Top 10 Happy Tails of 2022: Meet Midnight

As 2022 comes to a close, we're taking a look back at all of the lives that we’ve saved thanks to your support. Today begins our Top 10 Happy Tails of 2022 — each story is remarkable in their own way and are examples of the heart of our Muddy Paws Pack community. We hope you enjoy reading them as much as we’ve loved all of these special pups.

Our final Happy Tail of 2022 is the one you’ve all been waiting for…our girl Midnight!

Midnight, the dog who was our longest stay ever, came into our care in October 2021 from our shelter partner Animal Care Centers of NYC. This beautiful, sweet senior was underweight and heartworm positive (HW+), but we saw something special in her, and knew she needed to be a part of our pack. Midnight had a few amazing short-term fosters before she landed with Isabel - who kept her for nearly her entire stay with us (almost 10 months!). During her first few months in foster care, Midnight received the critical medical care she needed to become healthy and treat her heartworm – something that required months of medication and mandated rest to ensure her heartrate didn’t rise too much, which could kill her.

By January 2022, Midnight was officially HW-! Everyone was thrilled to see her continue to thrive and get even healthier so she could find her forever family.

Unfortunately, a few weeks later, just as Midnight was wrapping up her final heartworm meds, she got sick again. She started vomiting, wasn’t eating (even her favorite – salami), and had really low energy. A rushed trip to the vet informed us that Midnight was newly diabetic and was in diabetic ketoacidosis – and because of the severity of this condition, alongside her ongoing heartworm treatments, she required immediate hospitalization at Animal Medical Center (AMC) to try to get her healthy again. Thankfully, the team at AMC was able to get her stable with medications, so she was discharged back to Isabel a week later, with detailed care instructions for monitoring her glucose levels and administering insulin twice daily.

It would take a few months of frequent vet visits (sometimes weekly), and one additional stay at AMC to get her diabetes management fully under control, but throughout the process, Midnight was the perfect patient. She never once even flinched at her twice-daily insulin injections, and while she didn’t love the reduction in treats and snacks, as she became healthier, she started to thrive and her personality really shone through. “Midnight would find that perfect sunbeam to snooze away in all day, but as soon as a toy was presented to her, she’d go crazy tearing it apart to try and get the squeakers or stuffing,” said Isabel. The funniest part of the day was when Midnight would get the “wiggles”, squirming around on the ground lying on her back, quickly followed by a jump up and then the zoomies!

We posted about Midnight quite a bit while she was in our care, both to try and help her find her forever home, but also to help us with her mounting medical bills. She wound up having quite the fan base, within our Muddy Paws Pack community and with dog lovers everywhere. Thankfully, an anonymous donor stepped up and offered to cover Midnight’s medical costs for the next seven years - in the hope that removing a possible financial barrier would make it easier for her to find a family.

Finally, in August, our dreams finally came true! Elizabeth and Alyssa saw a video we posted of Midnight on TikTok and were just captivated by her. They came to NYC to meet her, and after a trial adoption, knew she was the one.

"The last few months with Midnight have been the best. Her face is the sweetest to wake up to every morning, and well worth never getting to sleep in again! We affectionately refer to her as Mamaw/Mimmaw, as everything about her reminds us of a feisty, sweet granny. When she wants someone to pet her, she will kick her back legs while lying down and staring at you, and if that doesn’t work, she’ll use her paws to pull your arm towards her chest. She’s the first dog I’ve had who wags her tail as soon as you say, ‘Good Morning!’.”

“She gets so happy after meeting someone on a walk that she just HAS TO do her famous ‘wiggles’. Midnight sits patiently and gives you her paw to test her blood sugar every night when she hears her dinner alarm go off. She thinks her joint supplement is a treat and will drool for it. The craziest thing yet…she has fallen asleep (full on SNORING) while I was cutting her nails…twice now! She brings so much joy to our lives and has helped us be sillier and live in the moment.”

“We can’t thank Muddy Paws (and her foster parents!) for putting in all the hard work to save her life and making it possible for us to adopt her, and we’re so thankful for the continued support. We hope we get to keep her happy and healthy for a very long time.” Don’t worry Midnight fans - you can follow her adventures at @midnights.adventures on Instagram!

While it took nearly a year for her to find her forever family, it was certainly worth the wait. And along the way, Midnight captured the hearts of the entire MPR community: without whom she likely would not be here today.