A mum says the beloved family dog that would share her bed at night turned on her and almost ate her alive - devouring 'half her arm' in a vicious attack.
Tya Lucas was at home showing off her new pup Roo to her friend Peter, 33, when seven-stone pitbull Hercules lunged at him, grabbing his neck with his teeth.
The 41-year-old quickly pried the dog away from Peter, pushed him into the safety of the bathroom and shut the door behind him.
But once the mum-of-one was left alone in the living room with the dog, it then turned on her.
The pit bull tore off two-thirds of Tya's right arm and ate her bicep as well as sinking its teeth into her leg and foot.
Luckily, Tya's daughter Tana, 20, and her husband Harley, 21, arrived home and Harley was able to wrestle the canine away from Tya and carry her outside where a police officer happened to be passing.
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Tya, from Lewisville, Texas, said: "The police said if I'd passed out in the house, he would have eaten me from my insides.
"A good two thirds of my arm was torn off. He ate my entire bicep.
"They said they'd seen stabbings, gunshot wounds and they've never seen what they saw that day.
"They put a tourniquet on my arm and the doctor said if he hadn't been there to do that at that exact moment then I wouldn't have made it until the ambulance got there."
Tana and Harley had found Hercules abandoned at the side of the road, covered in cigarette burns two years before.
But bartender Tya says that Hercules had never shown signs of aggression before and even slept in bed with her the night before the attack.
Tya said: "The puppy went to jump on the couch so I went to pick the puppy up and my friend told him to get down.
"The pitbull jumped on my friend's neck and he started bleeding. I was like 'what the f*ck'. He was latched onto the back of his neck.
"I got the dog off his neck, opened the bathroom door, shoved my friend in and shut the door so I was left on the outside of the bathroom with the dog.
"He must have smelled his blood all over me and started attacking me. I don't remember a lot of it. I remember looking down and my flesh being torn off my arm. I don't remember the feeling of it, I remember screaming 'Hercules, it's me'.
"I was screaming 'help me, I'm dying'. My daughter and her husband came home and could hear me screaming.
"She saw the dog was trying to kill me. She reached out her hand to me and I tried to grab it but I missed her by inches.
"It grabbed onto my leg and dragged me further away. Her husband walked in and he beat the dog off of me. I don't remember that part. I don't know if I was passing out.
"He said I was so covered in blood he couldn't tell I was a white person. He threw me over his shoulder and carried me out.
"He carried me out and sat me down. I said 'I love you' and passed out.
"I don't know how many times he bit me. I think it went on for about five minutes. I thought I was going to die. I fought somehow to stay alive."
Tya was rushed to the hospital where she was put on a ventilator for two days.
She stayed in the hospital for 19 days where she had hundreds of stitches across her arm, leg and foot and five operations to cut away dead skin.
Medics also performed a sixth operation where a muscle in her back was rolled up into the shape of a bicep and attached to her arm.
Tya has set up a GoFundMe to cover her medical bills which are £180,000 so far.
Tya said: "I woke up on a ventilator two days later.
"My arm bends a couple of inches but it's stiff. My hand is really swollen, my wrist doesn't move, there are 15 inches of nerve damage, and my nerves and tendons were crushed.
"For each inch that was damaged, it takes a month to come back. My wrist hangs there, I don't have much use of my hand.
"I had staples in my leg and under my foot. I'm in constant pain.
"I need physical therapy. The discount programme is £100 a week then there are prescriptions. I don't even know the total yet of the hospital bill yet."
Tya and Tana gave the dog to the police and it was put down. They have no idea what triggered the aggression but Tya has been left terrified of dogs.
Tya said: "He was never aggressive before. I heard him bark one time when something made him jump.
"I've no idea why this happened. He slept in bed with us. I don't know what triggered him.
"He was getting food aggression so there are things that I look back on now and realise maybe things were changing but we didn't see it. I know it's not anything that we did.
"I never had a problem with dogs but now I'm terrified of them. I can't go near dogs. If there's one off a leash, I panic [like] I'm about to have an anxiety attack."
A Lewisville Police Department spokesperson said: "Lewisville PD officers are trained in many life-saving techniques.
"Officer Jordan Potter’s actions that day show his dedication to protecting and serving the residents of Lewisville.
"Our department is proud of his life-saving actions, as well as those of Animal Control Officer Amanda Navarro who removed the dog from the house.
"This was a traumatic situation for this family and Officer Potter’s actions kept it from being a deadly situation, providing some comfort for the family."
You can donate to Tya's page here.
Do you have a dog story to share? Email paige.freshwater@reachplc.com.
