A Vancouver family is celebrating a “Christmas miracle” as they are reunited with their beloved senior Chihuahua who has been missing for years.
Delilah, who is now 13 years old, vanished from her owners’ back yard three years ago.
The pup was found shivering in a box outside a Richmond Trail Appliances store last Wednesday, according to the BC SPCA.
“The poor little thing was in horrible condition,” Richmond SPCA assistant manager Emma Michel said in a media release.
“She was emaciated, dehydrated, she appeared to be partially deaf and blind, she had no teeth, she had suspected frost bite on the ears, and she was anemic.”
Staff got the dog immediate medical attention, and posted her photo on Facebook in the hopes of finding her owner.
One of the SPCA’s Facebook followers thought she recognized the dog, recalled a woman looking for a similar lost Chihuahua several years ago, and put two and two together.
Not long afterward, Delilah’s owner reached out to the SPCA by email to say it might be hers. The SPCA quickly got to work to verify that the person was indeed Delilah’s owner.
“We were in shock. We asked her to provide us with more information, and we were just praying that this really was her dog,” Michel said.
“We have no idea how little Delilah ended up in that box, alone and cold, but we were just so thrilled that we could reunite her with her family. Our whole team was there for the reunion and there were a lot of tears.”
Michel said that even though Delilah is seeing and hearing impaired, she still crawled out of her bed when she realized her family had arrived.
The lost dog’s family was equally joy-struck, she added.
“She is so sweet and we are just thrilled that Delilah will be spending Christmas at home, safe and warm, and that she will get to live out her last years with the family she knows and loves.”
The BC SPCA said that Delilah’s medical bills were covered by donations to the organization. You can learn more about donating to the BC SPCA here.