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Life As A Rescuer

The Reality. What it is like every day living in Romania, written by a Paws2Rescue rescuer:

It took me a while to write this because I am constantly thinking of what words would better express my feelings. I will give it a try because I want everyone to know how it feels like to have a government who does not support animal well-being in any way, how it is to live in a corrupt system in which humanity is sometime regarded as a flaw and not as component part of the human being.

Have you ever felt afraid of going somewhere in your own country? I am sure that in most of the cases the answer is no. Well if you live in Romania and you are an animal lover things change completely! Whenever I go on a holiday in this country I am actually terrified of what I might find on the way, how many animals I will see hit on the streets, how many dead, how many alive trying to survive somehow. I am afraid of stopping by at a gas station along the way because I am certain I will find abandoned dogs there or dogs with medical issues and I will not have the power to help them all, as I wish I could. I have a long history of picking dogs from the gas stations or parking lots because I could not remain indifferent at their suffering. The ones that I could not save have stick with me for so long that I can't even remember and have made me feel miserable and guilty for letting them there…their eyes are the only thing that come into my mind and it breaks my heart. It took me a very long time to realize that the ones who do harm to animals in this country are way more numerous than the ones who want to help and love them. It took me a long time to accept that I could not save them all because I do not have this power…it took me an even longer time to struggle with myself and to accept that I am limited in my willingness to do good to them.

Either way, if you are an animal lover it is depressing to walk around this country. Things have not changed almost at all regarding animals in the past years. The public shelters are horror, the dogs are kept (in most of the cases) in terrible conditions and most of them die without knowing what love feels like. If you go to a public shelter you will have your heart broken to million of tiny pieces that will never be glued together. I admit, I do not have the courage to go in the public shelter and see all of those souls suffering, willing to be free, waging their tails but silently waiting in a death row, …I do not have the heart to see them all there and not be able to do anything for them, to leave them behind once I walk out the gate. I am weak, very weak when it comes to animal suffering…I know and I am guilty for this.

In Romania, if there are animals that people do not have any profit from (like meat, eggs, milk, etc.) nobody cares about them. I often see old dogs being abandoned because… IMAGINE THIS… they are old. I often question myself: how insensible can you be to leave a dog totally defenceless in the middle of nowhere? I never ever find an answer to this! I just wish that the ones who do this get the same treatment when they are old so they know how it feels like to be scared, to be hungry, to suffer in silence not knowing what you did to deserve this. I realized a long time ago that I love more animals than I love people. Their love is incomparable to anything else.

I have a dream that one day I will be able to walk around this country without being afraid of what horrific scenes I will assist to, without trying to not look on the highway to see animals who have died crashed by cars, without being worried that at every 6 months new puppies will be killed or left on the street / woods because people are to ignorant and do not spy their females. We have laws, but what use if they are never applied? People kill, beat, abandon their animals and no one suffers any consequence. The justice is blind, the animals are not important so no measures are taken against anyone. It is just a case that is present today and will be forgotten tomorrow…this is until the next one comes out. It is just like a circle that no one seems to break.

I have a dream that someday people will start neutering their animals so the suffering will end, I have a dream that justice will be made in the name of all the dogs that have died, I have a dream that someday this country will become animal friendly…I just have a dream shared with million of other animal lovers.

I am on a mission to save animals but I also have a dream that someday I will not have to.