Looking away is easy. Hoping things will get better is comforting but hope alone leaves us without a path to act. Real transformation begins when we acknowledge how fragile life is, how quickly it can be destroyed, and how challenging it is to restore.
At Home for Life®, we have witnessed that transformation firsthand in animals like Una. His story shows how compassion and creativity can turn cruelty into renewal.
Una was born a street dog. At just six months old, he was shot in the face in his home country. The gunshot, meant to kill, instead left him with a shattered muzzle, unable to breathe or eat properly. Without urgent help, he faced infection and a slow, painful death.
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Before being shot in the face, Una most resembled a lab. With dark humor, we note that people pay thousands of dollars for a pet with the bulldog-like face Una now has, but he paid a far greater price. |
| In his home country, veterinarians tried to repair his wound with a plastic implant salvaged from a German military hospital. By the time he came to Home for Life® , the implant had failed, and surrounding tissue had become infected. | 
from his collapsed muzzle. |
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His sinuses inflamed, and his upper muzzle unsalvageable. Surgery removed much of his muzzle as well as the implant, which had caved in. Una lost many teeth, one nostril, and sight in one eye. He could only eat soft foods and needed help cleaning his face. |
Many animals arrive at Home for Life® with permanent disabilities from abuse or accidents. But injuries to the face carry a particular cruelty. The face is the center of expression, connection and identity- for both animals and people. To destroy it is an attempt to erase the very essence of being born with trust and innocence. Una is one of three dogs at our sanctuary who endured such a deliberate assault.
Yet Una’s gentle spirit never wavered. He taught us how to move forward. With hands- on care and ingenuity, we shifted from identifying him as a victim to helping him author a new future. Today he thrives alongside other dogs who have also endured trauma, forming a community bound not by what they have lost, but by the companionship they share.
Una’s story proves that compassion and creativity break the cycle of cruelty and indifference to restore a shattered life. Each act of care sets in motion a future that would never otherwise exist. We have seen dogs and cats, once so frightened that they flinch from a touch, learn to trust again; and animals once disfigured by violence discover a new life filled with peace and joy.
Awareness is the first step. As painful as it is to know Una’s past, more stirring yet is knowing that he was not destroyed by cruelty. His life is evidence that brokenness can give rise to wholeness.
At Home for Life,® we see our sanctuary as a mosaic, where shattered lives are repaired and joined into a greater whole—a healing and joyful community.
Home for Life ® is proud to be an internationally recognized care- for- life sanctuary. In 2019, USA TODAY named us one of the 10 Most Amazing Sanctuaries in the Country. Unlike most shellers and rescue which strive to find homes for every animal, our mission is to provide a true home for those who cannot be placed- dogs and cats with special needs or lifelong care requirements.
We call this vision The Third Door®- an alternative to an undeserved death. For animals who cannot be adopted, we offer a permanent home where their lives are cherished, and their futures are secure. The dream of a home should belong to every dog and cat. At Home for Life®, we make that dream a reality.
Fundamental to changing the world for animals is changing their story. For our cats and dogs, their stories up until the time they have needed us have been marked by loss, often neglect, commonly indifference and misunderstanding and even violence.
So, the most essential part of our mission is to make sure our animals’ stories don’t continue or end the way they began. Rewriting their broken stories is paradigm-shifting because, by the time our cats and dogs have reached us, they have fallen off the grid of the animal welfare matrix and failed its measures of success. Home for Life® defines success in a new way for these forsaken animals and imagines a new story for them.
This fall, our campaign, Sponsor Happiness, with a $50,000 match is underway with a chance to be part of the reimagined story for animals like Una, who had nowhere else to turn when they came to us.
Our sanctuary is where compassion creates beauty from despair. As a supporter of our dogs and cats at Home for Life®, YOU are an integral part of repairing and rewriting their broken stories to design a new idea of success for animal welfare, for the animals that need compassion and understanding the most.
With gratitude,
Lisa
PS be sure to check out the update on the progress of our new building, which will complete the sanctuary prototype, and provide expanded services to animals and the people who love them!
