Lena Dunham Opens Up About ‘Heartbreaking’ Decision to Give Away Rescue Dog Lamby — After Getting Two New Puppies

Lena Dunham and Lamby in their early days. (Photo: Lena Dunham via Instagram)
Lena Dunham and Lamby in their early days. (Photo: Lena Dunham via Instagram)

Lena Dunham has been showing off her two new puppies, Susan and Karen, everywhere from Instagram to the Tonight Show. So her fans were wondering what was up with Lamby, the rescue she adopted in 2013. The Girls alum gave them an answer on Wednesday: She gave away the troubled pup in March.

“A lot of you have been asking where Lamby is these days since he’s always been the star of my gram and I’ve been posting pics of my poodle girls,” Dunham wrote. “Well, you know honesty is my jam but this one has been really heartbreaking to talk about. But I feel I have to share that last March, after four years of challenging behavior and aggression that could not be treated with training or medication or consistent loving dog ownership, Lamby went to live at an amazing professional facility in Los Angeles @matt_thezendog where an awesome person named @therealdanishay (who is educated in a rescue dog’s specific trauma) loves him so hard.”

A lot of you have been asking where Lamby is these days since he's always been the star of my gram and I've been posting pics of my poodle girls. Well, you know honesty is my jam but this one has been really heartbreaking to talk about. But I feel I have to share that last March, after four years of challenging behavior and aggression that could not be treated with training or medication or consistent loving dog ownership, Lamby went to live at an amazing professional facility in Los Angeles @matt_thezendog where an awesome person named @therealdanishay (who is educated in a rescue dog's specific trauma) loves him so hard. Lamby suffered terrible abuse as a pup that made having him in a typical home environment dangerous to him and others- we needed to be responsible to ourselves, our neighbors and especially our beloved boy. Jack and I will miss him forever but sometimes when you love something you have to let it go (especially when it requires tetanus shots and stitches.) Someday I'll really write about the pain and relief of letting Lamby go off and really be Lamby, biting and peeing in his own mouth and all. There were so many lessons in it, about forgiving myself and loving with an open palm and giving in to a larger plan. Shout out to @jennikonner for listening to endless hours of Lamby pain, and especially my partner @jackantonoff for loving him even when he ruined floors and couches and our life. Jack knows what Lamby means to me and he let me come to the decision in my own time even when it made his days challenging. Susan & Karen will never be my first loves, but they are fuzzy and hilarious stuffing for the hole Lamby left and we cherish them deeply ??#lamby #thefirstcutisthedeepest #foreverlamb PS If you have a similar situation, please know its possible to responsibly re-home your rescue rather than sending them back into the shelter system. It can require patience, diligence and often a financial contribution but there are solutions that leave everyone happy and safe. You will always have been your dog's first stop outside shelter life and that's beautiful.

A post shared by Lena Dunham (@lenadunham) on Jun 20, 2017 at 9:33pm PDT

“Lamby suffered terrible abuse as a pup that made having him in a typical home environment dangerous to him and others- we needed to be responsible to ourselves, our neighbors and especially our beloved boy. Jack and I will miss him forever but sometimes when you love something you have to let it go (especially when it requires tetanus shots and stitches.)

“Someday I’ll really write about the pain and relief of letting Lamby go off and really be Lamby, biting and peeing in his own mouth and all,” she wrote. “There were so many lessons in it, about forgiving myself and loving with an open palm and giving in to a larger plan. Shout out to @jennikonner for listening to endless hours of Lamby pain, and especially my partner @jackantonoff for loving him even when he ruined floors and couches and our life. Jack knows what Lamby means to me and he let me come to the decision in my own time even when it made his days challenging. Susan & Karen will never be my first loves, but they are fuzzy and hilarious stuffing for the hole Lamby left and we cherish them deeply.”

Dunham adopted Lamby from the Brooklyn animal rescue BARC, and it made headlines at the time as he started showing up on her social media accounts. Oh, and in Vogue magazine spreads. The dog had an Instagram account with 17,500 followers, including fashionable ones like the editor-in-chief of Glamour mag, Cindi Lieve.

Issues arose almost immediately after Dunham brought home the dog, however, which she detailed in a piece for the New Yorker in March 2013. Lamby, which she described as “a golden sausage with the most human eyes I’ve ever seen on a non-human” and “perfect,” didn’t like her boyfriend, Jack Antonoff. The first night the dog, which had three homes before Lena’s, met the musician, he bit him.

“Tears stream down my face. What have I done?” Dunham wrote of having doggie regrets just two months after adopting the pooch. “We had such a nice life. The first real comfort I’ve known in so long. Nights were quiet and sweet, and we slept until whatever o’clock we wanted, then sat on the couch in our underwear and planned the day.” Nonetheless, she vowed to take care of the troubled pup. “‘I’m not going anywhere,’ I tell Lamby,” she wrote.

A year later, Dunham posted a photo on Instagram of her bleeding behind, which Lamby bit. She said it was the second time the dog had attacked her.

Lena Dunham shared a photo of her bloody panties after Lamby bit her behind. (Photo: Lena Dunham via Instagram)
Lena Dunham shared a photo of her bloody panties after Lamby bit her behind. (Photo: Lena Dunham via Instagram)

She revealed that it was the second time the dog had bit her. Gawker ran a piece blasting the actress, saying the dog should be taken from her due to insufficient care. She defended her doggie care on social media.

The oddest part of this doggie saga, however, is that Dunham, who was dealing with a dog with severe trauma, then got two more dogs. In February, she officially introduced her six-month old poodle puppies, Susan and Karen, on the Tonight Show . The sweet animals stole the show as she talked about how one of them is Jewish and the other Italian. One is goth, the other loves rap. One is a Minka Kelly superfan while the other loves her Chris Pine.

In her post about saying goodbye to Lamby, Dunham doesn’t detail how the three got along together, but judging from the fact Lamby went on a permanent vacation soon after, it doesn’t seem like they were a jolly, happy family.

Now that they’ve parted ways, we hope that both Lena and Lamby find the happiness that they couldn’t find with each other.


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