Hopsing

September 2019 was a crazy month for our family, we were in the process of purchasing a home in Delaware.  I will never forget the day I saw Jasper (formerly Hopsing), his little face on the adoption website.  He, like my older Aussie, was disabled.  Jasper was not only deaf, but has vision impairment as well. I can not explain how I knew, but I just knew he was suppose to be apart of our family.  I turned to my husband and showed him the picture and asked if we could adopt him.  We both agreed if the house purchase went through we would try to adopt him.  One thing led to another, and another family was looking into adopting Jasper.   I won’t lie, I cried...sobbed like a baby; but tried to be happy that he was being adopted.

The beginning of October we finalized the closing of our home purchase.  I was still sad, I kept thinking about Jasper and how in my heart I just knew he was meant for our family.  A few days later, I got a message saying the adoption fell through and wanted to know if I was still interested in Jasper. YES! Yes! Yes! (And yes, I cried like a baby again).

October 10, 2019 was a beautiful day. Jasper was brought to our home by his loving foster mom.  I feel like he walked in and everything fell into place.  Our 7 year old Aussi, Asher, took right to him, and Jasper to him.  They played in our yard and ran around as if they had known each other their entire life.  He took to both of my younger children very quickly, and through the months that we had him would try to play with them.  Literally, using his paws pushing trucks around.  I think he secretly is a human toddler at heart.

I think it’s so important for people to realize that adopting an animal is a beautiful and loving act.  But, what comes with it is work. Most of these animals come from some sort of trauma, and NEED dedicated families. Yes Jasper fell right into our home nicely, but there were moments where we had to work through.  It takes time for animals to truly trust you and to TRULY FEEL like they are apart of the family.  Six months was our magic number, learning to understand him, his specific needs and working with his disabilities.  Our family was already educated with a deaf dog, but still needed to learn Jaspers needs.

When you adopt an animal it is forever, or should be.  Sadly humans give up, blame the animal for “bad” behavior.  I look at things from a dogs perspective and maybe that is why I understand them, I truly SEE them.

As I write this, I look at Jasper now laying faithfully at my feet, with tears and so much love for him.

I am so thankful for the dedicated humans who save animals like him, who help foster and love animals like him, who dedicate their time and money to rescue animals like him. Without them I wouldn’t have Jasper and he, would not be on this planet right now without them.

To those people I have the utmost respect for all of you. Without you I wouldn’t have this loving, faithful, goofy, curious, happy, little protector, that I call my fur baby Jasper.

With Gratitude,

Danyelle and Family