Rescue Journal

it's never just one thing

Carol  ·  Jan. 6, 2016

rescue is many things all at the same time, in multiple, multiple layers.

sometimes i yearn for that past age of innocence when i could blithely just skate over the superficial surface of things...everything seemed so simple, so easy, so clean.

but rescue isn't like that and really neither is life...and quite honestly, i wasn't very effective way back then.

rescue is challenging..its freaking deep.

we can do everything humanly possible, every single responsible available medical thing and still norman may die. we can't give norman the one essential thing that he missed out on in his first hours of life...an early yet critical immune system to protect him via his mother's first feed of colostrum. he is not missing a tiny piece of the puzzle, he is missing a great big critical chunk.

on bad days i want to blow my brains out at how easy rescue seems from the outside..applying coconut oil while singing kumby-ya fixes everything solutions to complex problems.

and that is where we let these animals down. we do not take our jobs and responsibilities seriously enough. we want that elusive happily ever after and if we can't have that, we want the full saintly angel stacked and grieving choir.

and here is the thing...norman's life or death has nothing to do with me. i ensured he got the best of care, every moment of every day because that is my job. that is what saints promised him the second that he came here. and maybe it will be enough that he can live and grow strong and maybe it won't be.

we haven't been stupid, we haven't been lazy, we haven't gone airy fairy crazy and forced coconut oil down his throat. but we did provide a safe, dry, warm, comfortable and clean environment, multiple access to qualified medical practitioners, top quality 24/7 monitoring and daily care. this is not sainthood..this is simply good rescue care.
we gave him the whole, deep, full, layered package, not just the superficial "oh look at our sweet rescued baby cow!"

and in the end..the final decision on if norman lives or not is now beyond our control. call it fate, call it god, call it crappy bad luck to be born a baby bull, or super good luck that saints took him in....whatever it is..it's not us and it's not him..it just is what the reality is.

but good lord, none of it should ever be taken lightly, none of it should be superficially surfed. every single thing we do here affects something or someone in some way. my advice to anyone in rescue is use the full capacity of our human brain..think, think, rethink, think and think some more...not to make oneself bigger, better, smarter, more important but for one reason only..to meet the actual real needs of the animals.... not to roll around in happy endings but to have met and fulfilled one's responsibility thru all the layers whatever the ending may or may not be.

happily after is not the sole purpose of my job...doing what needs to be done, what has to be done every day is.

that is rescue.


but still hope floats eternal..please norman live.

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