Posted 4th July 2024
We were asked by a kind lady who helps a lot of cats in her locality if we could publish a situation with a very unwell cat called Thomas. Poor Thomas couldn't survive his illness, and he was gently allowed to go over Rainbow Bridge, but he did leave a bill behind which needed to be paid so we helped a little with €30. Sleep tight Thomas.
Poor Luna was hospitalized at the vet for a week for stopping eating, they thought she had something in the intestine that she was obstructing then they decided to send it to the emergency veterinary hospital, there she did new analyzes and a new ultrasound that she found that there was already a perforation in the intestine which made her need urgent surgery, then they realized that there was no object but she had several cysts and one of them broke. They have now been removed, and there was a very large debt, and we helped with nearly €200 for this. The good news here is that the results came back as non-cancerous. Well done Luna, and we hope you feel much better. 🙂
Little Luppy was very unwell and they found it was Parvovirus, and there was a bill of 127.50 which the owner couldn't manage, so we paid that and now Luppy feels much better. 🙂
Once again Pluto found himself very itchy, and his nose and eyes were sore, and his ears were itchy so he shook his head trying to make them feel better, and his toes were so sore he was chewing them all the time. So he went off to the vet and had some blood tests, and has some alterations to his medication, and feels a lot better.
3 poor sick puppies were taken to the hospital with Parvo, and only 1 survived, but the bill was still outstanding, so we settled the €305.14 account. The survivor was named Zeus and is happy in his new home. 🙂
I then heard about poor Izzie, who had lots of allergies, and issues, and due to her breed she was made to have training, and the owners did it all for her, and were just managing, barely keeping it together with everything they had to do with her special food, medication and then they found out that poor Izzie has a cross ruptured ligament and the budget for the surgery is €1500 So we helped by sending €805, which is a lot but not the entire bill, but I hope it was enough. Izzie is now at home recovering and being well looked after by her caring owners. 🙂
I discovered a dog called Whiskey whose owners didn't have the funds to take him to a vet, but he was limping. He isn't a young dog, and an association paid for pain relief and X-rays, but it was discovered he had a broken leg 🙁. Poor boy it must have been so painful. But it took me 28 hours of work and effort to track down Whiskey and his family, who don't have Internet, and his vet had quoted €600 to operate on his leg. The association and the family couldn't afford this. Thank goodness we were able to pay this bill, and he had his operation. This shows the need for our lovely group members to spread the word as much as possible, so a dog gets help faster and people know we are here for them.
Whisky's operation is booked for July 10, so finally he will be out of pain.
The next dog we had in our group has worked as a search and rescue dog for a long time, a very special dog, and has lots of evidence of his work. But sadly when he needed the help of the people his owner struggled, and Sylar needed a hip replacement costing €4500. This was impossible for the owner and for us, and other associations, so I flooded the social media with Sylar's story and it was the fastest I think I have ever seen the solution occur. We did raise some funds, and for that I am very grateful, but not enough in the short time we were live on this case, but I ceased fundraising when we had some good news. It was the social media posts and the speed with which Sylar's story and situation was shared which bought the final end to his pain. A kind benefactor agreed that he would pay the remainder of the bill, so I straight away stopped the requests, and concluded the fundraising, and other associations who were able to help were told that with all the gratitude we could offer, we were pleased to say Sylar has his operation booked and even though our total amount raised has been passed on, and received with gratitude, it really was a case of together we are stronger here! 💪
Almost straight away I have a dog called Bobby (also known as Bob) who has a terribly painful looking tumour to the head, which is in-operable, due to its size and the placement (on the head). But poor Bobby will likely need medication for life to keep the pain and inflammation and infection away. He is 9 years old, and I have opened an account for him at his vets, and I have put €100 into the account so that he can be re-evaluated and his treatment can start. It seems there is an indication of cancerous cells, and this can't be removed, but can be managed with medication. So we will need to add more money into Bobby's account as he starts his treatments. Sadly we are now in the pain management and comfort phase, there is no ultimate treatment for this for poor Bobby.
We then had a dog asking for urgent help, his name is Bin, and he needed some sutures near his anus looking at in case of infection and some bloods (I will spare you the pictures) but the bill is €95 which I have agreed to pay.
Now it is our 1 YEAR ANNIVERSARY! And we have another little dog, asking for help, and she waited, queued up patiently, even though she is completely blind! So she ended up being our last dog of the First Year little Cereja (Cherry) Our Anniversary dog. We intend to return the sight to one of her eyes with an operation at a specialist in Lisbon, costing €1400 approximately.
