Meet the Abandoned Fawn Who Changed Her Rescuer’s Life (VIDEO)

Deer are often seen as mere hunting targets, but Dillie’s story shows that they have the same loving emotions and therapeutic qualities as normal companion animals.

The laws of nature are often brutal and promote survival of the fittest. Following typical animal practices, Dillie’s mother abandoned her, after her 2004 birth, for having a defect — blindness. That would have been the end of the poor fawn, but a deer farmer kindly brought her to veterinarian Melanie Butera’s clinic.

Butera and her husband Steve Heathman took Dillie under their wings and into their Canal Fulton, Ohio home, promising her the best medical care available. They intended to keep her in their barn, but the deer was afraid of the horses, and missed Heathman, who fed her goat’s milk from a baby’s bottle to nurse her back to health.

In 2009, Butera entered a video of Dillie in a contest run by Zoombak. The media attention from her winning entry introduced her to many fans she wouldn’t have met if it weren’t for her adopted deer. Butera, who is currently battling cancer, thanks Dillie for teaching her that every life has meaning.

In 2010, Dillie’s “mom” wrote a book about how the deer changed her life. Dillie even has her own Facebook page.