Catching up #1 - RIP Wilfred, 1996 - 2007
Oct. 22nd, 2007 01:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jim_pWell, last week was one of the busiest in recent memory, both personally and at the shop... I'll break this up into several posts to do justice to each theme.
I'll do the sad post first: I had to have my pet rabbit put down last week. He was almost twelve years old, which is OLD for a bunny. He had been having progressive mobility problems for about a year. He'd been less and less able to groom himself and he'd started to have problems getting around.
Last weekend he had another serious downturn -- he wasn't able to get his feet under him at all. He'd be lying on his side and would kick frantically but couldn't stand up. Whenever he tried this he would then stop and pant in obvious severe pain.
Took him to the vet and they put him on prednisone to try and get the joints working again, but after a week there was no change whatsoever. Friday I went to the vet at closing time (when they do all their euthanizing). They said they'd take him out back to do it, but I asked if I could be present. I feel it's part of my duty to animals in my care -- if I'm going to have them put down then I want to be with them to the very end. They warned me that euthanizing rabbits is not quite as pretty as dogs and cats. Since it's very hard to get a needle into a vein, what they do is put them under heavy sedation and then inject directly into the heart. I felt that I could handle it, and I did. They were very nice about it.
I took him back home and buried him in the northwest corner of the yard. According to at least one school of feng shui, this is the corner for one's ancestors and therefore an auspicious location for burial.
That's not his picture in the userpic, BTW -- I'll have to dig to find a picture for him.
I'll do the sad post first: I had to have my pet rabbit put down last week. He was almost twelve years old, which is OLD for a bunny. He had been having progressive mobility problems for about a year. He'd been less and less able to groom himself and he'd started to have problems getting around.
Last weekend he had another serious downturn -- he wasn't able to get his feet under him at all. He'd be lying on his side and would kick frantically but couldn't stand up. Whenever he tried this he would then stop and pant in obvious severe pain.
Took him to the vet and they put him on prednisone to try and get the joints working again, but after a week there was no change whatsoever. Friday I went to the vet at closing time (when they do all their euthanizing). They said they'd take him out back to do it, but I asked if I could be present. I feel it's part of my duty to animals in my care -- if I'm going to have them put down then I want to be with them to the very end. They warned me that euthanizing rabbits is not quite as pretty as dogs and cats. Since it's very hard to get a needle into a vein, what they do is put them under heavy sedation and then inject directly into the heart. I felt that I could handle it, and I did. They were very nice about it.
I took him back home and buried him in the northwest corner of the yard. According to at least one school of feng shui, this is the corner for one's ancestors and therefore an auspicious location for burial.
That's not his picture in the userpic, BTW -- I'll have to dig to find a picture for him.
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