My name is Xavier!

Another discarded senior 😢. Meet Xavier.

The time before the holidays is always filled with surrenders and abandonments, especially seniors. We will never understand the psychology of it- it seems to be some kind of combination of making room for the new Xmas puppies, starting the New Year with less responsibility, not wanting to have an ailing pet interfere with holiday plans… sometimes multiple factors. But it’s a phenomen we dread every year and why most seasoned rescuers grow quite Grinchy around the holidays 😖

So Xavier was turned into animal control by someone who supposedly “found” him, and (no shocker here) no one came looking for him. He looked like a ragged old bathmat, smelled like an ashtray, wasn’t bearing weight on one of his back legs, and his eyes were covered in crust. He is a complete sweetheart, happy and lovable despite his discomfort and neglect, and just craves human attention and sounds like a human baby crying if he’s ignored. He has a host of common but treatable/manageable old age issues- there really isn’t any body part on him that functions 💯. Let’s see: chronic dry eye, heart murmur, arthritis, old knee injury, early kidney disease, enlarged prostate, a bunch of crusty old dog wart growths, rotting falling out teeth and breath that can clear a room… is that enough? He’s happy, eating well, walking much better on pain medication, on meds to help his heart, a good boy for his longterm eye drops. He likes other little dogs (sometimes too much- he wasn’t previously neutered and actually that’s probably the only part that still works normally for now, but we will take care of that when he gets his dental. 👋 👋 🏀 🏀 Our motto is you are never too old for a Second Chance or a neuter 😆), though some dogs are a bit offended and annoyed by him until his hormones settle. His mind is still young and he has a lot of living left to do if he can get his body to cooperate, but he’s already getting around so much better and his tail is always wagging. He looks to be a poodle/bichon mix about 13lbs and probably at least 13 years old.

If you love sweet old men that like to be spoiled and doted on, please email njwoof@cs.com to meet Xavier!

Your donations this holiday season help us keep up with the never ending stream of little dogs of all ages being given up in the coming weeks 🥺

Since COVID-19, we are no longer holding our Sunday adoption events until further notice, but we are scheduling meet and greet appointments with a specific dog or dogs at our meeting spots in Northern NJ. To streamline adoptions, all communication before, during, and after the adoption process is done through email only: we have limited volunteers able to return phone calls. Submit an application from our website www.secondchance.petfinder.com to speed up the adoption process and email any questions to us at njwoof@cs.com. Please check your email regularly for next steps. All our dogs reside in foster care in Northern NJ until adoption and we do not have a central shelter location. We are a small all-volunteer organization focused on rescuing local dogs from area shelters, as well as accepting some surrenders and puppy mill rescues.