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| Name: |
Drayke
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Age: |
Nine and a half months old
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| Gender: |
Male |
Breed: |
German Shepherd
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| Home: |
Colorado Springs, Colorado, USA |
Drayke here is a very special dog, at least to my partner and I. We got him at five weeks old (At the time didn't know it was illegal here in Colorado to get a pup that early) and he was such a tiny ham! He barely even was bigger than a half loaf of bread. We had lost our last dog a few months prior, and we weren't exactly "Looking" for another dog just yet but I saw him posted up on Craigslist and I just fell for him.
We rushed that evening to go get him! We met his previous owners at a truck stop (half way between our towns) and he was even better in person! He loved everyone and was just so excited to see us. After a quiet ride home, he got settled in and well, the rest is history.
Until a few months back.
On December 16th, 2016 Drayke had a three-minute seizure. We rushed him to the Powers Emergency Vet Clinic here in Colorado Springs to get him looked at. After five hours at the ER the Vet wasn't sure what could have caused it so she suggested us get blood work done. I had become unemployed just a month earlier, and we were so tight on money that there was no way we could do blood work that second. She sent us home with three different kinds of medicine.
On December 27th, 2016 we raised enough money via Drayke's GoFundMe that we got his blood work done and paid off his ER vet bill 100%. The good news, his liver was 100% healthy but his Kidney levels were at a 4.7. The Vet suggested putting Drayke down because, "He could die any day, it will be fast, but very painful, and it wouldn't be right to let him suffer." These words struck like a drum to our hearth! This puppy we had raised from five weeks old, now barely even six months old, was about to die. My partner and I were too broken up by the news, we refused! We knew that there had to be something we could do to prolong this in some way!
Later I called my vet and told her we will not be putting him down, he was so full of life and was his crazy self! We refused to put him down just because she said he could die any day, telling someone that is horrible to begin with and after much thought we realized that Drayke had gotten a hold of some really bad toxins, that's what caused all this to happen! Maybe with some special diet, herbal supplements, and monitoring him carefully we may be able to heal his Kidneys from the damage, better to try then not, right?
So, skip to today! Drayke is still his crazy wacky weird self, and we love him every day for it! When I am sad or have had a really bad day, he will come up and place a toy in my lap, he always wants to play, and seeing such life helps me stay positive. We don't have a vehicle, so taking Drayke to the park is hard, but luckily on weekends the apartment kids love to play with him constantly when he's outside with them. Through it all, he is doing great and we love the crud out of him! No matter how many people he runs up to wanting love, he always comes running back to us! He never goes more than 50 feet from us on a leash-free time when at the park or hiking, and if he does, the second we call he is right at our sides.
All in all, he is a great dog! Though I might rethink owning a German Shepherd again, he may be a trooper, but he's a little too smart sometimes and trainings hard. He knows the basics, Sit, Stay (Well...sorta), Roll Over, Crawl (Still working on), Jump (Vertically), Touch, Side, Front, Come (of course), and Bed. I've been trying to teach him Shake and some others but he is just SO full of constant energy it's hard. Been wanting to try to raise money to take him to a trainer, but they cost so much, and a roof over our head is better than a professionally trained dog. Drayke loves water! Literally, if we let him, he would chug and chug and chug till he died, so sadly it has to be regulated otherwise he gets sick, so taking him to the park with water is hard. He always tries to just chill by it, and slowly over time we are training him that he can only drink it or be in it when we say it's okay. We don't want him sick, ya know? He also loves fetch! We had 6 squeaky tennis balls and only one has survived this long, and it's because it gets put up after every visit to the park, otherwise he rips the squeaky bit out of it! Such a stinker!!!
Anyway, Drayke is just overall a fantastic dog! I know I keep saying that, but to me and my partner, he really is! We've had rats, a cat (still have her), and we now have a baby ball python in the house and even though he is a hyper pup, he always is gentle and never over the top. He and my rats used to even play together (with watchful eyes of course) and even though my cat isn't super crazy about him after all these months, she will sometimes play chase with him. He just loves other dogs, but when we're at the park, he would rather say hi to every human instead, so we always have to tell the other humans to ignore him, that he needs to play with other dogs, not humans. Luckily most understand and will ignore him so he will go play. I guess he's like that kid that's always excited to play, but the second you take them near other kids, they get a little shy for some reason.
Oh yea! Drayke also loves to jump! On people more than anything, which we are working on, but he has jumped onto a three- to four-foot high wall once, and it meant a lot to me that he could do that. We're training him to jump fences, trees, wiring, and many other things, just in case anything happens and he must know these things aren't a bad thing and that he can jump over them. He loves going rock climbing with us, he's even gotten a little too adventurous and has gone right up to a five-story ledge, though the second he looked down he froze and we had to slowly move him back to us (we were right there by the edge too, but he had never done that before and it was unexpected).
If you want to watch our adventures and such, we do have a instagram account! DraykeNFamily is what it is called and we post to it all the time. You will see Anai, Drayke, and maybe Snape occasionally along with my partner and I, and any weird adventures we have that day!
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