Welcome to Doberman Assistance, Rescue and Education

IN MEMORIUM

She came to me December 14, 1998. She had turned four in October. Skin and bones, barely weighing 50 lbs, with scars all over her face, neck, chest and front legs. She was wearing an ill-fitting sweater, a choke chain and a nylon leash. Her only luggage was a dirty crate with teeth marks all over the outside where the pit bull tried to get at her, a filthy crate pad, and a baby comforter that ‘had to be placed on the top of the crate to cover the holes along the sides otherwise she would not sleep’. Her only toy was a filthy panda bear whose squeaker didn’t work and which she defended and would not let out of her sight.

My Doberprincess whose bed was her half of the sofa and, of course, my bed; whose toys filled a wicker basket and who had learned that it was okay to chew on rawhide bones because there was always more in the ‘chewy can’. Whose wardrobe consisted of collars and seatbelt harnesses, blankies, sweaters and sweatshirts. Who, six months later, wasn’t recognized by the same volunteer who brought her to me because she had become a proud, confident beauty. Who, once I filled her out, never weighed less than 62 lbs even when she died less than four years later on September 6, 2002 of liver disease.

You see, she came with a DAR&E volunteer on a home visit. She was only taken into foster care Saturday afternoon December 12th. Her crate was still sitting in the volunteer’s SUV. She had slept Saturday and Sunday in the spare bedroom with the volunteer’s husband and had tried to carry the food dish everywhere that they provided for her. Although I had had other large dogs, this was my first Doberman. She only came on a home visit to see how I reacted with a Doberman and if she would get along with my cats.

Although it was dark, she put her front paws on the gate and looked into the large wooded yard. She would become the terror of the rodent world. In the house she kept staring out of the floor to ceiling windows in the kitchen and sunroom fascinated with the wildlife.. She approached everything cautiously, afraid.

One look into her haunted eyes in that poor scarred face and that skinny body and there was no way she was leaving. We unpacked her things and she spent only that one night in that crate. She refused to come near it after that. She had her forever home. It’s just that I thought it would be for so much longer, and yes, even for such a short time, I would do it again.

She was my companion, my protector, and my friend. She nudged herself into almost every aspect of my life so that now there is almost nowhere that I can go; nothing that I can do without remembering her; missing her. How I miss her.

Her name was Carmen.