Nobody understood why Benji kept getting returned to the shelter after being adopted. It had been 11 times by now and all his owners just kept giving obviously fake and weak excuses. Only when the new trainee decided to take Benji home with her did they find out what was actually wrong with Benji.
And nobody at the shelter could have predicted this…
Stacy was still shaken from the experience as she was driving back to the shelter. Benji was in the backseat sleeping. Stacy felt horrible as she had been so sure she could help this poor dog but now he had to be returned to the shelter for a 12th time. But at least they now knew why…
Stacy had called ahead and there were 3 other employees waiting for her and Benji to arrive. They were obviously disappointed that the adoption had not worked out, but they were also extremely curious as to the reason for it as now they would finally get an honest answer.
11 times Benji had been returned to the shelter always with an excuse, buty they knew that Stacy would tell them the truth. But they would find out that they were not ready for the truth…
So why was Benjij returned to the Shelter 11 times? What was wrong with this poor dog and could they fix it?
By this point Benji had been at the animal shelter for 1,5 years. He was barely a puppy anymore but he still very much looked like one and everybody who came to the shetler to pick immediately fell in love with him and wanted to take him home. So why was poor Benji still here?
The truth is that from those 1,5 years, Benji actually didn’t actually spend that much time in shelter. If he was present there it would be at most 2 weeks before he was adopted by somebody. But the thing is that he just kept getting returned by the people who adopted him.
This already started when he was brought into the shelter the first time as only a 3 week old puppy. His first owners had a dog who gave birth to 5 healthy puppies. But they inexplicably decided to keep four of them and only Benji was handed over to the shelter without a word of explanation…
Some eyebrows were raised at the shelter at the time so they had Benji extensively checked by their on-call veterinarian. When all the test results showed that there was seemingly nothing wrong with the puppy, the shelter just concluded that he probably just got unlucky ending up here.
They put him up for adoption that same day and the very next day somebody had already come in to adopt him. It wasn’t everyday that a shelter would have puppies up for adoption as mostly older dogs were brought in, so people who saw Benji knew this was a golden chance.
The family he was going to seemed to be absolutely perfect. A young married couple with a 5 year old daughter dying to get a puppy. The mother also worked from home so there would always be people around to give Benji attention. Nobody at the shelter expected to ever see Benjio again…
But this would not turn out to be the case whatsoever. It only took 3 weeks before Benji was returned to the shelter by his new owners. The father had come alone with a happy and excited Benji following behind him. He had obviously bonded with the men and had no idea it would be the last time he would see him…
The men only gave a vague reason for returning Benji that was obviously an excuse. Something about that was just not working out as it was just constant too much time. It didn’t make any sense based on what the shelter knew about the family…
But the shetler decided not to ask too many questions at that time. If the family was not willing to care for Benji, then the dog was better off with them. And they were sure he would find a new owner who would absolutely love him in no time. This had to only be an incident right?
But this would turn out to not be an incident whatsoever. For some reason it just kept happening. Every time Benij was adopted he was eventually brought back to the shelter and within 2 weeks he was adopted again within 2 weeks.
The shelter had never seen anything like this before and they just could not figure out why it was happening. The reasons given for returning the poor puppy always just seemed too shallow and weak. And they were also so different, at least some of them would have to be lies.
Some said that Benji had way too much energy while others claimed he wouldn't even get out of his bed. Some said that he was aggressive to other dogs while others said he was too scared of them to go to the park. It just didn’t make any sense…
The shelter was at a loss because what else could they do than to put Benji up for adoption again. They could not just keep him at the shelter forever. This poor dog needed to find a forever home but when he got returned for the 11th time, nobody had any hope left for that.
It was also obvious that this constant horrible cycle started to take its toll on the puppy that everybody at the shelter loved so much. They could just see the sparkle in his eyes shine a little less bright every time he was put back into that case. It was heartbreaking…
At this point Benji was just sitting in the corner of his cage looking sad. His 11th owner had finally given the shelter a return reason that they actually believed. That Benji just seemed not to trust him and just seemed unhappy overall. They would believe that all too well…
Everybody at the shelter just felt like they needed to find a solution to this problem. They all cared so much about this dog and luckily for them, the solution actually came from a trainee named Stacy, who had been with them only for about 2 weeks.
She was studying to become a veterinarian and to train. She was volunteering at the shelter for 2 month. When Benji was returned by his most recent owner, it was the first time she laid eyes on the dog and she instantly fell head over heels in love with him.
Even though she had only seen a very sad version of Benji, the personnel who had been at the shelter longer told her all about how fun Benji had been before. They also told her the truth about Benji being returned 11 times for various reasons.
But this didn’t deter Stacy at all. Their loss she remembers thinking about all the stupid previous owners returned Benji to ther shelter. She was determined to give this dog the life it so obviously deserved. But she had no idea yet about what she was getting herself into…