Sunday, November 13, 2022

We were working outside, and a couple of our dogs were playing in the yard.  It was starting to get dark when we heard a bunch of coyotes followed by a gun shot.  We live in the middle of nowhere so these types of things aren’t unusual, but this time the sounds were uncomfortably close.  The dogs were quick to come back up to the house, but Hugo was no where to be found.  We hollered for him for hours.  It was 22 degrees that night, and Hugo hates the cold, but he never came home.  We searched the woods for hours the next morning.  Nothing.  We took to local Facebook groups to find him with no luck.  When Shanda came home from work that Tuesday, Hugo was standing at the top of our driveway.  He was beat up pretty bad, his hind leg was swollen, overall he seemed ok, but most importantly he was alive!  THANK GOD!  Jamie took him to the vet the following morning, and we learned that he had actually been shot by a muzzleloader.  The bullet entered the back of his hind leg, come out the front of his leg, reentered his stomach, and stopped at his chest.  The injury to his leg was too severe for our vet to repair, and with so many other question marks remaining, we had no choice but to amputate.  He had lost a lot of blood and was possibly bleeding internally so we had to put the surgery off several days to get his blood count up.  He spent eight days at the vet trying to stabilize his body before they were comfortable enough to do the amputation and fix the hernia where the bullet reentered his stomach.  The vet was not able to remove the bullet from his chest without fear of it moving further into his chest cavity.  A few days after surgery, we finally got to bring our big guy home!  He’s doing very well and is adjusting quickly.  It’s truly a miracle!  We pray that the muscles around the bullet heal and keep the bullet in place to avoid any further complications.  Right now we are just thankful that our baby is home and alive!  

HUGO, YOU ARE A FUCKING WARRIOR!