Munchie, the Hell-hound

Saturday, June 13, I got mauled by a dog. In 37 1/2 years of life, I've never had a serious injury (just some sprains, bumps, etc.), so this was pretty major for me. I'd gone over to my friend Nancy's house to help her with yard work. We were planning a big picnic party for June 27th, so this was to get the yard ready for the party. I'd dressed in jeans and a T-shirt I didn't care about, had my mug of hot coffee, and was ready to get dirty.

I arrived around 11:40 AM or so. There was a sign on the front door to come around back. I walked around to their backyard fence, and looked for Nancy. Two dogs were running around their large, fenced-in yard. Nancy had written on the sign that the dogs were friendly, but they didn't know me, so I waited outside the gate until Nancy came back outside to let me in. Nancy's dog, Seamus, who looked like a Setter mix, was a love; the kind of dog that thinks every new person is his new friend. I let him sniff me and lick me and check me out. Nancy explained that the second dog (I don't remember his name) belonged to her younger sister, Amy. Amy had recently moved back into the family home (apparently) due to personal and financial issues, and she had brought her two dogs with her. The second dog was definitely more excitable, and he was barking, but he seemed okay with me. The gate was loose, and though I thought I'd closed it properly, one of the dogs pushed it open, and both dogs went running out into the front yard. Nancy took off after them to retrieve them, leaving me in the back yard. That was when I noticed the third dog tied up next to a couple of trees. He wasn't barking at all, just standing there, watching things. He was a big dog, my guess maybe 100 to 125 lbs, and a mottled black color. Nancy finally got the two dogs back into the yard, closed the gate properly, and I asked her about the third dog. That was her sister's other dog, Munchie. I'd been in the back yard for about 15 to 20 minutes now, the other dogs were okay with me, so I asked Nancy if it'd be okay for me to go up and meet Munchie. I figured if I was going to be in the yard doing work all day, the dog should have a chance to get used to me, either that, or I needed to know to give him a wide berth. Nancy said it was okay, so we walked over slowly for me to meet the dog. He was standing, and his ears were perked forward, but his tail was wagging, and he wasn't barking, growling or snarling. There were none of the classic signs I would think of that would indicate an aggressive dog. His hackles weren't raised; he wasn't hunched back, nothing. I wasn't scared or nervous, and I talked to him as I walked up, saying something like, "Hi, Munchie!" or whatever. Nancy was right by my side. He let me approach him, and again, I saw no warning signs what-so-ever. I held out my right hand so that he could sniff it. He sniffed my hand, and then put his head down slightly, like he was sniffing my legs. There was a pause for a moment, and I swear to God, the dog was thinking about what he wanted to do.

He decided to lunge for me, biting my abdomen and fortunately getting mostly just my jeans button and zipper. It was totally without any warning and without any provocation. There was no food around. I hadn't touched the dog. Nancy was standing right by my side, and the dog had seen me interacting with the other dogs, so he knew I wasn't an intruder. There was no explanation for it. As he bit my abdomen, I registered that the dog was attacking me, and I started to pull back away as fast as I could. The dog let go of my jeans, and then he sunk his teeth into my upper left leg. I think at that point, I started to scream. He knocked me down, and fortunately, I fell backwards, away from him, and he was still tied up. He started to maul my leg, tearing and snarling. I remember I was screaming and hitting him in the head with my hands, trying to pull myself away from him. I have a couple of nicks on my right hand where I probably caught his teeth when I was hitting him. Meanwhile, Nancy was desperately trying to pull him off me, yelling at him and pulling on his collar. He let go for a second, and Nancy was able to pull him away as I rolled on the ground away from him. I think I took two or three rolls on the ground, then I got up and tried to hobble as far away from him as I could. I wigged out for a couple of seconds, just screaming "Oh my God! Oh my God!" at the top of my lungs, and then I started to calm down. I think that was when my brain was starting to release the Endorphins.

Nancy came running up to me in a panic and asked if I was all right, what she should do, etc. I was clutching my leg with both hands, and I pulled my right hand away from my inner thigh. My hand was covered in blood and a yellowish, oatmeal-looking substance that I realized was fat tissue torn out. It looked pretty bad, and I thought to myself, what if he hit my femoral artery?, so I asked Nancy to call 911 and to bring me a towel.

