It has been a long time in coming, but finally we have had a chance to sit down and write about our Bella aka "Noel" by your staff.

When we got the phone call that she was coming in, we were both excited and anxious.  Then when we first met "Bella" we thought that it was going to be too hard to bring her out of her tightly wound shell?!  But now, going on 5 months there is great progress.

Initially, we had the accidents that come with a new environment and anxiousness surrounding new smells and sounds, but a few days on she started to kick in the senses that outside was best and even with the deep snow we braved the cold in our boots and coats and succeeded.  We had her stitches removed and all was fine with her, but seemed to have a bad sort of rash on her skin and was itching a lot.  The evidence of her litter also disappeared but took some time since her body needed time to adjust to the change in life style.  We changed her food to a top quality brand and suffice to say we are now on a diet program to lose some of the extra weight (Christmas didn't help much either).  Bella's coat is luxurious and thick now and has no problems at all.

We take her to a dog park in the evening close to our home and she is doing well, still scared of the humans though! but what can you expect from a girl that has gone through so much in her little life.  Off leash is not a problem with this girl since she was so scared initially that she was my shadow but progress!! as of a few days ago she is now running with our other dog in the park and chasing the other dogs around.  She even let another dog owner give her a cookie! which is a big step forward.  We are stilling working on the walking part, since traffic and loud noises still get her going BUT her tail is now up and wagging away compared with before when it was glued to her underbelly.

We want to thank you for all you did on her behalf to get her to the shelter and then calling us.  It was the right decision and we have enjoyed lots of fun excursions with her, even staying overnight in a hotel in Toronto for the weekend.

2 broken ribs later for me (a long story, but in short, I was trying to get her excited and to play with toys in the first month or so and scared her so much she had an accident on the living room floor and I hit it full speed and so New Years was a quiet time for me with Bella asking for hugs and kisses) but worth every second ...

Bella is doing very well.  She is now much more social and active with the other dogs in the neighbourhood and is very willing to go up to a person "on her own terms" and say hello.  Even now she is still a bit timid of people in the beginning but she warms up to them and is very friendly with all the other dogs and dog owners in our local dog park.  She even will let people give her a treat and sit for them and let them touch her too.  Before this she would, so to speak, run away if anyone came near to her or even called her name, not anymore.  It is not a rare occasion that you see her running in the park with her tail up and looking all happy with her new found self-assurance.

Yours truly,

Thomas & Miho

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