Zoey Surgery + 36 Golden Retrievers Rescued from Istanbul

Hi and hope it’s been a good Tuesday. My day has been full of the usual things…teaching yoga, personal training, attempting to tackle my inbox. It’s also been a little emotional because Zoey had her surgery today.

Our vet does the surgery same day so I was able to pick her up this afternoon. The surgery went okay but there was one vessel that they couldn’t get to stop bleeding so they had to lengthen her incision to get in there. She’s pumped full of morphine right now and pretty pathetic.

She laid down for the entire car ride home and I had to call my neighbor to help me get her out of the car because she wouldn’t stand up. She’s been camped out by me in the office. I know this is a routine surgery and for her best but it’s still sad for me to see her hurting or scared because up until today she’d never known these feelings. Gosh, I can’t imagine what motherhood must be like. I cried when I picked her up today seeing her so puny.

I may or may not have let her up on the couch last night to cuddle. Yes, I totally confess to being a crazy dog mother and I don’t even care.

While we’re on the topic of golden retrievers (haha…when are we not) my mom told me about the most amazing story.

The Adopt A Golden Rescue in Atlanta (my parents got their golden boy Sam from there) just rescued 36 golden retrievers from Istanbul, Turkey. Apparently, golden retrievers were a status symbol in Turkey 10 or so years ago. As the years passed and more and more people got the dogs, they stopped being a status symbol and people started calling animal control to surrender them or simply let them out onto the streets. At animal control they were often euthanized or taken to “wildlife retreats” outside of the city where they were released with undomesticated dogs who oftentimes attacked and killed them.

The Adopt A Golden Rescue has been working for the last several months to arrange to bring 36 of the goldens over to America. It cost over $1,000 per dog for the transport. Here they are all loaded up on a truck in Turkey and ready to be taken to the airport.

And here they are on American soil. They’ve been named the Freedom Goldens and all of them have patriotic names like Hero, Freedom, Jefferson, Firecracker and more. They range in ages from 6 months to 10 years.

They’re currently being housed in a facility just outside of Atlanta where they are being medically treated and evaluated. They have been living on the streets and in shelters so they have to be observed to see what commands they know, if they’re housebroken, what type of personality they have, etc.

The craziest thing is that they speak Turkish! There are volunteers who are Turkish speakers working with them to help them learn English commands.

It is the hope of the Adopt A Golden Rescue that all 36 of these dogs find the loving, forever homes that they deserve. They’re getting a ton of press and the story has been covered in Atlanta as well as on national news outlets like USA Today and the Washington Post. You can follow along on Facebook (they have their own page!) and support Adopt A Golden on their website. All photos about the Freedom Goldens are from Adopt A Golden.

Have a great night everyone. Hope this warmed your heart.