HELP US SAVE ANIMALS — BUY A ROMANTIC STORY — JUST $2 !

by Katerina Lorenzatos Makris ~

Our top mission here at Rescue Diva is to help animals in need, and to support the people who rescue them. So it is with great pleasure that we’re offering matching funds challenges to FOUR animal rescue groups!

Right now your donations to these great groups are DOUBLED. 

Every bit you can give always counts, but now it counts TWICE!

Read about these excellent groups below, and select your favorite for a donation. Or better yet… give to all four of them.

All four groups are enormously effective and deserving.

No better time than now to show how much we appreciate the difficult work for the animals done by the volunteers who run these groups, and to help them with our spare bucks so that they can accomplish even more!

ELISAVET’S STRAYS in northern Greece:

After working long hours at her day job, Elisavet Pessexidou uses every possible moment, as well as money from her own pocket, to rescue, foster, and re-home every needy animal she can.

This valiant lone rescuer does not have volunteers or staff to help her, because the part of northern Greece where she lives does not typically offer a lot of public or private support for animals’ needs.

Elisavet is well-respected in Greece’s animal rescue community. Her steady dedication has won the admiration and devotion of many supporters, including Rescue Diva.

Because she does not shy away from the most acute and horrific cases of ill and injured animals, her debt to the local veterinarian is hefty. He is kind and understanding and continues to help while Elisavet tries to raise the funds to pay him, but he deserves compensation for his own hard work for the animals.

Nina is one of Elisavet’s many success stories. Only six months old, this stray suffered tremendous pain from a badly broken leg. Elisavet got her off the streets into safety, then arranged for the vet to perform a very complicated surgery, costing 600 euros, to repair the break. With help from Greek Animal Rescue (GAR), sweet Nina is now recovering in a foster home and soon will be available for adoption.

During a recent phone conversation Elisavet and I discussed the heavy emotional toll that saving animals can take on rescuers. Although we witness gruesome suffering, there’s only so much that any of us can do to relieve it. All the while, we know there’s more coming tomorrow and the days after that, until some day when people become less irresponsible and cruel.

“On the other hand,” said Elisavet, “it gives me such great joy when I can help even one animal, that it’s all worthwhile.”

Let’s help Elisavet pay the vet, and give her both the moral support and the financial assistance she needs to keep on helping animals.

BROWSE OUR BOOKSTORE FOR ROMANTIC TALES… ALL ABOUT ANIMAL RESCUE!

CANINE ADOPTION AND RESCUE LEAGUE (C.A.R.L.) in southern California:

In August I fell in love with a picture of a dog. Not unusual for a dog addict like me. But this one I couldn’t get out of my head. Chip was 12 years old and a complete wreck physically, with anemia and horrific skin infection. On the emotional front, too, he suffered from fear and confusion.

Speaking of emotions, I was something a wreck myself, having recently lost several loved ones, including my beloved high school English teacher, Mrs. Christine Eastus.

The veterinarians, staff, and volunteers at the Ventura County Animal Services shelter in Camarillo, California were giving Chip much-needed care, and he was rapidly improving, but still, a public shelter is no substitute for a home, especially when a dog is older. To wrench my heart even worse, he looked like my boy Agapi, RIP, who we lost two years ago.

For various reasons I could not foster or adopt Chip myself. All I could do was beg some private rescue groups to accept him into their programs, while I pledged that RescueDiva.com would cover all his expenses for boarding, veterinary care, and come what may. Helping him survive and thrive would be a way of nurturing myself while mourning departed loved ones.

Sharon Clark, executive director of Canine Adoption and Rescue League (C.A.R.L.) replied right away. Next she contacted the Camarillo shelter to request a rescue hold on Chip. In a few days he was in C.A.R.L.’s private shelter, where Sharon and her fantastic crew continued the excellent job that the public shelter had started. They kept working to resolve Chip’s health issues and to restore his confidence.

Soon I received a video of Chip playing ball with a volunteer, then another of him being cuddled. They sent regular updates and photos.

At one point a C.A.R.L. volunteer noticed symptoms that might have indicated bloat, a gastrointestinal problem that can rapidly kill dogs, so they rushed Chip to the vet. Thank goodness it was a false alarm, but I was highly impressed that Chip was getting such close and caring attention from his care givers at C.A.R.L.

Every step of the way, all the folks at C.A.R.L. were responsive and caring toward me, too.

As the icing on the rescue cake, after only a few weeks, Chip was adopted by wonderful Tracy, who adores him.

