He Was Left For Dead On The Roadside. Then Hope Arrived.

A few weeks ago, Vanessa Grandez was walking near her home in Peru. She spotted a small, furry figure that had collapsed on the roadside. Arriving closer, she learned the heartbreaking truth.

It was an abandoned dog who’d been hit by a car. Though seemingly lifeless at first, the pup was in fact still alive.

“When he was run over, nobody helped him,” Grandez told The Dodo.

But now help had arrived.

Grandez immediately swept the dog into her arms and rushed him to a veterinarian. There, it was discovered that he’d suffered a broken spine in the accident and would require emergency surgery.

To cover the cost, Grandez started a fundraiser — though that wouldn’t be all she did to help.

Naming the pup Peluchin, Grandez opened her home to him to begin his road to recovery.

Under Grandez’s care, Peluchin’s spirit quickly healed, revealing him to be a joyful, energetic dog.

Sadly, however, his body would take more healing yet.

Moving about the house, Peluchin appeared to have lost the use of his rear legs.

He’d need to relearn to walk.

“Because Peluchin was always crawling, we wanted him to practice and feel his back legs,” Grandez said. “We decided to make him a wheelchair.”

Grandez’s boyfriend, Sebastian, took it upon himself to make the custom mobility aid.

It was the perfect fit.

Sebastian designed the chair in way that encourages Peluchin to rebuild strength and agility in his rear limbs — and it’s working.

“He has improved a lot with the wheelchair,” Grandez said. “You can see he has more energy and the desire to walk again.”

https://volume.thedodo.com/embed/80a46461c?autoplay=false&loop=true&placement=article&player_type=chorus&tracking=article:lede&privacy_consent=allVanessa Grandez

Throughout it all, Grandez was working behind the scenes to help Peluchin in yet another way.

Unable to keep pets at her place, she found him a home with a family to call his very own.

“Peluchin is feeling much better now. I handed him over to his family after his stitches were removed from the operation,” Grandez said, adding that she still visits him in his new forever home. “I was like his mother during his recovery.”

Though Peluchin is still using his wheelchair for now, he’s come so far from the place where Grandez had found him. And she’s hopeful that one day he’ll be able to greet her by running and jumping into her arms unassisted.

Grandez is cheering him on.

“I love Peluchin very much,” she said.