Yesterday was a sad day. Yesterday, my beautiful lovely, sweet, gentle 7 year old chocolate labrador died in my arms. He was 'broken' from the day we picked him up from what we now believe to have been a puppy farm set up - we just didn't know it then. Despite his medical problems both mental and physical we happily loved him with all our being. Today our hearts are breaking over his premature death, but more than that, today our hearts are burning with anger over the greedy, unscrupulous, bastards out there that think it's okay to use and abuse animals just to line their own pockets. Shadow wasn't a breeding dog he was one of the puppy's, and we got him when he was 10wks old (but in hindsight probably much younger) We were naive and hadn't really heard of puppy farming and therefore perfect 'victims'. I now know all the warning signs were there but I didn't know to look - this is why I want to educate people about them now. Shadow was 'broken' probably through his mum being repeatedly interbred, through being mistreated the short few weeks after he was born, and through being taken from his mother far too soon. We named him shadow because he was terrified of literally everything - even his own shadow, and because he became my shadow, never ever letting me out of his sight. He lived his life in fear - even leaving a bag out on the table would have him freeze in his tracks and having a melt down. In anyone else's eyes he was probably severely brain damaged - in my eyes he was just 'special' and needed a little bit more love than anyone else ~ which we happily gave him. As I kissed my beautiful boy goodbye I made a promise to him that I would do everything in my power to raise awareness & stop the vile industry of puppy farming. Loving him was the easiest thing in the world ~ letting him go is proving to be the hardest xx