Elderly German Shepherd Who Spent 11 Years on a Short Chain Finally Gets the Love She Deserves

We’ve all seen it. The shattering sight of a chained up dog, with eyes full of desperation to be anywhere else but where they are now. Gergana was no different. She’d spent her life chained to a tree, never knowing anything else but six square feet, watching animals and people passing by, most likely wishing she could switch places. The only purpose she had in life was to guard a deserted land – that’s why her owners chained her up.

Gergana wasn’t a companion, but a mere piece of property there to do a job, until she got sick and became more of a burden than a use. That’s when her owners finally let the Animal Friends Foundation Burgas take over and give Gergana the care she desperately needed. After 11 years of imprisonment, she would, for the first time ever, experience freedom.

A Long Road to Recovery

With a skeletal physique and tumors hanging down from her breasts, it was clear that the years of being chained up and neglected had taken their toll on her health. Her life now depended on the Animal Friends Foundation Burgas team. Inevitably, they took her straight to the clinic for a thorough examination. The good news was, she didn’t have metastases. However, she would require surgery to remove the tumors. The bad news is, the vets found she had tumors in her ears as well, so a sample needed to be taken in order to check whether they were cancerous or not. At the same time, she was eating well. During her decade on a chain, Gergana only got fed every now and then when her owners remembered. Now, she got meals all the time and her appetite never wavered.

Growing Medical Bills

Every day, needy animals are brought to the Animal Friends Foundation Burgas. Unfortunately, the foundation can’t always afford to provide every animal with veterinary care because they don’t receive enough donations. They’re already hundreds of dollars in debt with the clinic because they struggle to fund each animal’s medical bills. Therefore, they were unsure whether they’d be able to foot Gergana’s towering veterinary bills that seemed to be growing by the day.

After posting her story on their Facebook page, several kind individuals came forward with donations, which enabled Gergana to get the care she required. As a result, the tumor removal surgery was carried out successfully and the sample for her ear tumors was taken, which also revealed good news – they weren’t malignant tumors!

How is She Now?

Gergana, it’s plain to see, has not had an easy life. Even when she got help after eleven years of solitude and confinement, she needed to undergo multiple examinations and surgeries which was understandably stressful and scary for her. But now, she’s better than she’s ever been before. The foundation says she  “looks amazing.” She’s gained weight, her ears look better and she seems much more at ease now than she used to.

Radostina Dubarova, who works at the Animal Friends Foundation Burgas says, “She acts very gently. She constantly searches for attention from people. Very often she runs to you, climbs upon you and ‘talks’ and ‘purrs,’ begging you to caress her.”

Gergana is currently living at the Animal Friends Foundation Burgas shelter and once she’s received all the treatment she needs, they’ll put her up for adoption and she’ll be ready to start her new life with a new, loving family – the life she’s always dreamed of.

Will You Help Gergana Get the Rest of Her Treatment?

She still has a lot of health issues, though. The foundation is currently trying to raise money for her much-needed dirofilaria treatment. You can help this sweet pup, and many other animals at the shelter, by donating today. Her life depends on kind, compassionate, generous people like you. You can also find and follow her story here.