A Butler Township woman’s motherly instinct drove her to put herself between her dog and a bear a year ago, March 5.

Despite suffering life-altering injuries, Lee Ann Galante, 56, said she is sometimes blamed for the bear’s death after it attacked her. But the attack and negativity didn’t stop her from traveling to Italy a month later, before she could smile after surgery.

A mother black bear attacked Galante while taking her 5- to 8-pound Pomeranian, Smokie, out around 8:30 p.m. last year, while her husband, Mark, and son, Marc, were away. Smokie is always supervised when going out, she said.

Galante and Smokie heard a commotion over the neighbor’s fence at the side of the house when stepping onto the back deck, and Smokie ran off the deck to bark at it, as he would with any deer or small animal.

While Smokie barked, Galante noticed three dark silhouettes moving in the neighbor’s maple tree, which she later recognized as the mother bear sending her cubs up the tree to safety.

Galante said she started screaming when she saw the bear jump the neighbor’s fence and sprint toward Smokie. Galante’s screaming lured the bear to her on the deck.

When she ran to the deck stairs to retrieve Smokie, the bear climbed the deck, got behind her and pushed her onto the concrete slab at the bottom of the stairs which crushed her nose, upper jaw and sinuses. The bear then began clawing at the back of Galante’s head.

“I still have several deep grooves in the back of my head,” Galante said. “My scalp started to pull away from the back of my ear.”

With Galante on the ground, the bear returned to Smokie and cornered the cowering Pomeranian nose-to-nose. Galante regained her footing and screamed at the bear again. It ran over and knocked her down again next to the back door and bit her arm. The neighbors did not hear her screams.

The bear briefly left the deck with Galante lying next to the back door long enough for her to get up, grab Smokie and get into the house while the bear climbed back up to the deck.

Galante said she almost froze in fear before opening the door, worrying the bear would follow her into the house, but the two entered successfully. Smokie ran upstairs to hide, while Galante crawled to the phone.

“There was so much blood,” Galante said.

The 911 operator on the phone with a hysterical Galante told her an officer was in the area and asked if she could crawl to open the front door. An officer arrived quickly after Galante reluctantly opened the door fearing the bear would find its way around the house.

A neighbor came over when she saw police outside, but Galante wanted her to check on Smokie first. Galante said only after checking on Smokie, who escaped with a claw to the back, did she allow her neighbor to help clean the blood throughout the kitchen and main area.

Galante was taken to Butler Memorial Hospital, where they stapled her wounds before transferring her to Allegheny General Hospital.

Galante had a surgical plate inserted in the right side of her mouth and another on the left during upper-jaw and sinus surgery, after the initial swelling reduced. She was on a no-chew diet for nine weeks and still has numbness on the left side of her face, deep scars on the back of her head and a few slight bald spots.

Even after facing a bear, Galante admitted missing her 12-day “cousins trip” to Italy was in the back of her mind. She and Marc planned to meet her cousins in her grandparents’ homeland. She told her doctors immediately about her trip the next month.

“My doctors worked so hard to get me to where I was able to fly,” Galante said.

The flight went smoothly, despite worries about her sinuses, and she said the trip was wonderful. Her family said Galante was almost able to smile by the end of the trip.

Galante planned to buy Italian gold as a trip souvenir, so she decided on a gold chain with a charm in the shape of a bear.

Galante said when she thinks of the attack, the image of Smokie being nose-to-nose with a bear comes to mind first.

“I could not let (Smokie) get eaten by the bear,” Galante said. “He did not deserve that.”

She said neighbors tell her often when they see bears in their doorbell cameras or in the backyard.

She and Smokie recovered with no post-traumatic stress, but now her husband takes the dog out at night.

“People think we live in the woods. We live in a residential neighborhood,” Galante said. “We’re a mile outside Butler city.”

Travis Lau, a Pennsylvania Game Commission spokesperson, said it’s still early in the year for bear sightings, but another attack occurred about a month ago in Jim Thorpe, Pa. He said the bear was rabid in that attack. Bears are usually put down if they attack someone.

“I feel so guilty they had to kill the mommy bear,” Galante said. “It breaks my heart because I love animals.”

Galante said, along with the cards she’s received wishing her a speedy recovery, she’s also received comments from people blaming her for the bear’s death. Some thought the bear’s cubs also were killed.

“When a dog attacks someone, you put the dog down,” she said.

Galante said bears are put down after an attack because it turns into a learned behavior. If a bear gets away with attacking a person, they will likely become more territorial and do it again, she said.

Pennsylvania usually sees one or two bear attacks per year, with most involving a third animal, like dogs, Lau said. Pennsylvania’s black bears are somewhat passive and generally avoid confrontation, he said.

“When a person is attacked by a bear, it’s almost attacked as a result of trying to break up the attack with a dog,” Lau said. “I think pet owners, in general, are reluctant to stand there and watch an attack take place.”

He said the best way to avoid a bear confrontation is to hide backyard items that would attract them, like bird feeders, grills and garbage. Feeding bears is illegal in Pennsylvania.

Lau said in most cases, a bear will leave when it sees a person nearby, unless they become accustomed to people or associate them with being fed.

“They’re animals to always be respected,” Lau said. “They’re big, strong and fast with sharp teeth and claws.”