Two Canine Amputees Get Rehabbed
They have love, and six legs, between them
 Durell Godfrey |
(6/05/2008) Raymond, an American Staffordshire terrier mix, was a puppy living on the Shinnecock Reservation in Southampton four years ago when he had to be taken to the Animal Rescue Fund of the Hamptons for treatment of a leg infection. The right front leg never healed and had to be removed. A staff member there bought Raymond from his owner.
Enter Kaia, a 4-year-old shepherd-husky mix who was living in a cage with her siblings, all of whom were abandoned by their owners and delivered to ARF in Wainscott. Kaia had never been socialized, but nonetheless was adopted by a family and taken to Brooklyn. One day she jumped out a second-story window and ended up on the Belt Parkway, where she was hit by a car.
The vet she was taken to saw her tag and called ARF. Once there, her front left leg had to come off. She has been back at ARF for a year and a half.
Being the only two amputees at ARF, the two dogs were put in the same enclosure and started getting rehabilitative therapy from Carole Taylor, who volunteers her extra time, sitting with them, talking to them, exercising them, massaging them, and playing music for them. She even takes them to the beach.
“Raymond is easier to train. He already understands commands and craves attention,” she said last week. “Kaia,” however, “was a feral dog and takes longer to come around. She needs someone to love her and be patient with her.”
Ms. Taylor, who now works at Design Within Reach in East Hampton but was chief of the physical therapy department at New York’s Metropolitan Hospital for six years, understands dogs, even those with three legs. “I worked with a lot of amputees and they all have an element of anxiety and depression. Human amputees get a lot of rejection, too, which these two dogs have experienced, so I decided to treat them like people.”
After a month of working with Kaia, who, while skittish, is very affectionate once she loses her fear, the dog “started wagging her tail and eating better. She’s elegant, she’s warm. Once she relaxes, she’ll come to you,” Ms. Taylor said.
Ms. Taylor will throw a ball for the dogs to fetch. “They don’t know how to play with toys. They can’t hold a bone . . . it’s unusual for Kaia to let a person hold a bone for her.”
As she spoke, Ms. Taylor held Kaia up on her hind legs and danced with her. “She often falls asleep in my arms,” she said.
Dogs may experience stress reactions to amputation that are similar to people’s, but in the case of these two, it may also be their previous neglect that has intensified their reactions to the results of their surgeries. Kaia, for instance, “is afraid of noises and people,” Ms. Taylor said, adding that the dogs “love music, which helps calm them down.” Especially Latin music, it seems.
It is not clear whether the dogs recognize each other’s disability, which might partly explain, according to Ms. Taylor, why “they love each other.”
It is hoped that the dogs will be adopted by the same person or family, as they are so attached to each other. Ms. Taylor is attached, too, but has enough animals of her own at home and can’t manage two more.
“When I leave here after working with them, my heart is full,” she said.