Fedora was born the first in the litter of 3 babies with no problems at all that could be seen or suspected.

After 48 hours I noticed that she had some trouble nursing and started to suspect that she had Cleft Palate. Since I have never seen one before it was hard to tell, she was not nursing so I decided to start tubefeeding her and the same day I went to the vet with the whole litter and mom.

He confirmed my suspects, Fedora has cleft palate in a grade not easy to say but apparently not the worse. Since she is a very alive puppy and a fighter, I decided after thinking a lot, to continue supporting her by tubefeeding and see what happens. 

I am well aware that she has a lot of possibilities to die the first days, or weeks or even worse, at 4-6 months due to respiratory infection caused by fluids going into her nose or lungs. If that happens and she shows any sign of suffering I will take the decision to put her to sleep, but I just can not do it now that she is so alive and strong and doing well even if still not nursing by her own yet.

I am learning a lot about this congenital problem and some cases can be succeful cared for and puppies can actually survive with a certain precautions, even if nothing is 100% sure or safe.
Of course, if she survives long enough she will be spayed and of course she will stay here forever no matter what or how long she will live.

As her breeder, I feel totally responsible for her and that includes to keep her alive (always ONLY if no pain or suffering involved) and this is what I am going to do, because I want to do it and because I feel I have to do it, but mostly because I love that puppy already.

The only reason I can see now to put her to sleep at this moment is that IF she survives weeks or months and then dies, I will suffer more than if I put her to sleep NOW. To me this is NOT a valid reason at all as implies only MY feelings, and Fedora is a living puppy and she will live as long as she can have a decent life, the loving part is the easiest, she will be loved all her life, no matter how long.

When we have an adult or young dog with health issues that can eventually end with the death of the dog but in the meantime the dog lives well and the dog never knows what is going on so no psicilogycal damages either, we will do all sort of stuff to keep them alive and well ... to me a just born puppy is exactly the same and will have the longer and happy life I can share, no matter how long, it is a matter of love and life.

I will update Fedora´s site often, with news about how she is feeling and doing and all the info I can collect from Cleft Palate, I will share it here.

This kind of decision HAS to be taken with heart AND brain, it will take a lot of TIME to raise Fedora, so far we are tubefeeding her every 2-3 hours (nights included) and also in between holding her to help her to nurse a bit from Mama´s milk because this is the best for her inmune system and she will need it working even more than a normal pup needs because she will be much more sensitive to infections. All the people in the house has to agree and collaborate in a decision of this kind.

WISH US LUCK !!!!!!! WE WILL WORK FOR IT !!!!!!!