He Could Still Walk. His Back Was Broken.

[00:00:05][music] [music] Hi. Something terrible happened yesterday at the great house. It began, the day began normally, but at 10:30 or something like this, I got a note from Mariel telling me that one of our little dogs, Sebastian, has injured himself.

[00:00:33]Sebastian was rescued 6 months ago after his owner died. The gentleman died and he left his four dogs in the apartment and they stayed there for god knows how many weeks. Finally, somebody called us and we went to pick them up. So, Sebastian is one of one of those little ones.

[00:00:51]So my little tells me that uh he has uh jumped from the sofa in the kitchen to the floor and he has injured himself and I said now come on really yeah really it's not there there's something wrong so she sent me this video and I can see in the video that Sebastiano [music] is not only limping it wasn't just a limp I could see there was more he was disoriented looked like genital pain he was acting strange. This must have been a big fall. A big fall from from where?

[00:01:27]Well, any of you that have Chihuahua or small dogs, when you look at your house, you will see that these dogs jump up and down your sofa, your pet. Some of you might decide not to share the bed with them, but they always have the tendency of jumping on the furniture. It's a great, it's like a superpower. They can jump and be in the furniture. Well, this is what happened with Sebastian [music] in his previous home. Obviously, he was the kind of dog that slept on the furniture and you know, he's uh repeating the same [music] procedure here with us. He enjoys it, especially at the kitchen where the team gets together, they eat, they hang out, and that's always where Sebastian hangs out as well. So, turns out that he was there. He jumped out of the sofa and he did a bad gesture. Well, but that bad gesture turned out to be much much worse than initially that we initially thought. Usually when one of our dogs starts limping or gets a little injury and it happens all the time I tell you in the great house they go around jumping up and down playing with each other jumping out of the, you know, the water sprinkle. I mean there's usually something happening. just you know now when something like this happens I always tell them just take a break go rest and keep an eye on it and let's see how it evolves usually it's just a bad gesture so with a couple of days or three of of anti-inflammatory it's more than enough but this time I could see that Sebastian wasn't doing well because he wasn't only limping he was not able to step on that leg and the way he stepped it was really funny and the The way he moved indicated that there was a lot of pain there. It wasn't a problem with one of his legs. It was worse. So we took him to our vet to central nerve integral with [music] Juan. Juan has been with us for nearly I don't know 18 years. He was the first vet that we ever work with here. He runs a small practice. Um we don't send there the really difficult cases. He is our daily vet. The one we take for everything. We take the medication from there. Small little things, small little injuries, whatever. Juan handles it.

[00:03:46]Those of you that follow him, follow follow us. I've known him for many, many years. Now, with the small evaluation of what the problem was, we did some X-rays and immediately we saw little Sebastian jumping from that sofa had broken his back.

[00:04:04]Unbelievable. I was in shock. Then of course you think about it. It's a small Chihuahua. Tiny Chihuahua mix. Okay, it's a tiny little thing. And then he jumps from a sofa which is about four times his height. It's usually I mean it had to happen sooner or later. I've seen tech jumping from sofas and I always think well from their backs that's going to be a big problem. If you have a tackle, you know it's it's a problem.

[00:04:34]These jumps, the stairs, it's a it's like a weak point. But I had not I had not seen it with one of our dogs. Well, turns out that he indeed broke his back.

[00:04:46]This one of the vertebraas that is compressed [music] and that you know the spinal cord is like this and it goes like this. So this right now this thing is not stable.

[00:04:59]So there is a big risk of instability and of cutting the spinal cord completely.

[00:05:07]If that happen Sebastian will become paralyzed. He will lose the use of his two back legs. I mean not only terribly painful but he will become handicap and he will need to use a wheelchair. It's a terrible situation.

[00:05:26]So yesterday we launched a fundraiser.

[00:05:29]If you're one of our donors, you have received that email in which I explain what happened and I sent you to a video.

[00:05:36]Today [music] I'm going to send you the link. Same link is at the bottom of this video. The first comment is is there.

[00:05:42]You go and watch the video that we published yesterday. If you're one of our donors and you didn't donate yesterday, I'm going to send it to you again. Why? Because that surgery is going to cost nearly €3,000. And yesterday we only managed to raise [music] 1,000. So we're 2,000 short.

[00:06:00]What does it mean that we are what?

[00:06:01]2,000 shots. Is Sebastian not going to go into surgery? Ideally, no. And most probably no. He will go into surgery.

[00:06:11]But we need to raise enough funds to pay the specialized trauma surgeon that is going to conduct this surgery. Because if we don't do it, then the organization goes into debt, massive debt, and we cannot bury ourselves even more. So right now, the choice is we raise enough funds so that Sebastian can go into surgery. Hopefully, it's going to work and he's going to have a good rest of his life without jumping in the sofa either again. I promise you that.

[00:06:38]Marvel, please take note. Sebastian [music] cannot go in the sofa or any of the other dogs. Okay, that's one option.

[00:06:46]The other option is he doesn't go into surgery. He goes into rest [laughter] and he rests for months hoping that he's going to develop enough material to provide enough stability. That's going to be super painful. There's no guarantee it's going to happen and any day now he can become paralyzed.

[00:07:05]There's no third because the third in any other rescue would be we euthanize him because he's too old because he's so silly for jumping off the sofa and we don't have any money for the surgery.

[00:07:16]But that's not the kind of organization we are. So this is not even contemplated. It's not an option. Okay.

[00:07:23]Sebastian is a great dog. He's really great. He's super. He shouldn't be at the shelter. Actually, he should be with a family because he really is wonderful.

[00:07:34]But this injury has happened while being with us. So we are responsible for what has happened. Now we are responsible doesn't mean that we are guilty. We're not guilty of anything. This could have happened to anybody. But I am responsible because it is my responsibility to solve the situation to deal with this problem. It is my responsibility to ensure that Sebastian has a rest of his life without pain and with mobility. Somebody will say, "Well, if this is your responsibility, you handle it, Victor." Yes, but Sebastian is one of the dogs of our organization.

[00:08:08]He's under our protection. It was an accident. It was a silly accident. It can happen to any of you. Actually, most probably it's going to happen to any of you during your lifetime. If you have a Chihuahua, if you have a Tech, if you have a cockpie, this thing could happen. So, Sebastian is waiting for his surgery hopefully tomorrow, but we need to raise nearly €3,000. Could you please help us? My job is very ungrateful to appear here always asking for money. But my job is actually to tell you the stories as they happen to convey the things that happen in this organization. The good news and the bad news. And today I have a bit of bad news.

[00:08:53]But doesn't have to be the end of the world and the end of the road for Sebastian.

[00:08:59]Could you please help us? There's a link at the bottom of this video. Just please go there and donate. It doesn't have to be much. Just a little bit. what you're going to spend in a couple of beers.

[00:09:10]Give us a hand, please. Sebastian is a great dog. His owner died. Left him dead. He's very lucky he's with us. Give us a hand, please. Please donate. Help us save Sebastian.

[00:09:25]Thank you.

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