A dog was left by his family at the shelter they adopted him from, along with his bed and all of his toys.
Confused and alone, the six-year-old Lab mix couldn’t comprehend why his family were bringing him back to the shelter which they had adopted him from just three years earlier.
Wall-E was first adopted from Maricopa County Animal Care and Control (MCACC) in 2015 when he was just three, and had been living with his new family ever since.
As reported by The Dodo, the Lab mix found himself and his belongings being taken back to the Arizona shelter in September this year.
His toys and bed were packed into two plastic bin bags as his owner reportedly cried as he said goodbye to the dog.
The family could no longer look after Wall-E in the way that he deserved, so they made the decision not to keep him. Unfortunately, this meant the Lab was back to square one.
In a post to MCACC’s Facebook page, the shelter posted a picture of Wall-E along with an explanation about how he came to be there.
They wrote:
This guy deserves a forever family who won’t give up on him. Please don’t bash his previous owners though. We don’t know the whole story.
What we do know is the owner was heartbroken and crying. It was hard to finally help them leave. The staff was crying with the owners. We don’t believe this decision was taken lightly.
Jordan Bader, who runs the Facebook page for the adoptable dogs of MCACC, told The Dodo:
He was surrendered by his family because they did not have enough time for him. He was very scared. In his kennel, he would bark and bark.
Despite his family packing all of his toys and bed, Wall-E was not able to have these with him in his kennel and he quickly became withdrawn.
Because of this, potential adopters would pass up on the opportunity of adopting him as they couldn’t see past his defensive nature.
Jordan explained:
Because of his kennel presence and evaluations he was passed up by many people. [But] with volunteers he was very sweet and playful and loved doing zoomies.
This went on for two months, with people passing Wall-E by and him becoming more and more withdrawn. But then, everything changed when Jordan had an idea.
He decided to tell the Lab’s story on Facebook for the world to see, explaining how he came to be there and the circumstances surrounding his current position.
Luckily, it worked; the post received much more attention than expected and Wall-E has since been adopted and found his forever home.
Bader explained:
We knew this picture would be heartbreaking and would get a lot of attention, but we had no idea it would blow up like it did. We had so many people interested in him
A woman called Lynn Lee saw the post and immediately made her way to the shelter to meet Wall-E. She took her own dog with her and they became fast friends.
So much so that only the day after the Lab’s story was shared online, he was adopted and on his way to his new home with Lynn.
I’m not crying, you are.
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A Broadcast Journalism Masters graduate who went on to achieve an NCTJ level 3 Diploma in Journalism, Lucy has done stints at ITV, BBC Inside Out and Key 103. While working as a journalist for UNILAD, Lucy has reported on breaking news stories while also writing features about mental health, cervical screening awareness, and Little Mix (who she is unapologetically obsessed with).