I think the most terrifying thing about that damn dog is that as soon as Nancy got him off me and I rolled away, he heeled. He didn't continue to bark or snarl. He just stood there quietly, at attention, watching me. If I had still been within his reach, I believe he would have attacked me again. This was NOT a dog-gone-wild kind of attack. He did not turn on Nancy. For the dog, it was a very controlled, deliberate attack. It was his reaction after the attack that makes me absolutely convinced that he was trained as an attack dog.

Having the dog stare at me was freaking me out, so I hobbled out to the front yard to get away from him. Once in the front yard, I asked Nancy to make sure the gate was closed, and then I laid down on my back, with the towel on top of my leg. Nancy was on the phone with 911, and we were both trying to apply pressure to my leg. By now, the Endorphins were working their magic -- my leg felt mostly numb, and I just felt very peaceful. It seemed like the paramedics arrived pretty quickly. They got my jeans cut off and assessed the wounds. I made an effort not to look, because I was feeling okay, and I didn't know how I'd react to seeing them. A police officer came, too, to take a report. The paramedics applied a temporary dressing, got me loaded up onto a stretcher, and put me in the ambulance to go to UPMC Passavant. They asked me if I had a preference on ERs, and I told them I had no idea where I was, so they should take me where ever they thought was best. My first ambulance ride! I got oxygen; they put some heart rate and BP monitors on me, and they put in an IV port. Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals had been the night before, so there were a lot of jokes about my being a Red Wings fan.

At the hospital, they cleaned out the wounds, trimmed away some loose flaps of skin, shot my leg full of Novocaine and gave me eleven stitches. The stitches were spaced far apart because the wounds were so deep, and they said they needed to be open in order to drain. The deep puncture wounds without tearing they left open. Once I was in the hospital, I dared a look at my leg, and I didn't pass out. It looked pretty bad, but there weren't any huge chucks of my leg missing or anything. There was a ton of paperwork to fill out, including a dog bite report they needed to do. They also gave me another tetanus/diphtheria shot, just in case. FINALLY, at the very end, they gave me a double-dose of Augmentin and a Percocet for the pain.

Nancy had called some other people who were planning to come over to help with the yard, to tell them not to come. A friend, John, lives very close to UPMC Passavant, so when he heard what had happened, he came to the hospital to be with me. Nancy was tied up with the police officer and was also an emotional wreck after what she had witnessed. John stayed with me at the hospital, drove me home, helped me get upstairs, went to the pharmacy to fill my prescriptions for the Augmentin and the Percocet, and he stayed with me all afternoon, all night and Sunday morning. He was SO awesome; he just took care of everything for me, including bringing me my pills and water when I needed them. Basically, the only thing I had to do was get up and go to the bathroom.

He also set up a website for me through Lotsa Helping Hands. I woke up, and he said, "Here, let me show you the website I set up for you." Lotsa Helping Hands is a free website that allows you to have a secure community to coordinate help efforts for any person in times of need. He'd set up an entire week of lunches, dinners, my ride to the plastic surgeon on Tuesday, and then he'd broadcast the website to all of our circle of friends to get them to sign up to help. I was also able to add my own help requests / tasks to the calendar as things came up, like a ride to another doctor's visit last Wednesday. Fifty-two of my incredibly-awesome-amazing-generous friends signed up to help, so many that I literally couldn't use all of the help that was offered. It was a huge relief to be taken care of so well after the injury, especially since I had so much trouble walking and was taking so much Percocet for the pain. Yeah, once the Endorphins and the Novocaine wore off, I was in a lot of acute pain. The best way I can think of to describe it is to imagine a 100 fire ants biting your leg.

There's more to tell, but that's probably enough for one night. Through all of this, I feel so lucky and so blessed with my friends, with my job, my very-understanding boss, my health care coverage, and with the fact that Munchie really only got my leg. The injuries could have been so much worse, especially if he'd been able to get at my face. So, in spite of everything, I have to feel grateful.