From:
"cherylnj81"
Date: 2009-03-01 20:43:58 UTC
Subject: [ferrethealth] Linus is gone :(
To: ferrethealth@yahoogroups.com
He did so well yesterday, only vomited/regurgitated once and we
thought maybe the heavy duty doses of Metaclopramide were starting to
work, so this morning we gave him a little more Ensure and maybe he
choked on it? I am trying not to blame myself, he probably had worse
aspiration pneumonia than we realized and maybe he was too weak
yesterday to bother vomiting anymore.
He started breathing pretty heavy this morning after eating, like
open-mouth breathing, so we brought him to a local vet to spend some
time in their oxygen cage. This happened the other day and the oxygen
helped him, his breathing was fine after that. But this time when we
brought him back out he was making sounds with each breath, the vet
was not sure if he was wheezing or crying, so we decided to euthanize
him right there. My ferret vet wanted me to wait until tommorrow to
bring Linus to him, but he wasn't there to see what bad shape he was
in. Then after she gave him the sedative before the other drugs, his
breathing calmed down a lot. So I had second thoughts, and I told her
we would take him home and go to an emergency vet if the breathing got
worse again.
When we were coming in to the house, I noticed his breaths were coming
further and further apart, and then he stopped all together from what
we could tell. We've spent some time trying to figure out if he is
just unconscious or breathing very very shallowly (the vet said he
would sleep 3-4 hours and his body temperature would lower so we
weren't sure what we were seeing). We are pretty sure he is gone now
though, based on some universal signs of death. This was a long
battle and such a frustrating fight for me, and I wish we could have
tried the feeding tube, but I guess when he 'heard' about that he was
like, "No way, I love food too much".
We are having a necropsy done tommorrow in the hopes he can help
future ferrets with megaesophagus.
Ten days ago, I wouldn't believe in my wildest dreams that he would be
gone, but he is.
[Moderator's reminder:
even though sympathy messages that do not contain new
health content can not be posted publicly on the FHL, know
that you can always wrote directly to people to help them
with their grief, and everyone appreciates such kindnesses.]
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