We need a new home for our boy

[rosie4]

I am heartbroken to be writing this to you. We got our beautiful boy Boris who is an Fi Chocolate Labradoodle a few weeks ago; he is now 4 months old. He came from a breeder in Kent; the mum was there, a lovely healthy looking chocolate lab who had managed to have ten puppies. We saw photographs and paperwork of the dad, a standard apricot poodle, but not huge probably 22". Boris has settled in well to our family. We already have a rescue girl called Snowy who is half poodle and not sure what else but possible runt of the little mini doodle; she is four and a half years old. We also have a cat who accepted the puppy well and visa versa.

The problem is that I have been waking up with my eyes glued together, have what looks like a rash all over my hands and face, and constantly have a sore throat and running eyes. My GP thinks I am allergic to Boris, or that because we now have two dogs in a small-ish house, my allergies have kicked in. I am UTTERLY devastated, especially for my son who really wanted a second dog, but the simple fact is some mornings I can hardly see to drive them in to school. I am not allowed to take anti-histamines because of my blood pressure meds.

I think we are going to have to look for a new home for Boris, but there is no way on earth I will see him advertised so that some farm can pick him up - our baby girl, Snowy was puppy farmed and I am still working away her trauma with her... ( He is currently with my dog sitter, a lovely man who takes family pets in to his home for holidays, etc. while I try and work out what to do next...

Can you please help us? He is a beautiful, affectionate, trained little boy who would make a wonderful addition to any family...

[EstelleB]

Before you give him up is it worth getting allergy tested? Could it just be a coincidence that this has happened now? It could also be that your allergy will calm down as they sometimes can.

If you do have to give him up, I'm sure that the lovely people on here will be able to help x

[rosie4]

HI, thank you for your reply. I am pretty certain it's an allergy to him as when I am away from our home for a while, e.g. coffee at a friend's house in the morning, it stops. However, I am going to get a proper test while he is out of the house, and also see if with him not here it clears up or not... x

[Niandsa]

How awful for you..... It's definitely worth getting a an allergy test before you make a final decision.

I can think of a couple of options for rehoming. Firstly, would the breeder take him back to rehome for you? A lot of breeders prefer you to do this rather than try and rehome yourself.

Secondly, contact the Labradoodle Trust (their details are on their website). They home check potential new owners and usually seem to have a waiting list of people looking to rehome a dood.

It will depend of whether you need to recoup some of the costs you have spent when you originally purchased him.

Good luck...I hope you manage to sort it out soon x

[rubybenronan1]

HI,
Sorry to hear you may have to rehome your boy................but really would get test done first.

Ok, it comes back positive, have you contacted the breeder? my breeder gave me a contract, in it, it stated if we needed to rehome her for whatever reason to contact her first, as she has a lot of enquiries for older dogs. I would have thought any breeder worth thier salt would advise/help.

Take care
clairexx

[Samdunn]

Hi
Would be a terrible shame to have to rehome Boris. Some allergies can be got over by desensitising etc, I'd defo first get proper testing and maybe a treatment plan to tackle ways to overcome it first?.

[rosie4]

Hi,

thank you all; I have booked a test today for next week. The breeder is not interested so that just goes to show what rotten judgement I had, then. She said ' we don't have the room for another dog' and virtually slammed the phone down. I am pretty shocked - I was hoping maybe she would even have him for a short while until I can get results back and research managing allergies. I went to see a dermatologist today who is pretty certain it is allergy related but has arranged a proper test through my GP. I feel utterly miserable about our baby boy:-((

[rebeccag]

Hi there
I'm so sorry to hear about your situation. It's a terrible shame that the breeder has been so negative towards you. I had a similar situation with a stray cat that decided to move in and I too was allergic, but after taking anti-histamines and building up my tolerance we now live in harmony with him and our 18month old labradoodle, Noodle.
If this still doesn't work, I would love to look after him for you, and for him to be a little brother to my boy, Noodle. My friend had to rehome her dalmation/collie cross and was absolutely heartbroken, but after finding a family home for him, she now occasionally has the dog to stay for holidays and meets up for walks along the beach.
Good luck with your appointment.
Becci x

[Jacquelinew]

Hi Rosie

I am new to this forum, and just tried to send you an email, but not sure if it went through or not!
My husband and I are very interested in meeting Boris and we could provide a lovely home for him.
Please let me know if you receive the email!

