Fostering rescue animals is such important work. If you can find time in your life and space in your home, it is a rewarding experience. So many cats and dogs are saved because rescuers step in and care for them. Without a strong foster network, even these rescuers would fail.

I often post pictures of my cute little fosters, cuddling together or cuddling with me. What I don’t always post are the times when fostering is tough.

My last dog foster came from a severe hoarding situation; she was horrified by human contact, and we spent weeks gaining her trust. She is now in a new home, happy and thriving with her forever family.

My current litter of kittens are all on antibiotics and require medicine twice a day. One of them has a severe URI, and I spent yesterday morning sitting in a steamy bathroom trying to help her breathe. Later in the day, my husband took her to the vet for a breathing treatment and new meds, and today she is beginning to feel better.  We are not out of the woods with her yet, two meds twice a day and some more steamy bathroom time and she will make it.

I am not sharing the tough part of fostering to scare people away, I just want to share what one person can do to save a life, and give these sweet babies the happy home that they deserve.

The one thing I hear from people more than anything else about fostering is, “I could never do it, I would want to keep them all.”  You will want to keep them all, the one thing that prevents me from keeping them all is knowing that if I have too many, I cannot help the next one that needs me.  Also, as sad and hard as it is to turn them over to someone new it is rewarding to know that you helped save them and assure that they are placed in a loving home.