We started collecting items for sale and raffle, and we have some amazing collaborations with Hoblor Gifts for 10% of any orders placed with the code BUDLEG, Alyson Sheldrake until the end of November for any pet portraits ordered with the same code BUDLEG, and also Alyson gave us an amazing donation to celebrate the 2nd anniversary of the publication of her book Kat the Dog! Alyson is having a Summer Sale. A few original paintings for sale all discounted for you… and 20% of the proceeds from the sale of the paintings will go to Buddy's Legacy! Nandi Charity gave us a great donation which really helped us a lot and we want to thank them from the bottom of our heart!
We had a fundraising Birthday Party (Thank you Ken!) and raffled a dinner for 2 at Restaurante Xicken Piripiri, a Fun Art and Wine afternoon thanks to Tatyana Platitsa, a Guadiana River Cruise for 2 people including Lunch and Wine, and a beautiful home made scarf by Fiona Whyte. Texel Stafford made Lavender Hearts for us to sell, and Karin Geens donated some hand made items for sale. This fundraiser, along with all the added raffles online and on the day made €742.57 in total, which is a much needed huge boost for us, and we thank Ken for doing this for his Birthday, and all the people involved in donating fundraising items. 💖
I have another Fun Art and Wine afternoon thanks to Tatyana Platitsa voucher to raffle, and also a €25 voucher from Algarve Candle Co. and an amazing prize voucher for a 30 minute Golf Lesson with the incredible Peter O'Connor, Head Golfer at Castro Marim Golfe, a night Glamping with Twin Springs near just outside of Gomes Aires near Almodovar! And a voucher for a dinner for 2 people in a restaurant in Vila Real de Santo Antonio. These will be going on our 1 year Anniversary on July 6. We would like to extend our thanks to all the people, companies and businesses who have donated towards our raffle, and allowed this to be a successful fundraiser. Thank you all!
We also have lots of people collecting small change, all those annoying coins nobody wants, tucked away in a drawer/pot/bag. Let us know and we will find a way to collect them, or get them collected. I will test this for a year and see what this initiative raises! 🙂
We have helped 35 dogs, some more than once, and sadly 3 who didn't make it, we have helped 4 cats, again sadly 1 didn't make it and for year 1 we think you all have helped us do a great job, and we look forward to starting year 2 in a strong position to help even more.
We wanted to mention all these things, as we are very lucky and grateful to have the support we have had, and this year has been emotional, and also very fulfilling as we continue to help those who need it. We are having our own small 1 year fundraising celebration party at our home, with some food, drinks and prizes on offer, but I hope people help us celebrate our first year with a small donation, marked ‘1 year' so I know it is in honour of this. I will add everything up and let you all know in the Facebook group what we raised for our 1 year celebration, including donations via IBAN or PayPal.
Then we did something not related to Buddy's Legacy, all funds were raised outside of the group, and no funds were used from the group. But just so you know this is what we do, when needed. There was a dog who was hit by a car and left on the side of the road. He lay there for a long while and somebody took him to a vet. While we, as a group, don't help street dogs, strays, un-owned dogs, we do believe this dog has an owner as he seemed well fed and looked after. So he was found to have an injury to his back and needed pain killers, fluids and anti-inflammatory medication, and the hunt was on looking for his owner. At the start he was unable to even sit up, but after a few days he was sitting and eating and drinking, but still not walking or standing. We paid his vets bill by kind donations, not related to Buddy's Legacy, which was €650.86, and also some food was included to take with him on his discharge. He went from the vets straight to the Hospital in Portimão, where he had a CT scan to see in greater detail what his issues were which cost another €350, again donated by the kindness of dog lovers outside of the group. He was called Simon and he had his castration, and all his blood work done to ensure he was healthy, and he went into foster home. After some weeks he moved to a second foster home, and both the foster carers are very much appreciated by everybody who helped Simon, as without them it would have been for nothing. Simon went to Dog Locomotion to be measured up for his special wheels, and he has a forever home, where he will be much loved, cared for and his physio therapy treatments can be continued. So poor Simon could have had a very different outcome, but he was very loved and ‘lucky' not to be hit and run, but to be noticed and helped. Thank you to everybody involved as I coordinated it from here, miles away from the action, and could have done none of it without all of you!
