What A Difference A Day Makes – An Amazing Dog’s Tale

What a difference a day makes...and a little love ! Harper was a deformed Pitt  Bull puppy who had been put into a plastic garbage bag to die when a curious woman stopped to see what was in the bag.

There was a man outside the Save-A-Lot selling pit-bull puppies for $50 a pop,” Daniel explained. “This woman approached him and noticed a noise coming from a garbage bag he was holding. She asked him, ‘What’s in the bag?’ and he said, ‘Don’t worry about it.

The woman pressed the issue and the man opened — and gave her — the contents of the bag. Inside was a puppy so deformed that it couldn’t walk or hold up its head. Shelter workers and veterinarians grimaced when they saw the dog and came to the same conclusion: It really should be euthanized.

Well, if that was the case the woman was determined to at least make her last few hours on Earth good ones.

“I had to show her what it was like to be loved,” Daniel said. “I’d planned on taking her home that night, letting her sleep in bed with us, and having her humanely euthanized in the morning.”

But of course, that's not the end of this story. A little love and a day changed everything for the puppy now going by Harper.

Harper’s rapid recovery began on that initial day with Daniel. The puppy had been born with a condition commonly dubbed “swimmer puppy disorder,” and most dogs afflicted with it don’t survive. The formal name of Harper’s disorder, pectus excavatum, causes puppies to lie flat on their chests with their legs perpetually splayed out, as if they were humans — or perhaps frogs — swimming through water.

But it turned out that Harper just needed some love and reassurance to keep on keepin on.

Within just a few hours, Harper started lifting her head and looking around. Her front legs became more limber as well, so much so that she tried using them to walk and pull herself around.

Daniel’s reaction: “WHOA.”

Harper now gets daily massages to loosen her stiff muscles and spends time at  Hip Dog CaHydrotherapy & Fitness in Winter Park, Fla., where some nice people heard about Harper and donated free hydrotherapy and massage therapy to the puppy. Harper responded remarkably well, and before long she actually started walking.

She started out on grass, then carpet, then concrete,” Daniel said. “She still can’t walk on tile or hardwood floors, but she’s getting there.

Today, Harper is about 11 weeks old, and she’s holding her own playing with the seven other dogs at Daniel’s home. Daniel estimates that Harper should be ready to be adopted in about a month — that is, if she can handle parting with her.Right now we’re saying that eventually she’ll be available for adoption because we haven’t made any decisions,” Daniel said. “If I give her up, that will make it possible for me to foster another dog. But she’s like a baby to me. I just don’t know!”

What an amazing story and reminder of what a difference a day can make !