Heartwarming story

Second Chance: Fla. town saves hobbled hound
By Rick Neale, USA TODAY

Things didn't look good for Chance in the spring. The cute, brindle-and-white puppy had suffered life-threatening injuries -- broken right front leg, broken right rear leg and broken left front ankle -- when somebody apparently threw him from a moving vehicle onto an asphalt road April 4. Thanks to the community response, healthier, happier days lie ahead for Chance. Volunteers, aided by a social media-powered rehab campaign at www.gofund- me.com/6t1n84, raised money, so the spunky American Staffordshire terrier could undergo five surgeries and receive sophisticated medical treatments over a five-month span. The campaign is still up at that link, including photos and video. Though the hobbled little hound still wobbles when he walks, Chance has found a permanent home in the Central Florida countryside with a woman named Jennie Brady in Apopka. Chance has quickly bonded with Blue, Brady's 85-pound brown Labrador mix, and both dogs love to play tug of war and romp across her half-acre yard. "Those two are something else when you watch them play together," said Brady, 66, a retired business manager who raised a variety of animals on a 60-acre Alabama farm. "They share bones and everything else. There's no fighting over food or anything else. The only thing they fight over is my attention. Chance was found lying in the road by a motorist who contacted Purrs and Whiskers Shelter, a Melbourne animal rescue group. Volunteers took the puppy and organized the online fundraising drive, featuring videos of the limping little dog romping about with casts on his legs, tail wagging. The campaign generated $5,925 from 145 donors to defray Chance's medical expenses, which hit about $6,500. Mona Motz, a Purrs and Whiskers Shelter foster mother who picked up the rest of the costs, labeled the energetic puppy's plight "an extreme rescue. After Chance was evaluated by a Tampa veterinary specialist at an Orlando clinic, he underwent a series of surgeries at Animal Medical Clinic in Melbourne -- keeping his human handlers' hands full by constantly gnawing off splints and bandages. "He handled every surgery well. Yeah, he chewed on his casts, but he's a puppy," said Theresa Clifton, executive director of the Cocoa-based Central Brevard Humane Society. "He had the fortitude and the attitude, and he's just one of God's little blessings. "With many dogs, when they've been abused or hurt like that, they don't handle it well. And they get attitudes, or they just hate living, and they get depressed and they refuse to eat. Or they're in pain, so they nip at you. Chance, he just never had any of that," Clifton said. "Whatever was going on -- the casts and the shots and the surgeries -- he just went with it. And he trusted everybody that put a hand on him. And I think that just really pulled on people's heartstrings," she said. Advanced medical treatments included laser therapy for overstretched tendons in his ailing ankle and chiropractic massage on his lower back. "Think about when you have a sprained ankle: You're limping for a week, your other side is really tired of carrying the weight. Well, Chance had three legs that were goofy. And so his whole back was just locked," Motz said. The identity of those who abandoned the dog remains a mystery. Based on Chance's initial X-rays, veterinarians came to the conclusion that he was thrown from a vehicle and landed on both of his right legs. After re'cup'erating from a fifth surgery to remove a pesky bone fragment from his right rear leg, Chance was adopted by Brady. "I can't understand anybody that wouldn't feed an animal right, that kicks an animal or throws them around like that," Brady said. "They are God's creatures. They didn't ask to be here. They depend on us. They are our responsibility. And they deserve our love and care. Clifton said Chance's recovery illustrates why "it takes a village to raise an animal. "He's probably that one in 1,000 that gets lucky. Because he was at death's door. And most shelters, they'd just put him down," Clifton said. "He had his own little guardian angel," she said. Neale reports for Florida Today in Melbourne.