*WARNING* GRAPHIC* MEET OUR WARRIOR, ADIRA
June 22, 2022 | 1:35pm*WARNING* GRAPHIC, MEET OUR WARRIOR, ADIRA
Scroll down, warning - **graphic content** If you do not wish to view her story but want to donate to her care, click here to bypass graphic content: DONATE NOWThe Rescue: On June 10th, we rescued this wounded angel. Her wounds horrified us. Sources tell us she's only ever known the name "bitch." She was covered in fleas, flies, and was so dirty. She’d been living a nightmarish existence that we can’t even begin to imagine. It was paramount to us that she be given a proper name, so we named this warrior girl Adira, which means "strong and powerful”.
Beginning Care: We rushed her to our clinic immediately and sedated her right away so we could begin cleaning and assessing. It appears it was an abscess from a large wound. We’re still at a loss for words to describe just how awful it was. Dr Schulz cut away as much dead muscle and tissue as she could; it is very deep - 3 layers of muscle, all the way to her ribs and dangerously close her spine. She was in critical condition for the next few days but she had a fighting chance!! And Stray Rescue of St. Louis will always take that chance, no matter how bleak the odds may seem.Critical Condition: To help comfort her as she stayed her first night with us, we gave her a rainbow unicorn to snuggle with and posted this message that night: "Ok miracle girl with the most beautiful eyes…you can do this. You survived this long somehow, now we need you to fight. Please, please make it through this. Our beautiful and strong warrior, Adira. She has broken our hearts." It was a sleepless night for all of us.
Good Morning: The first night is always the scariest, and we hoped Adira would continue to fight through the night in her battle to attain the life she deserves. The next day we were beyond relieved to see she not only made it through the night but was surprisingly bright eyed! She ate a little breakfast, too. We are so impressed, so grateful, and in absolute tearful awe of our incredible, world-class medical team:
Out and about: Only a few days later, we were elated to show everyone just WHO wanted to go for a walk! Adira feels the positive energy and prayers she's received from all around the world! That day she was eating well and getting tons of rest. She is a walking miracle. Adira isn’t out of the woods yet, she has a long way to go and a lot of things could still go wrong, but we can't help but feel hopeful.
June 20th Update: That brings us to today. We'll continue to provide updates as we go, but we are learning more about her and her injury every day on her healing journey. She is slowly coming out of her shell and showing us more and more of her personality. She especially loves Jill, one of our selfless and dedicated Clinic Caregivers. She adores going for walks and springs to life when rolling in the cool summer grass (although we can only let her do it a little!). Adira’s bandages are now being changed every other day and she’s growing some good, healthy tissue and soon will be ready to undergo skin grafts. That’s the good news. The not so good news is that she’s lost some more muscle, exposing areas of her spine, however, that can heal with time. Other areas of her skin are dying as well; we’re awaiting the results of a skin biopsy hoping there aren’t additional complications such as an autoimmune disease. We’ll share the results as soon as we receive them. She’s losing weight and hasn’t been eating well for the last few days, but she ate a good meal today. We’re going to offer her some yummy rotisserie chicken that we know she won’t be able to resist! In the meantime, she is showing us such grace; she loves getting kisses just as much as we love kissing her.
Beneath the bandages: Here you can really see how the wound is healing. As that grey color gets more red, the tissue is getting much healthier. However her skin is still dying around the wound.
***This video is the most graphic*** This is a bandage change.
Please only watch if you can handle the above photos. Otherwise, skip this and move on to the next update:
Walks with Adira include frequent stops for love, kisses, and silliness. This is one amazing warrior girl. She is a miracle
Update July 19:
Today Adira's wound was ready to add nutrient-filled fish skin and scaffolding to help create a framework for new skin growth. Thank you to Lauren Risley Realty and Randy Morgan with Guild Mortgage for helping us cover the costs for this procedure and needed medical supplies. There is of course a chance it won't take, usually that happens because of movement. So we're hoping and praying this works for Adira!
Donations significantly drop in the summer, but we are still saving warriors, showing them love, and need your generous hearts to help us continue on through the heat of the summer. Please give, any amount will help our girl. We'll continue to provide updates!
