Shut the front door! Swinging door catches goldendoodle by surprise

Meet Ellie, Alyssa and John’s adorable and energetic goldendoodle.

Lifelong Bay Area residents, Alyssa and John had their eyes set on a big move—to the Big Apple.

“We always wanted to live in a big city and just have a change of pace,” Alyssa says. They packed up their lives and jetted across the country. But just when they started to get into the New York state of mind, everything changed in an instant.

“We made the trek right before COVID hit,” she says. “We had a stellar one year and then the whole city was shut down. But we were pretty determined to just stick it through.”

Being at home offered the couple an opportunity to expand their family. Alyssa and John adopted Ellie in the early months and got to work acclimating her to big city living. John says, “You know, we have taken her on a lot of walks—she could go all day. Then, when we’re inside, she still has all this energy to play.”

Living in the big city was exciting for an energetic pup like Ellie. However, little did she know, there was an unassuming hazard lurking outside her home that led to her Hambone-nominated scare.

What happened?

“I was just heading out one evening and I was taking her out for her last potty break at night,” John recalls.

The building management had recently decided that pets needed to enter and exit through the building using a side entrance, rather than the main door. Not a big problem, the couple figured.

“The only option we had was to take her outside using the service door, which is this heavy steel door,” John adds.

The night of the accident started like any other. John remembers, “I took her out for her to do her business, then we came back in. She was in front of me, and I thought we were both clear of the door—but this heavy steel door closes very, very fast. Unfortunately [the door] caught the tip of her tail.”

Ellie and John had mistimed the swing of the door by a fraction of a second, to disastrous results. John adds, “I hear her yelping, so I go, ‘What happened?’ and I looked down—and there was a puddle of blood.’”

John rushed upstairs to get Alyssa. They swaddled Ellie in a towel and jetted to the local animal hospital.

The surgeon on call had bad news for Ellie and her parents: A part of her tail was severed and couldn’t be saved. They would have to do surgery to close up the wound, but fortunately she would be okay.

Ellie received two separate surgeries to repair her injured tail. She would also need several follow up appointments to make sure everything was healing properly. Recovery took several cautious weeks of close observation (after all, how do you stop a happy dog from wagging her tail?).

Fortunately, Ellie is now fully healed and back living her big city lifestyle.

How Nationwide helped

Most people don’t really think about the everyday hazards that could befall us and our pets. Fortunately, Alyssa and John were protected from any unexpected costs—because they had pet insurance.

“We tell all our friends if you’re getting a dog, you need pet insurance,” John says.

Alyssa adds, “Yeah, we promote it like it’s our own calling or something…. [Nationwide is] super easy to work with when submitting claims and getting reimbursed for surprise vet bills.”