Linda's Page

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Why I chose to foster

There are two reasons I chose to foster. The first one being, "I love these little ones with a passion!" I must since my family has 14! It wasn’t until my son Kevin was introduced to them in fifth grade that I really knew anything about them. His teacher brought a pair of them into the school that year for kids to watch, learn, and take care of. She assigned a new student to care for them each week. I have loved animals all my life and had rabbits or hamsters as my pets as a child. When Kevin came home one day and said he wanted a chinchilla as a pet, I at first was a little skeptical. To be quite frank, I was afraid of them. I had always thought them to be a vicious animal, waiting to have the chance to bite the person that pets them. My opinion changed soon after, once getting to know more about them through that school year. I ended up finding them to be quite cute and sweet, which was the opposite of what I had believed for many years. Needless to say, I did in fact end up getting Kevin one as a pet, but not until after doing much research about them. The first chin we got we ended up naming Bug. I know it sounds like a strange name, but we all thought she was "cute as a bug". We were all so taken by her, that within the next four months, we ended up buying two more. Sassy, and then a few weeks later we got Rocky. Rocky turned out to be a chin that loved to be held and cuddled, which is actually pretty rare with chins. Rocky became the apple of my eye.

About three years later, I saw another adorable baby chinchilla at a pet store. I immediately fell in love with him and decided he had to come home with me. I hoped that he and Rocky would get along, and be cage mates. They did, which is not always the case with chins, as they usually prefer to pick their own companion. Rocky and Rowdy became best buddies right from the start. During that year as Rowdy grew, Rocky began having problems with his teeth. He had to have his teeth trimmed the year prior to getting Rowdy, so it didn't seem to be a big deal. Unfortunately, it did end up being a very big deal for Rocky. A year and a half later, in April of 2004, my family lost Rocky due to complications with his teeth. When he died, my whole world seemed to fall apart. My most loving chin was no longer there for me to love and cuddle with. Rowdy too seemed to be at a loss as well without his buddy to snuggle with.

Shortly after Rocky’s death, I was on the internet looking for items to spoil my chins with and came across adopting chinchillas during my search. I had thought about getting Rowdy a new cage mate, but knew I could never find one to replace Rocky, not to mention I never even knew there was a demand for chinchillas to be adopted. I discovered Second Chance Chins and found they were located here in Michigan. I kept being drawn back to this site over and over again for days. My husband, Dan said: "why don’t you put in an application to adopt one?". He knew how much I missed Rocky and thought that maybe this would help me get over his loss. After giving it much thought, I did finally fill out an adoption form for a chinchilla named Sweetie. I figured I didn’t have much to lose in doing so. Rocky must have been watching over me, because on May 14, 2004, I got the news that I was selected to be Sweetie’s new mom! That date happened to be my birthday and what a present it was! I was so excited by the news that I almost started crying. From that moment on, I had decided never to purchase a chinchilla from a pet store, but to adopt a chin that needed a good home instead.

Now we come to my second reason. Through eleven other adoptions, Mya and Jim have become like family to me. I wanted to help Mya continue with the rescue. She was getting so many chins in that it started getting a little crowded in her home and she had to put some on a waiting list until she had available space. Since I do not work outside the home, and she occasionally got chins that needed extra attention, I figured I could make a difference in two ways. One way would be free up a spot in her home so others could be taken in and second, I could help a chin that needed a little extra TLC since I had the time. Fostering chins that needed a little more attention is right up my alley. I love them and what better way to spend some of my time than spoiling them and getting them to become more social until they could find their new home! Mya does such a wonderful job finding these little ones just the right home, and I wanted her to be able to continue in doing so. They really need her to be there for them when they need her most.

Those are the reasons I decided to adopt and foster chins. Let me tell you, they are worth adopting, but they're not the right pet for everyone. I wouldn’t be surprised, if sometime in the future we end up adopting more, since my entire family loves them so much.

Linda's "Crew"

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