My husband and I are childless (by choice) and retired. When our own dogs passed, we decided to foster so we could indulge both our loves–Dogs and Travel. It proved a perfect fit! As we gained experience, we took on ‘problem’ dogs–with behavioural or medical issues. We prefer these as they stay longer, teach us more, and seeing them flourish in a new home is incredibly rewarding.
Coco was our 15th of 21 fosters (sofar). Adopted as a pup from SAFE Karratha, she was returned 8 months later because she was ‘guarding’ their young daughter, to the point of biting family/friends. When we picked her up she was so shut down we had to tip her out of the flying crate she arrived in. We dove in with a specialist vet, prescribed meds and a behaviouralist, and 10 weeks of hard work later Coco had progressed from a bitey, reactive dog, to one who could safely interact with new people. We would have gladly continued fostering her, but felt it was a good point to hand her over to a ‘foster to adopt’ fosterer. The couple that took Coco continued her rehab for another 2 months before ultimately adopting her.