Gidget was less than a year old when she was abandoned at a vet hospital with a broken leg, now she’s 9 years old. The staff came to work one morning to find that she had been left there overnight. For treatment they put a heavy bandage on her leg and healed her leg using cage rest only. Once the leg had healed sufficiently to start physical therapy they contacted us to take her into the Sanctuary. Once she settled in with us we realized how her rough start in life had impacted her—she stopped wanting to make new friends. Gidget was most likely born and raised with very little early socialization, which was now making it hard for her to cope with all of the new people she was now meeting. So, we moved her to a quieter cottage that had less visitors, and developed a consistent way of introducing her to new people. Gidget has thrived on the routine, and as long as she is managed properly and introduced to people with our now widely used “Gidget intro”, she’s made so many new friends that she has her own excel spreadsheet to keep track of them. Gidget thrives on the consistency of her daily activities at the Sanctuary which even include daily PT and massage for her now healed, but still problematic broken leg. Gidget has attended every type of class that we give at our Valerie Friedman Program Center and also has a spreadsheet for all of the tricks she knows. If you sneeze near her, she can bring you a Kleenex!
Current Status:
Gidget continues to meet new people and enjoy her walks around the Sanctuary. She occasionally has a stiff leg, but for the most part her monthly trips for holistic care takes care of her discomfort. She developed an aversion to getting into cars, so staff has worked on that, along with her comfort visiting a house we have on the Sanctuary grounds. Likely Gidget has never lived in a home, so she was very stressed when visiting that building. With some work with food enrichment toys there she is learning that the cottage is a safe place.