Maude

As told by Sally Tackley

On February 20, 2001, while checking the local shelters’ web sites, I ran across an 8 year old female Pem. She had been abandoned by her owners, left to fend for herself, and picked up by animal control. She looked pitiful. She was blowing coat, filthy dirty, and smelled to high heaven. She was supposed to be 8, but shuffled around like she was ancient.

I took her to my vet’s to be checked out before bringing her home, and while we were in the waiting room, her rear legs went out from under her and she collapsed. I told the vet about this episode, so he checked and determined that she didn’t have much feeling in her legs. Oh, dear. I left her there for a couple of hours so that they could do some tests and clean her up. When I picked her up, she was a different dog! What a beauty.

She has since been diagnosed with degenerative myleopathy. I had originally put out the word that she was available for adoption, but I’ve changed my mind. I’m keeping her. I’ve learned more about DM than I ever wanted to know, and one thing that seems to adversely effect the disease is stress. I don’t want to put her through the stress of going to another new home. Her rear legs have strengthened a little with regular exercise and a proper diet and it wouldn’t be fair to her to undo all that.

I’m lucky to have found her. She is a wonderful old girl. She was already housebroken and has nice manners. She loves everyone and gets along well with my other dogs. I know that the DM will get worse in time, but we’ll face that together.