For all those reasons and more, I am a big C.A.R.L. fan. 

Chip is only one of the thousands of success stories brought about by C.A.R.L.’s work since the group’s founding in 1996. 

Recently there was another dog, Homer, whose photo on the C.A.R.L. website captivated me too. Sharon granted permission for us to use him as the cover model for my Rescue Diva fiction short story “Love School,” and in gratitude for that adorable pic, we donated $300 as Homer’s modeling fee.

So when Homer found his forever home, his family adopted a professional model as well as a fabulous dog.  😊

All profits from “Love School” go to… of course… C.A.R.L.!

Now it’s our great pleasure here at Rescue Diva to offer an additional donation to C.A.R.L.—a $1,000 matching funds challenge.

RescueDiva.com’s donations to C.A.R.L. of Chip’s $440 in boarding and vet expenses as well as the $1,000 in matching funds are dedicated in memory of Mrs. Christine Eastus.

PLEASE SHARE OUR BOOKSTORE — HELP US SELL MORE to DONATE MORE! 🙂

RUTHLESS KINDNESS in northern California:

While working at a municipal animal shelter, veterinarians Dr. Sarah Reidenbach and Dr. Kate Kuzminski saw a lot of abuse cases. They found that “while we could help that animal in that moment, we really wanted to see what we could do to get ahead of that.”

“There were some unmet needs in the community that we felt we absolutely had to get out and address,” they explained. “We’re really interested in that link between suffering of animals and the suffering of people. Every animal should have access to veterinary care regardless of their family’s economic status or their location… We felt compelled to fill gaps in services which cause unnecessary trauma.”

That’s why they founded Ruthless Kindness (RK).

On their website the vets further define their mission:

Medical treatment for individual animals, while extremely necessary, is not enough. Suffering animals are linked to suffering people. Forgotten animals are linked to forgotten people. At-risk animals are connected to at-risk people. Animals and people heal one another. The research shows that we can use the human animal bond to more effectively prevent suffering and heal trauma for both people and animals.

To get in front of the problems that caused the abuse and neglect that we saw in our veterinary clinics, we needed to get to the root causes of violence, abandonment, and neglect. Using empathy as a long-term antidote to abuse is key to our process.

As veterinarians, we approach unnecessary suffering as we would a medical ailment – seeking specific science-backed prevention, immediate treatment, and long-term solutions.

Ruthless Kindness’s services include the following, among others, as described on their website:

. Free mobile veterinary care and vaccines for the pets of victims of domestic violence and other at-risk community members in crisis. 18-48% of victims will delay or not leave a dangerous environment if they can’t bring their pet with them. Our services remove an obstacle for victims, children, and pets escaping harm. Up-to-date vaccines are required for pets of victims to enter pet-friendly safe houses, domestic violence shelters, apartments, and pet boarding facilities.

. Free on-site veterinary clinics for vulnerable community members who are unable to access veterinary care through regular veterinary hospitals. We have provided veterinary clinics at several homeless and domestic violence shelters. 

. Creation and distribution of virtual resources for reducing physical, sexual and emotional harm to people and animals in the home..

. Free veterinary tele-support to at-risk individuals, families, and shelters to prevent toxic stress and abandonment.

On Facebook recently Ruthless Kindness posted a video of driving to their next destination, with the following text…

With your help, we are headed to helping more people and animals in crisis. We are headed to more low-cost mobile appointments with victims of domestic violence who are in urgent need of support for their pets so that they can access safety… About 50% of victims won’t leave violence if doing so means leaving their animals behind…  We are headed toward more free clinics for people who cannot access veterinary care for their animals. We are headed for innovative programs that decrease trauma for the most vulnerable people and animals.

As a victim of domestic violence myself, I am deeply grateful for all that Ruthless Kindness does for other survivors, and am greatly pleased that my website RescueDiva.com can offer $1,000 in a matching funds gift to dynamic duo Dr. Reidenbach, Dr. Kuzminski and their team.

Rescue Diva relies on sales of our fiction to create real-life happy endings like those of Claire, Tika, and Dolly. Enjoy a fun read while you replenish our rescue fund!

KEFALONIA ANIMAL TRUST (KATs) on the Greek island of Kefalonia:

For 16+ years I’ve been a fan and supporter of hardworking and highly effective group KATs.

In 2013 Rescue Diva donated to KATs the use of a cottage on our property in Kefalonia, where the group’s volunteers run a charity resale shop that helps pay for hundreds of spay/neuter procedures.

