Matilda was just a puppy when she first arrived at the Douglas County Animal Shelter. Even though the tiny pit bull was being brought to the shelter, the staff couldn’t help but notice how happy she was. The little girl was so excitable that she couldn’t stop her tail from wagging.

Matilda’s bubbling exuberance threw shelter workers off guard. They couldn’t believe how friendly she was after her rough start in life. The sweet pup spent her first two months of life as a stray dog on the often unforgiving streets of Georgia. When she was discovered by shelter workers, her belly was full of worms and she had a terribly irritating skin condition.

Even though the pit bull pup was looking the worse for wear, her tiny tail just kept on moving.

A volunteer with the shelter, Satina Sanders, couldn’t help but catch Matilda’s case of “the wags” on video and share it to social media.

In an interview with The Dodo, Sanders expounds on how heart-meltingly adorable the little pit bull was from the very start.

“She gave the most sweetest kisses. She was the cutest thing ever!”

Thankfully for Matilda, Sanders wasn’t the only person who found the pit bull too cute for words.

The New York-based rescue group, Pibbles & More, reached out to Sanders after they saw Matilda’s video debut. They were absolutely in love with the little girl. Teresa Bowles-Chiofalo, one of several of the groups coordinators, wasn’t about to leave Matilda in the shelter.

So, she arranged to have the adorable, tiny pit bull placed in a foster home, instead. When she got there to retrieve the little pup, though, she couldn’t believe her tail. The puppy was so thrilled to be getting out of the shelter that her tail didn’t cease to wag even once. Not for the entire 1 ½ hour car ride!

“The dictionary definition of ‘joy’ is: ‘noun: a feeling of great pleasure and happiness’ This is the picture next to that definition in the dictionary. Matilda. She is pure, pure joy,” the rescue group wrote on their Facebook.

Teresa lovingly drove the small pit bull pup to the new foster home she had arranged.

A kind woman named Kerri Rich agreed to foster the puppy until she could find her forever home. What she didn’t count on was falling helplessly in love with Matilda the moment she laid eyes on her.

“She wags her tail so hard that she walks crooked,” Rich laughs about her foster pup.

Rich and Matilda got along great! Matilda couldn’t be happier to be with her new foster mom. Rich soon found out, though, that there was one thing in this world the pit bull definitely did not like; her collar.

The second that she put Matilda’s new bling around her neck, her tiny tail fell down. For the first time since anyone had met her, the pittie’s tail had stopped wagging. Her foster human could only assume that her skin wasn’t healed up enough yet for the collar. Worried it might be causing the sweet baby pain, she immediately removed it.

As soon as the collar was off, the tiny pit bull’s tail went right back to wagging.

As anyone might have expected when caring for such an adorable little girl, Matilda’s foster mom took the leap and adopted the excitable little pup. Now, she spends her days helping her human brother do his homework and snuggling with her other doggy siblings.

Thanks to the kindness and compassion of the shelter, its volunteers, and of course, Matilda’s humans, she will never be on the streets again. Now she gets to know what it’s like to have food in her belly, a roof over her head, and to be surrounded by love.

We are so happy that Matilda found her forever family, and that her little tail keeps on wagging. If you’re thinking of adopting, please consider checking out Pibbles & More so you can be another pup’s hero.

To learn more about this incredibly happy little dog, watch the video below.

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H/T: Animal Channel