That's right! When you view the
attachments,
you are NOT seeing double...Stanley's REAL brother has joined
our family. Now there are over 200 pounds of canine fur living
at our house...YIKES! If you think you are surprised, our
heads our still spinning! Through an amazing twist of fate,
we discovered that one of Stanley's littermates was in need
of a new home. The story is incredible....It involves two
countries, three states, three families, and two brain tumors
(yes, you read that right). The odds of all of the things
that transpired over the course of a mere 4 day period are
astounding. We would have had better odds of hitting a major
Powerball jackpot than discovering this one dog.
Parker is just as handsome and loving as his brother, Stanley.
Parker and Stanley were both born in Budapest, Hungary on
October 1, 2002 (also, Tim's birthday!). They were both
exported to the U.S. the week before Thanksgiving on separate
flights to their new homes: Stan to ours, and Parker to
New Jersey. Parker went to a married professional couple
with no children. He was left all alone 12 to 14 hours a
day, while his owners were at work in New York each day.
The owners decided to place him up for adoption using a
private advertisement. A woman in Maryland read the ad and
hoped to adopt him. This woman happened to write to an email
group she found of bernese owners around the world, seeking
guidance and advice regarding this adoption. I, as part
of this email group, read her posted messages and the responses
she received. Ultimately, she became unsure as to whether
or not the timing was right for her family to adopt. At
that point, she stated some facts about the dog's history
including his place of birth and birthdate, and I began
thinking there was a remote possibility that this dog may
be related to Stanley. This was Thursday, October 30th.
I talked with Tim, and we decided that if this was indeed,
Stan's brother, we needed to help him. I contacted the woman
in Maryland who had been considering adopting him. Strangely,
she herself is a 2 and a half year survivor of malignant
brain cancer.....are you getting goose bumps yet???? (Zoltan,
my 57 year old Mom has been surviving with brain cancer,
too, for over a year and a half, which is why that piece
of information startled us.)
Here is an excerpt from a letter the woman in Maryland
posted to the worldwide berner internet group on Sunday:
I received some tremendously encouraging and intelligent
and caring emails about my decision to adopt Parker, the
1 yr old Berner up for adoption via his first family. I
gave it some serious thought and had decided to get him
this weekend, then something flipped me for a loop and I
had to completely revisit my decision....
....I received a wonderful, caring and heart-wrenching
email from a fellow Lister, Jennifer Torigian. She shared
personal details and expressed her desire to help me find
out more about Parker, because she felt that the birthdate
of her dog and Parker was more than a coincidence. And it
WAS!!!! .....(We later confirmed that they are truly bood
brothers from the same litter!) Stanley and Parker are both
hale, hearty and have gorgeous calm temperaments.
After reading Jennifer's email, it dawned on me almost
immediately that this was the right family for Parker. I
felt it very very deep in my gut - and I trust my gut, having
learned the price of ignoring it. I immediately set about
writing back to Jennifer and we marveled out how much our
life experiences were similar, and it became obvious to
me that she was a warm, open and caring woman who had a
big enough heart to take Parker into their home and have
him spend the rest of his life with his own brother. It
gave me goosebumps, folks, honest to god.
At the last possible moment, right until I was to finalize
arrangements to pick Parker up in New Jersey, I notified
the owners that I had found, by one in a billion chance,
a family who had Parker's brother, Stanley .The sire and
dam and breeder were all the same, and indeed, Parker was
a full brother to Stanley. The owners were surprised, somewhat
taken aback and yet, they decided to follow my recommendation
and trust my gut instincts and agree to the switch in new
adoptive home - and thanks to Jennifer's wonderful Dad and
her husband, Tim, Parker is on his way home as I write this
and probably spending his first hours with his new family.(Sunday,
Nov 2)...
I'm so excited, I feel like I'm going to explode. I know
in my bones this is the right thing to do for Parker, and
that if I had followed my own desire to have him here, he
wouldn't have had quite as PERFECT a home as he will now.
He will have the benefit of a full time at home mom, two
adorable and gentle girls as his best friends and a brother
whom he can romp with, enjoy vacations with and grow old
with - and all within a warm family setting.
I hope everyone on the List can appreciate the incredible
FATE involved in this decision and that all the coincidences,
some of which I feel are private to Jennifer and I (i.e.
the brain tumor thing), add up to a situation where Parker
was meant to go to their family and I was meant to be the
facilitator. When I sat down with my husband and we considered
the sheer likelihood of this being merely a fluke, we couldn't
agree that it was - we considered it a "sign"
if you will. I'm not much for religious faith and don't
practice any religion but if I did, I'd think this was a
message to me. I believe in fate to some extent and this
is fate.
I want to thank the generous hearts of the Nelson family
who gave up Parker hoping for a better life for him, and
to the Torigian family for acting so quickly and taking
up the challenge of driving 8 hours to make sure that Parker
has a new family this coming week. Woo Hoo!!!!
Payton
Baltimore County, MD
So, that's the story of how Parker found his way to our
home. Sorry so long, but it's all so complicated, I couldn't
decide how to shorten it more! I know the picture quality
stinks in the attachments. If it ever stops raining, we
can get some nice shots outside of the "Brothers from
Budapest." Parker has been here for just a week now,
and it's as though he has always been with us. Right from
the start it was an incredibly smooth transition. Our vet
said they KNOW they are littermates because of something
called "scent-mediated kin recognition." When
they sniffed each other, they knew they were brothers.
I thought their breeder might enjoy knowing that these two
boys are living happily together. They were born Oct 1,
2002. Hope you can share our special story with their breeder.
Sincerely,
Tim, Jennifer, Nicole, Amanda, sisters Cassie & Lacey
(the ragdoll cats),
and brothers Stanley and Parker
Massachusetts
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