Ryan Fischer, dog walker for Lady Gaga when he was shot by thieves attempting to abduct the star’s dogs, is opening up about his ordeal.
On Friday’s edition of “CBS This Morning”, Fischer sat down with Gayle King to share how a routine walk with the pop star’s French bulldogs changed his life irrevocably.
Recalling the incident for King, when he heard a car that “screeched” to a halt he knew immediately “that they were stopping for me.”
RELATED: Lady Gaga’s Dog Walker Ryan Fischer Opens Up About Enduring Trauma From Being Shot
Watching CCTV video of the encounter, Fischer described his state of mind at the moment he felt the bullet tear through him. “I was scared, I was in pain. I had a feeling when they came up and pulled the gun on me I was going to be shot because in my mind I was like there’s no way I am not going to fight for these dogs,” he said.
“I was shot once. But because I was reaching forward it went through right here next to my neck above my clavicle and went out below my shoulder blade because I was horizontal reaching,” he continued. “It went through and pierced my lung. I remember being on the operating table, it was a team of eight people all around the table working on me trying to get the chest tube in. Once they got the chest tube in blood just spurted out on the doctor next to me and everyone’s faces just dropped and I heard my blood pressure drop I looked at the machine. The people in the ER who I saw that night told me they didn’t think I would survive that night.”
Surgeons wound removing “the top third” of his lung,” he said, in addition to “a portion of the bottom of it.”
RELATED: Lady Gaga’s Dog Walker, Ryan Fischer, Says Healing Hasn’t ‘Been Easy To Navigate’
During the interview, King asked about how Gaga has supported him through his difficult recovery.
“She has helped me so much, she has been a friend for me and after I was attacked my family was flown out and I had trauma therapists flown to me and I stayed at her house for months while friends comforted me and security was around me,” he said.
As King pointed out, Fischer’s subsequent launch of a GoFundMe led to speculation that he wasn’t receiving any support from Gaga. According to Fischer, that’s not the case.
“LG is very supportive of my journey right now and I think it is hard for people to understand why someone would go about healing in this way. I grew up Catholic, a Jesuit faith, and there is something about giving up your resources, giving up belongings, and to contribute that to society, so I know that doesn’t make sense to a lot of people but she totally gets it,” he said.
For the next stage of his healing journey, Fischer told King that he’s planning to attend “a trauma retreat for first responders and people from the army and police. I feel a bit of an outsider because I am a civilian but I also welcome hearing their stories and me sharing in my own and feeling what that feels like to share in stories of trauma and grief to then go forward.”
Despite the trauma, Fischer told King, “I feel good about my life. I am in a good space mentally as I have done the work to embrace this part of myself.”
