Northern California Sled Dog Rescue

"Hi everyone my Name is Marigold but most people know me as Mari. Earlier this year some nice people noticed me stumbling around in a grocery store parking lot and brought me to a local shelter. I was pretty young, they thought 5-7 months, so the shelter called Mama Gail at Norsled to see if she could help. Before I knew what was happening she came in like a whirlwind and my whole life changed! She knew that my extreme clumsiness meant that there was something very wrong with me, but she didn’t care, she saw ME! She saw that I am a happy girl who loves everyone and who is lucky enough that people love me back! 

Fast-forward 4 months…. I live with a foster pack that I love and I got better for a while (I even started to learn how to not trip over my own feet) but then one day I started having a hard time getting my feet in the right place and was stumbling around again. Mama Gail and my foster mom decided they needed to figure out what was happening and after a MRI they knew what the problem is. I was born with a cyst on my spinal cord. It pushes on my nerves which makes it hard for me to know exactly where my legs and feet are (pretty hard to walk when you don’t know where your feet are!). 

The doctor thought that surgery might help me but first I needed some medicine to make the cyst smaller so that they could see if the damage was permanent before they tried. GUESS WHAT????? It worked and now everyone knows that if I have the surgery, I may never be as agile as most of my breed, but I will be able to run and play with the best of them. Mama Gail and my foster mom say that the surgery and recovery are pretty expensive but they are determined to make it happen for me no matter what. If you can help, even a little bit, I will be very grateful and I promise to give you lots of kisses if I see you (or I’ll try really hard not to if you think dog kisses are YUCKY)"