Shila's Story
We rescued what we believed to be a Siberian Husky puppy from Pima Animal Care Center June of 2004. When she was examined by a vet, we found her to be a two year old who weighed only 28 pounds. We also learned that her canine teeth had been either filed down or she had worn them down trying to escape from some enclosure. After two weeks at our house, she was eating well and starting to be more active. One morning, Diego, one of my other dogs, started whining and pacing. I went to see what was wrong and Shila was in the neighbor’s yard. We thought that she had jumped on something in the yard and had gotten over the 5 ½ foot concrete fence. I went and got her, rearranged some of the things in the yard and went to work. The next day, Diego started with the whining again. I went out and Shila was next door again. I called her name and up over the fence she came (6 foot from the outside). Without a way of keeping her in the yard, we decided to put her in our bathroom. She had plenty of room, blankets to lay on and food and water was readily available.
The horror began. When we got home from work, she had torn through the first layer of the bottom half of the door. We went to the hardware store, bought a piece of masonite and attached it to the door. The next day when we returned from work, we found her in the backyard. She had gotten up on the sink, jumped to the window sill (5 foot high), opened the sliding window and jumped out (5 ½ foot on the outside). Making sure the window was shut, we went to work the following day and upon returning, she had once again chewed through the masonite. We contacted the vet and were told she was suffering from separation anxiety. We even tried a crate, which she bent the door on, got out of and then proceeded to chew the door again. The last straw was when she started on the drywall next to the door. We contacted Karyn Garvin at Invisible Fence and she came to evaluate the situation. She believed Shila to be suffering from containment phobia. We decided to have the Invisible Fence system installed September 2004. It was a godsend! Shila has not attempted to escape the yard since and she’s thriving on the freedom. She now weighs about 40 pounds and is as active as my other dogs. Karyn’s knowledge of containment phobia and her identifying it in Shila turned a truly troubled dog into a wonderful member of our family. We would like to thank Karyn and all her employees who have helped us with this.
Pam and John Himmelmann
Tucson, AZ