Thanks to the cleverness and hard work of KATs volunteers, in 2021 the shop earned nearly 22,000 euros ($23,200), helping KATs spay/neuter 1,030 cats and dogs, at a total cost of over 70,000 euros.

That’s the main goal of KATs—to fundraise and make arrangements for the spay/neuter of as many companion animals as possible on the Greek island of Kefalonia.

Spay/neuter is key to reducing animal suffering around the world, as explained by veterinarian Dr. Joseph Hanekom, who volunteered to perform many of these important operations for KATs. It not only limits the population of unwanted puppies and kittens; it also makes the lives of both owned and stray animals safer and healthier.

“For the females, it takes such an effort to pump out kittens every year, and you can see it,” said Dr. Hanekom. “They really lose condition. They lose weight…and they really struggle with that. Male cats… don’t really live very long because they’re fighting the whole time and kind of marking their territory, and fighting brings diseases of all sorts. So the individual animals will definitely benefit.”

KATs’ founders Pat Dolman and her husband Dave, alongside Pat’s sister Julia Preston and her husband Keith were enormously helpful to me every time I asked for assistance with animals I was rescuing, fostering, and re-homing.

Now that Pat and Dave have passed away, the flame they lit for animal welfare on the island continues to brightly burn with the work carried on by many devoted KATs volunteers.

This was the KATs news as of July 2021, from the group’s president Catherine Candy and treasurer Janet Jones:

We’ve had a very busy six months. It’s time for an update.

We have neutered:

. 31 female dogs

. 27 male dogs

. 270 female cats

. 94 male cats

A total of 422 dogs and cats!!

We have also paid for nine emergency operations.

The cost so far is €27,895 [almost $30,000].

These figures do not include the two big TNR [trap, neuter, release] programmes we assisted with in Lixouri [a large town on the island].

The dog TNR in March was totally funded by the Lixouri municipality [but organized and run by KATs.]

. 43 female dogs and nine male dogs were neutered.

In May, a cat TNR programme was held. We donated the cost of the drugs and ancillaries for the cats; 56 female cats and 43 male cats were neutered. Plus a dog!!

Giving us a grand total of 575 cats and dogs who will lead much healthier lives!!

Massive thanks to all our supporters who, without your generous and continual donations, we wouldn’t be able to carry on with the work we do!

A big shout-out to all our dedicated volunteers and voluntary vets too.

Speaking of shout-outs, here’s one from Rescue Diva, in the form of a 2,500 euro (about $2,600) matching funds challenge for KATs.

Anything you can do to help KATs meet and exceed that matching funds target will be put to excellent use. Between our gift and donations gathered from others, KATs will have the total of 5,000 euros (about $5,200) they need to spay/neuter 70 kitties!

Please donate to KATs via PayPal to kefalonia.animal.trust@gmail.com, and mark it RescueDiva.com Challenge.

MANY THANKS for any amount you are able to give to these four highly deserving organizations. Rescue Diva is ready and waiting to DOUBLE IT! 🙂

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Rescue Diva helps needy animals and their rescuers around the world, such as:

~ Diva assists Kefalonia Animal Trust (KATs) in Greece to provide free spay/neuter for hundreds of animals per year, which is one of the best ways to prevent the abandonment and misery of puppies like Noah and Kyla.

~ Diva donates to Center for Animal Protection and Education (CAPE), Praying for Paws, Southern California Siamese Rescue, Aniplant (Cuba) and many other groups.

~ Diva does in-the-trenches rescues of angels like Robin, Chance, and Tiger, with help from San Diego Animal Support Foundation; of Marisol and Lisa, with help from Last Chance at Life; of Mandi (Diamandi), with help from Graeske Hunde, and of Roki, with help from Stichting AAI.

About the author:

Katerina Lorenzatos Makris is a career journalist, author, and editor. Her fiction includes 17 novels for Simon and Schuster, E.P. Dutton, Avon, and other major publishers (under the name Kathryn Makris), as well as a teleplay for CBS-TV, and a short story for The Bark magazine.

Katerina has written hundreds of articles for regional wire services and for outlets such as National Geographic Traveler, The San Francisco Chronicle, Travelers’ Tales, NBC’s Petside.com, and Animal Issues Reporter.

Together with coauthor Shelley Frost, Katerina wrote a step-by-step guide for hands-on, in-the-trenches dog rescue, Your Adopted Dog: Everything You Need to Know About Rescuing and Caring for a Best Friend in Need (The Lyons Press), coming soon in digital format!