Snowball

Quick Facts:

  • Breed: Toy Poodle
  • Gender: Female
  • Age: 11 years old
  • Size: 9 pounds
  • Good with…
    • Dogs? Yes!
    • Cats? Unknown!
    • Kids? Yes! 12+

Snowball, aka “Snowy!”

  • 11 year-old female toy poodle
  • 9 pounds! Teensy!
  • Loves people! Sweet, playful, adorable!
  • Perfectly at ease with other dogs, very respectful, relaxed and kind.
  • No info about how she feels about cats.

***Snowball (aka Snowy) is no longer up for adoption, but she does need donations for her medical care.  Due to her cancer diagnosis and prognosis, she will stay in her loving foster home (where she is ridiculously happy!) until the end of her life.  See story below.***


December 23, 2021

Some months after we took Snowy into our foster program, our vet found more than half a dozen mammary tumors. Since each one had a 50% chance of becoming cancerous, we decided that it wasn’t right to adopt her out, knowing that she might only have 3-6 months left.  We didn’t want her to have the stress of adjusting to a new home and a new person with so little time left, especially because she was so comfortable and happy with her foster parents and her lovely foster home.  Over this last year, some of her tumors have grown larger, and the vet recently found a couple new ones, but miraculously, though it has been over a year since her diagnosis, the little trooper shows no signs of being sick!! She is perky, happy, energetic,  sweet, spunky, affectionate, and full of life.  When she arrived 16 months ago, she still had a bit of vision—mostly light and shadow—but is now totally blind. This hardly slows her down! She manages stairs well and loves to explore the big back yard.

 

Snowy has bonded so very deeply and strongly with her foster mom—her favorite person in the world! You’ll often find the two of them cuddled up on the couch together. Her foster dad takes her for a little “walk” every night. She follows her nose up and down the sidewalk in front of the house – so much news to catch up on! The neighborhood dogs and cats have been by during the day, and lots of humans too.

 

We promised Snowy that we would take care of her fully for whatever time she had left.  We never imagined it would be so long, and we couldn’t be more overjoyed that it has.  We also couldn’t be more grateful to everyone who supports our rescue because all of your contributions are providing Snowy with vet care, her fancy food (the only kind she will eat!), and all of the supplies she needs to have a wonderful life for as long as she has.  Thank you to all of our supporters from Snowy and from us!


Late this past summer, we were contacted by a social worker in a southern tier county.  She was hoping that we might be able to take Snowball (aka Snowy) into our foster program.  Snowy’s owner had advanced dementia,  had been moved to a nursing facility months prior, and Snow had been living in her owner’s former home by herself for the previous 3 months.  A kindly neighbor had been coming over a few times each day to give Snowy food, water, and to  let her out to do her business, but Snowy was confused, stressed, and in need of real care.

We were unprepared for the rough state that little Snowy was in.  She was deeply matted over nearly every inch of her body, her nails were painfully overgrown, and she was infested with fleas to a degree we had never before encountered.  Miraculously however, despite the matting that must have been painful with every movement, the long nails that must have hurt with every step, and the flea infestation that must have been a torture 24/7, she was happy, friendly, gentle and cheerful with us from the first moment we met her.

Nearly blind due to cataracts, little Snowy was patient during her all-day matte removal, bathing, and nail clipping, and then relieved and happy to be placed in her wonderful foster home.  Once she had a chance to get to know her foster home and her new foster family, she began to blossom.   It turns out that Snowy is gentle, loving, friendly, happy, silly, goofy, and hilariously enthusiastic about the things she loves most (like her foster parents returning to the house even after just a short time away)!

During a wellness exam, our vet found 7 nodules on her chest that she feared might be cancer, so referred us to Cornell Oncology Clinic.  The nodules were mammary tumors, and some had atypical cells and inflammation which made it highly likely that at least some were cancerous.   They offered 2 massive surgeries to remove both chains of mammary tissue and then to hope that the tumors had not already spread to any of Snowy’s organs, but our vet explained that given how many tumors there were, lack of spread was unlikely.

We all decided to opt for quality of life over the slim hope that the massive surgeries would truly eradicate the cancer.  And we further decided that since the vets couldn’t predict how long Snowy might have (could be 4 months, could be more than a year), we would keep her in rescue, in the foster home where she is extremely happy, surrounded by love and fun and tons of cuddling, snuggling, and security.

Snowy is an amazing little girl and we are going to make sure that every day is going to be an amazing day for her.  And as her condition declines, we will provide hospice care to keep her as comfortable and happy as is possible.  Please help us with donations for her care if you can, every donation counts!

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