Life? They say its from B to D. From Birth to Death But what’s between B and D? C. So what is C? IT IS CHOICE!! Your life is a matter of choice Live well, help others and it will never go wrong. Thank you for reading. Do put your own thoughts in the comments. If you have ideas how to help rescues, do share them with us.