by Alyson Maxymillian-Wheeler
In mid March 2023, Glacier, an underweight and uncared for Great Pyrenees, showed up at the animal shelter I volunteer for. She had previously been at animal control in another town. Typically our shelter gets larger dogs into foster homes ASAP, as they don’t do well at shelters. Another volunteer, Ann, took Glacier in. Upon her vet examination it was discovered that not only was Glacier pregnant, and not only did she have eleven puppies waiting to be born, but she was due in two weeks!
So Ann and her husband prepared a huge whelping box for Glacier. Two weeks later she gave birth to ten healthy puppies. Sadly, one was stillborn. The runt, Gem, passed on day two. That left nine puppies who needed help.
Ann created a daily sign up to help with the puppies and mama. Volunteers came for two-hour shifts throughout the day and Ann handled the nights. The puppies all required bottle feedings, as their mom Glacier was just trying to hold on herself.
I started signing up to volunteer every day at the same time, 11am-1pm. I live near Ann so it was easy to go over and help. I didn’t know Ann or her husband Doug before this. But as I got to know the pups, I had the good fortune to get to know Ann and Doug as well. None of us had any experience with puppies this young, let alone bottle feeding them. But we did it! We bottle fed all of them, cleaned up after them, watched their eyes open. We watched them learn to walk, bark, everything. My 10-year-old daughter would come help on the weekends, and my husband as well. While we were there, we encouraged Ann to go rest or do whatever she needed to do for herself, since most of her time was taken up doing so much for these pups.
In the next couple of weeks we lost two more puppies, Lambert and Stanley, to respiratory infections. Ann was heartbroken. My family reminded her that while these losses were of course very sad, she should also feel joy, knowing that she was doing such a good deed and that none of the puppies or Glacier would have survived without her.
On the fourth week, Glacier got sick and had to be separated from her remaining seven pups. She was put on an antibiotic that would have caused serious damage to the pups if they nursed from her. So there was so choice but to place Glacier in another foster home. Thankfully, Glacier thrived in her new home. Her health returned, her fur started growing back and she was gaining weight. Meanwhile the puppies remained at Ann and Doug’s.
I kept showing up to Ann and Doug’s house to help. They were so appreciative and welcoming. We became “puppy friends.” It’s funny how even though we lived so close to each other and both volunteered at the same shelter, our paths never crossed before these puppies. We come from different backgrounds: I’m a Jewish person from Long Island, and Ann, who is Christian, is a lifelong New Englander. But our differences were irrelevant as we bonded over our concern and care for the pups.
Mother’s Day was approaching. I decided to make paw prints of all the puppies and create an art piece for Ann and Doug. Each puppy had a colored collar so I backed the paw prints with each puppy’s personal color and framed the whole thing. I gave it to Ann and told her she was the mother of puppies now! She loved it, as did her adult human children.
The puppies were growing fast now. Ann asked me if I wanted one and I said: “of course!” Around that time, the DNA test we had done came back, and to everyone’s great surprise, we learned that the dogs were purebred Great Pyrenees! These pups were going to be huge. My husband and I both grew up with large dogs, so we were prepared.
We asked for our favorite pup, Mr. Black Collar. We though he would get along well with our 8-year-old Border Collie mix. When the pups reached eight weeks old we took our pup home. We named him Goliath, since he was going to be so big. We got him a little green bear that we named Baby David. Every Goliath needs a David!
I brought Goliath with me to my puppy shifts at Ann’s home daily so he could see his siblings and Ann could spend time with him until all the puppies went to their wonderful new homes. We watched each pup get adopted. By week nine all the pups were in their new homes and this puppy journey was over. But the friendship wasn’t. These puppies had brought two families together. I send Ann pictures of Goliath all the time. And she is welcome to show up at my home to visit him anytime she wants. Ann is Goliath’s Fairy Dog Mother, and she’s my friend. It’s amazing how dogs, in addition to the joy we get from being with them, can also bring about unexpected types of joy and meaning that we never would have expected.
If you’re near Medfield, MA and you’re looking to adopt a dog, or you want to donate to the shelter where Alyson volunteers, go to https://www.medfieldshelter.com/