Thanks

Jacqueline. Xx

[MrsAdmin]

I am sorry to see you are having a reaction to your lovely Doodle boy. Do try to get desensified to him if possible as you will always regret having to re-home him.

With regard to the two offers, and maybe more by pm, you have received. It's great people want to help and can offer a home BUT do check everyone out carefully first. This is a public open forum and sadly not everyone is who they make themselves out to be.

There are quite a few people on here who are experienced home checkers with the Labradoodle Trust and many other rescues who are more than happy to help I'm sure. Just ask away.

[rosie4]

Hello all,

Thank you all for your kind offers of re-homing, advice and support. Boris is on his way to his new home thanks to Yvette at DoodleAid. This has not been without very careful consideration, and we are confident that he is off to a very happy life with his new brother and sister.... )

[slim]

Would be very intersted in giving your lovely boy a loving home just what we are looking for

[Ianto!]

Hi Slim,

As you probably will have realised by now, Boris was safely re-homed by DoodleAid.

*This is a standard reply to all people who post wishing to re-home a dog for whatever reason. Over time we have discovered that this topic can become quite emotive and the aim of this standard response is to allow forum members to give support to you without repeating the same advice many times over until it feels like you are being shouted at!

As it is a standard reply, many apologies if it covers anything in your original post. It is not meant to sound patronising but is aimed at giving you all the options for re-homing that you may or may not have thought about previously in a supportive and non-judgemental way.

Have you contacted your breeder? Any good breeder would prefer you to contact them about re-homing one of their dogs. It is often a re-homing route missed by people looking to find a new home for their dog.

Have you considered approaching a dog rescue? They work in a variety of ways – some place dogs in foster homes, some try and re-home directly from you and some will put the dog into kennels. There are a couple of doodle specific rescues, if you ask your at your vet’s they may also have details of local rescues. Finally there are the national rescue charities such as Dogs Trust. If this is the route that you choose, please ask on the forum and members will let you know of rescue charities that may be able to help.
We fully understand that this route is not for everyone – many re-homers want to manage the process themselves so that they are certain that their dog goes to a home that they are happy with. There are some pitfalls that you are probably aware of but here is a list of things to consider if you want to manage the process yourself:

Is your dog neutered? Unscrupulous people trawl dog forums looking for unwanted dogs that they could use for breeding in a puppy farm. If your dog is not already neutered, please consider arranging this prior to advertising him / her. If you are not willing to neuter your dog, PLEASE do not advertise the fact in any advert that you place – it is likely to attract interest from someone that you would not want to hand your dog over to.

Are you going to home check? There are several people on this forum who are experienced home checkers or who have information about home-checking. If you want to manage the process yourself but would like help with home-checking – please ask and someone will post or PM you offering help and support. We would certainly advise home-checking to ensure you are happy with the environment that your dog is going into before handing him / her over.

Social Media and internet dangers. We are sure that as an adult you are well aware of the dangers of social media and the internet – people are not always who they say they are. Unpleasant characters looking for dogs to use as bait in dog fighting circles often look for “free to good home” dogs for this very purpose – it doesn’t bear thinking about. Experience has shown us that a dog offered for re-homing often brings responses from new members – often their first post on the forum. This inevitably leads to questions over why they have not posted before which can sound unnecessarily harsh and unwelcoming. That is not the intention but we are a forum of doodle lovers who want the best for any dog that is about to be re-homed. This is why we recommend home-checking so strongly.

First time posters looking for a rescued dog. We are aware that many people read the forum without posting, often for some time while deciding if a doodle is for them. However, first time posters who are enquiring about re-homing a dog are often treated with a bit of suspicion for the reasons above. If you are looking to re-home a doodle, please introduce yourself on the forum so that we can try and eliminate some of the suspicion. Even better, come along to a meet near you and meet other doodle owners – you will have a chance to see doodles in action and also start to get to know other members of the forum. If there is not a walk near you on the forum, many of us are also members of facebook groups and know of other walks that are going on that do not appear on our forum. The important thing is that you become known in our community as a person and not simply as a user-name.

All potential re-homers. As you can see from everything above, our recommendation is that you are home-checked prior to taking on a dog who is looking for a forever home. If you have other animals, it is important to see how they get on before any decision is made. This is all done in the dog’s best interest – we would all hate to see a dog who has been re-homed once have to repeat the process because things didn’t work out.

I hope that this has all been useful.

Good luck.

Anne & Ianto x