The History of How Cuteodyssey Came to Be

CuteOdyssey was created because of my dogs, Ulisse, Penelope and Telemaco and my first blind and deaf foster dog, Ricky, who then became my own dog. I owe everything to all the rescues that rejected my application, when I applied for one of their dogs. These rescues are dear to my heart as their rejection pushed me to get a dirty, messy pound dog from the Downey shelter. That dog was Ulisse, my first dog. I drove for the first time to La to pick up this dog that I never met. Driving back from LA, I looked at him and realized how hard his journey had been to get to me. He walked many streets and roads and avenues to come home to me, like Ulisse in the Homer's Odyssey did, that is why I called him Ulisse.

No one can understand how hard is to live all your life without love and without compassion but I knew, because I grew up without it all my life. Self worth was low in my life until I met Ulisse. I was a stranger in a foreign land, waiting to find my home. Ulisse did not come to me to find his home, he came to me to help me find mine. I found my home in the USA, when I met him. It is true home is where Your heart is and my heart belong to my babies, my dogs.

They gave me what I have been searching all my life. I was a gypsy looking for a place to stay and some stability. I traveled the seven seas, I lived in many countries and cities but even when I moved here I felt unstable, until I met Ulisse. I knew that no one could give me stabilty, I had to find it inside myself, deep in my heart. Ulisse was able to find the real me and give me back to life. I was dead and He gave me my life back, I was reborn with his kisses, with his licks and tail wagging.

I learned what life was about and what made me really happy. When I first met Ulisse, He did not look like the picture I saw on the shelter website, His hair was chopped off. He had a few bunches of hair left. He had an under bite, which then scared me (now I adore). I then did not know how sick Ulisse was. The shelter said that I had 5 days to return him. I took him to the vet, who found out that my first ever dog, was dying. He had Pneumonia, ear infections, kennel cough, tapeworm, flea infestations, skin disease. He was kept in the hospital for a few days but the vet was not sure he could make it. I begged my boss at work to let me take Ulisse to work every day as he was very sick. He agreed. Ulisse would sit on my lap so weak every day. I took him for a break out and he was so calm and gentle. Finally after a month he got better.

My boss asked me to stop taking him to work so I asked to work from home. He agreed to give few days. I could not leave Ulisse alone for too long, so I looked for a job closer to home. I found one. I also got him a little Sister/wife Penelope, another shih tzu with one functioning eye and one blue eye that was not working properly.

When I and my husband divorced, I had no idea where to live, had no money and no family here. I searched a long time until I found a place that would allow me to keep my dogs. The place was too small and had no yard and my dogs were suffering there. I became friends with Paul who had a house near the beach. He helped me try to find a place but eventually rented a spare room in his house to me. Paul was a vegetarian like I am and shared the same love of animals, so the situation was perfect for me, Ulisse and Penelope. Paul loved my dogs like they were his. He worked from home so they spent the mornings with him and with me the rest of the day. We took lots of long walks around the nice, hilly neighborhood.

One day at work a customer/client was moving over here from Florida with a 3-4 month old shih tzu and wanted to take him to the shelter as he was too tired to look for a place that would allow him to keep his dog. My colleagues told him about me and that I loved shih tzus. He decided to relinquish his dog to me. Paul said it was ok and fell in love with him at first sight. He spent the mornings sleeping at Pauls feet and with me and the pack the rest of the time. Since the day I brought him home, Telemaco has been my little spoiled-rotten boy. My cuteodyssey was completed or so I thought.

After several months I moved to East County to look for my own house to purchase. While renting I started fostering for a dog rescue a blind a deaf shih tzu named Ricky. He stole my heart. I decided to keep fostering the oldest dogs and I got two more shih tzus, one was 10, who I later adopted and one was 13, who died a few months later. Paul missed the dogs and wanted to get his own shih tzu, so he adopted Zeus, a gorgeous black and white shih tzu puppy.

I decided to start my own shih tzu rescue and Paul wanted to help me out, so I applied for my 501C3 and now we are officially a San Diego shih tzu rescue. We fixed up my property making it more dog-friendly and then we created the website on which you are reading this story.

I'm gratified for what Ive accomplished, having come by myself to this country from a tiny, poor town in Sicily, never having had a dog before, and now I'm a US Citizen and CEO of a wonderful dog rescue which has saved nearly 1000 dogs since it opened in Jan 2011. It's very rewarding to help so many innocent creatures!

There will be much more to write but you will have to wait................for more.  

If you want to check our story on video please click here: http://youtu.be/N0i6bco4fK0e