Stories of Rescue
Finding Mercy
“Blessed are the merciful, for they shall be shown Mercy” – Matthew 5:7
One day, in early November 2013, a kind man was walking down the road near his home in Abbeville, La., when he happened upon an emaciated, sickly-looking, muddy black and pale white shape lying in a ditch along the throughway. It was not moving. Carefully, he approached the figure, and it lifted its small head ever slightly, revealing her face, and the man knew the dog was still alive. He pulled her from the runoff area and brought her home, where he contacted a friend who knew of Animal Aid for Vermilion Area (AAVA).
The friend contacted one of AAVA’s volunteer fosters, who met the man that had found the dog. The Pit-bull mix was wrapped in a towel and quite obviously still in distress despite having been rescued by the kind man. When the woman fostering for AAVA took a closer look at the barely moving dog, she noticed a nasty cut along the dog’s stomach. Furthermore, the dog, who came to be called “Mercy,” appeared starved and dehydrated. Mercy was only ten months old and weighed but fifteen pounds, or roughly half what she should have weighed given her size.
Together with another AAVA foster, this woman tended to Mercy’s stomach wound, fed her slowly but consistently to ensure she would not overeat, and provided her with cool, clean water. Given vitamins and treated with medicine, some of which was applied to her stomach regularly, Mercy started perking up after just a few days in foster care. She soon took to the foster’s son, and the two became fast friends.
As Mercy gained health and confidence, she more than doubled her weight to over thirty pounds, and after the new year had started, she finally went to the vet for her spay in January 2014. She now loves to chew rawhide and tug on rope toys, and Mercy has become very active, playing whenever she gets the chance, especially with her new friends—human and dog alike.
Mercy stands as a testament to the kindness of strangers, the ability of people to band together to help animals who cannot necessarily help themselves, and the curative powers of a determined animal rescue such as AAVA. Without the man who found Mercy beside the road, or the man’s friend who called AAVA, or the foster who helped nurse Mercy to health, none of Mercy’s restoration would have been possible, and she likely never would have made it out of the ditch she had struggled to hide within.
Not only has Mercy been blessed, but so too have all those people who have come together to aid in her fight for survival. Mercy will undoubtedly make a family happy when she is adopted, and in all likelihood, she will shower them with her affection and appreciation by way of innumerable dog kisses.
