Shawnee

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3/23/06: Shawnee is a 2 year old spayed female, who spent the first part of her life in a puppy mill in Kansas. She is small, around 45 lbs, and very timid.

Shawnee started her day yesterday in Kansas, and ended up in Moline, thanks to multiple transport volunteers. It took a little bit of time to coax her out of her crate, but she jumped down on her own, and walked into the house pretty easily. She's staked out a corner of my office as her "safe place", and runs and lays down there whenever she's nervous. She's met the cats from a distance - she's pretty scared of them. My large yellow cat, Sundance, purrs really loud, and I think she thinks he's growling at her. Whenever Sundance walks near her, she runs to her corner, or into her crate. She's also fascinated and scared of the TV. She'll watch it, but as soon as something moves fast, or is loud, she runs into her corner.

She walked down the stairs on her own, and is getting used to going outside on a cable. She potties outside every time she goes out, and we haven't had any accidents yet (keeping my fingers crossed). She slept the whole night in her crate, without a single noise. She is starting to get curious about things, and will peek her head around corners, but as soon as I look at her, she runs right back to her "safe spot". There was a bit of a breakthrough this morning. I was sitting at my computer, and she came up to me to be petted. She stood next to me for about 5 minutes, but as soon as I stood up, she ran to her corner and laid down. She eats very well, I hope I can put some weight on her - all her ribs show right now. I can coax her to walk downstairs to go outside, but it takes awhile. It will take awhile for her to start realizing that people are not going to hurt her any more. I'm hoping there will be a big difference in a week or two.