E-mails flooded my inbox. The S.O.S. spread in the rescue world. “Cruelty investigation. Sweet, emaciated dog needs your help, Sharon.” I clicked on the picture and gawked at a walking skeleton with protruding hip bones, longer than normal ears, and brown, soulful eyes. “Those owners oughta be shot,” was basically the consensus. Putting my heart ahead of my brain, the “Beagle Lady” of Furry Friends Network sprang into action.

The following day, I stood in line at the York SPCA, waiting to fill out the necessary paperwork for Tasha’s release. I learned Tasha was a 3 year old beagle weighing less than 11 pounds. Her owners had refused any veterinary treatment her entire life. Patrons glared at me while my bag of bones stood quietly leashed. It suddenly dawned on me that they thought I did this to her. I wanted to explain, “No, I am rescuing her!”

Driving home, I convinced myself Tasha’s care would simply involve feeding her. It was concluded her owners starved her. I’ll just offer her food and she’ll gobble it down. She’ll fatten up in no time.

Owning three beagles myself, I consider myself familiar with the breed. Beagles are generally food hounds. They inhale every meal like it is their last. Nothing could be further from the truth with Tasha.

Tasha would not eat. She simply had no interest in food. Cocooned in a pet bed, she barely lifted her head the first few days. She refused everything from hamburger and rice to prescription canned canine cuisine. Perhaps she had a bad tooth, as her pungent breath and brown teeth could indicate. Maybe she had trouble swallowing? Something was very wrong.

And so began the emotional roller coaster of frequent visits to the vet, searching for an answer why she rejected food. She acted afraid to eat, hesitating, backing away, and withdrawing from edibles. Why wasn’t her instinct to survive kicking in? She had to be hungry. Why did she never gain weight as a puppy, as her owners reported? A gamut of medicines lined the top of my microwave, everything from appetite stimulants to Prozac. Panels of extensive and costly blood work were performed, even checking pancreatic enzyme function, each time with the hope of an explanation for her atypical conduct.

Tasha was a prisoner in her own skin. She was a bundle of nerves. Dropping a teaspoon spooked her for hours. She was depressed and lacked confidence. She had no spirit, no will to live. Was her gaunt and sorrowful expression saying, let me die? The times she nibbled a few bites, her posture was cringed and cowering, tail glued between her legs. She retreated from foods any dog would have devoured.  Anything meaty repulsed her. Imagine a dog with an aversion to steak. Unheard of.

Have you tried liverwurst? How about cottage cheese? Will she eat scrambled egg?  I purchased every brand of dog food on grocery store shelves. I discovered ground bison in the butcher’s case. I didn’t care if I had to resort to filet mignon on a silver platter, as long as she ate it. “Just eat,” I coaxed her, hoping she’d copy my beagles. My kitchen resembled a food test lab by most evenings. Eight little pudding sized dishes cluttered my counter tops as I prepared several new dishes each night, only to have Tasha refuse them. There were times I stood outside and cried.

Days turned into weeks. Weeks evolved into months. My volunteer duties as a foster became a full time job. Tasha’s care consumed me. When we weren’t running to the vet, I scoured the internet researching anorexia in dogs. To make matters worse, her eating habits were bizarre and inconsistent. If I was lucky enough to get a certain food in her one night, she turned her nose as though it were poison the next. There was no rhyme or reason to her eating habits.

One night I accidentally dropped a piece of cereal on the floor. Tasha ingested it like a real dog!  So I spent hours hand feeding her Cheerios, one by one, or tossing them and making a game of “Go Find.” Anything to get some calories in her. Trouble was it did not agree with her digestive system. Piles of diarrhea dotted my yard like cow paddies.

Frazzled and clueless, we enlisted the help of a pet communicator. Her take on Tasha was that she was emotionally beaten down and felt worthless. She had never known love. Tasha’s owners were horribly cruel to her. They hosed her down in her kennel and screamed “filthy scumbag.” She bred two litters of puppies, only taxing her frail body more. “Someone has really done a number on her, Sharon. There’s a fun little dog in there somewhere. But it’s going to take a long time to bring it out. Right now she wants to waste away so she doesn’t have to go back there.”

Armed with that information, I became more determined to fight for Tasha. She had given up on herself. I was her only hope. But there were times I was hanging on to a thread dealing with Tasha’s mental and physical issues. Nurturing Tasha back to health became a frustrating obsession.

A dedicated veterinarian at Good Hope became Tasha’s advocate. Dr. Nina Mantione took a special interest in getting to the bottom of Tasha’s medical needs, giving timely appointments  and contacting specialists. Together we brainstormed. But each time we thought we stumbled upon a new treatment, it was unsuccessful. An anti-nausea injection proved useless, pro-biotics did nothing to help Tasha’s rumbling intestinal tract, and chronic diarrhea plagued the poor thing.

Dr. Mantione contacted a vet at University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. Eureka! We had a breakthrough! A similar case involved a six month old beagle who could not gain weight. Tasha was ultimately diagnosed with SIBO, an insidious disease where her small intestine produces an overgrowth of bacteria. Further blood work revealed low B 12 levels in Tasha.

Tasha now receives bi-weekly injections of Vitamin B 12, which I learned to administer intra-muscular. She eats prescription food especially designed for intestinal problems. The thirteen medicines that were once arranged on my microwave have dwindled to two. Tasha is now ten pounds heavier, doubling her weight. People admire her filled out body and comment, “Is that Tasha? She doesn’t look like the same dog.”

That’s not to say the journey was over. It took eight months for Tasha’s tail to be erect on our beagle walks. She did not bark for almost a year. Her fur felt grungy for months because of the lack of nutrients. She has a skittish and introverted personality. Her mental anguish with food has lessened.

Twenty-two months later, Tasha was still my foster dog. A few good Samaritans inquired about her on our website. But after hearing her story, they asked, “How could you give her up? She belongs with you.”

When we’d leave to attend an adoptahon, my husband Ray instructed Tasha to “be bad”, hoping to deter any potential applicants. I suppose I knew down deep, after all we’d endured, that Tasha was here to stay. She became an official member of our family on September 11, 2011.

“Say good night, Daddy,” I said to Tasha last night as we went upstairs and she ascended the doggy steps to our king bed. She snuggled against me as I lay wondering if she remembers her former life.

Tasha is home.