3 months with our foster fail and she finally just had an entire normal week with zero panic episodes

We adopted Maya in January after fostering her for 6 weeks. She's a 4 year old hound mix from a rural shelter and had basically zero house experience - had never been on a leash, didn't know what stairs were, was terrified of the TV. The first month was genuinely hard and there were nights where i seriously doubted we were the right home for her.

This week she went to the dog park twice without needing to leave early, slept through a pretty intense thunderstorm without hiding, greeted my neighbor's kid without flinching at all, and just spent like 3 hours lying on the couch watching TV like she'd done it her whole life. No episodes. No retreating to her safe spot. Just a normal dog having a normal week.

I know everyone talks about the "3 month rule" for rescues but i was honestly skeptical it applied to Maya because of how shut-down she was at the start. Turns out the timeline was pretty accurate - things really did click around the 3 month mark. If you're in the thick of it with a newly adopted anxious dog just wanted to say it really does get better. Hold on.