Which is why, this past Monday night, when I got home from work to find Snicks laying around lethargically with his eyes barely open, I panicked. From the minute I walked in the door, I just knew something was not right. At first I thought maybe I had just woken him up mid-nap, but when I returned home after my exercise class one hour later and he had not moved, I knew something was wrong. I tried to lure him up with a banana (his favorite treat), I tried annoying him into movement... I tried everything to no avail. That rabbit looked awful. I checked his ears, his eyes, his nose, his teeth, his arms and legs and gave him a full-body rub down for any bumps. Nothing. Snicks laid around, would sometimes walk a few inches just to lay down elsewhere, but wasn't moving much, eating or drinking. Because his regular vet's office was closed by this time, I called the local animal ER. After being on hold for 10 minutes then hung up on, I called back to discover that the doctor on call was a dog/cat veterinarian, not a small animal care doc. Basically she said that I could bring him in and she could "take a look and see what [she] could do." No thanks. Doodle hates car rides and I didn't really want to drag him there to have his blood taken to receive no information. So I did what I knew how to do, which was stay up with him all night watching him. I drug my blanket and pillow behind the chair with him and I petted him whilst we watched "The Birds." (It's an animal movie.) I stayed up with him all night just making sure he was still breathing. Finally, the next morning, he took a couple bites of banana and started moving around more. He also let me bottle feed him some water, and he was VERY thirsty.
Never thought I'd be so excited to see Snicks eat a banana -- and poo -- in my entire life. |
THE SILENT KILLER, REALLY?!? Way to assist me in my panic. |
Definitely the best story to recount to an overprotective mother such as myself. |
The best cure for that is hay, hydration, fresh food and lots of love and attention. So I have been totally curing Snicks with my overwhelming love of him! I talked to the vet tech yesterday and she confirmed my diagnosis and told me I was doing all the right things and the only extra thing to do would be feed him pineapple juice or chunks because the acid would help break up the hair.
Needless to say Snicks has no interest in pineapples or their juices and, believe it or not, is not really a fan of being force fed. So that's where we are right now. Me wading through his poo and force feeding him pineapple chunks.
If you would have told me five years ago that at age 27 my life would consist of force feeding pineapple to a rabbit in order to get his bowels moving, I would have died of embarrassment for myself.
Yep.
No comments:
Post a Comment
I'd love to hear from you! Let me know what you think.