.jpg)
“There was a man outside of a store selling pit-bull puppies for $50,” 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?” He wouldn’t answer her, so pressed the issue and the man opened the bag and gave her the puppy. Harper, was so deformed that she could not walk or hold up her head. Veterinarians advised that the puppy should be euthanized.
Daniel, a regular at the local animal shelter, decided to take the puppy home for one full and final day of affection. “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.”
The puppy had been born with a condition commonly called “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 frogs swimming through water.
Daniel kept massaging Harper’s tight muscles, hoping to alleviate at least some of her stiffness and pain. 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.
Symptoms of Swimming Puppy Syndrome
If you notice a puppy that is always on its belly or beginning to show signs of a flat chest. Lay mom down and put this pup on a good nipple. Turn it on its side, holding its entire body and making sure it stays on its side. If the pup lets loose start over. Do this several times a day until the pup returns to normal and lays on its side; when that happens you have just cured swimmer puppy syndrome. There's no way to prevent Swimming Puppy Syndrome.
FOLLOW US!
