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Amazing pup lives a normal life despite severe spine abnormality

Pig the dog, born with an abnormal spine.

Pig the dog is extraordinary in so many ways.

Most extraordinary is her appearance – Pig is missing part of her spine, several ribs and her hips and joints are rotated in the wrong positions.

As a result, Pig looks like one of those no-necked photoshopped animals, or at the very least, like half a dog.

But don't tell that to her owner, Kim Dillenbeck.

"I bonded with Pig right away," she told Joey Kennedy at al.com. "I thought I'd either be with her or near her helping her find a home."

Pig was born to a feral mother in the woods outside of Atlanta, Georgia, last fall. She saved herself by barking, attracting the attention of a woman who took dogs in. According to Dillenbeck, the prognosis for the pup with such severe birth defects wasn't good.

"The lady who found her, the vet told her to have her (Pig) put down," Dillenbeck said.

But Dillenbeck refused. And, eight months later, Pig is living a healthy and relatively normal life.

"Pig doesn't know there's anything wrong with her," Dillenbeck said. She adds that Pig enjoys playing fetch, wrestling with other dogs and eating snacks. She runs and can stand on her hind legs with ease.

"She's not fully grown," Dillenbeck said. "She's still gaining weight. At this point, she has the potential to gain another 20 pounds, and that would probably kill her."

Because of her shape, Pig has to eat slowly so she can swallow her food properly. Pig has choked on her meals a couple of times, and Dillenbeck has had to perform the Heimlich manoeuvre to save her.

"She doesn't have the space in her to eat large meals without getting out of breath because her lungs are crowded."

With a caring mother taking such good care of her, many would think that Pig is lucky. But Dillenbeck doesn't see it that way at all.

"I'm the lucky one," she says. "She makes me laugh every day."

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