# my babes, dani and soph



## Sassmasteroli (Apr 24, 2014)

Well I've had a tough time lately, here's why

My oldest rat, Sophie, got put down last month, she was 3 years and 1 month, so she lived quite a while. She was one of my very first rats and I was and still am extremely devastated that she's gone, it's incredibly weird not seeing her little face when I go in to feed them, play with them or clean them out. Sophie had a tough year, she lost her cage mate and suffered a stroke because of it. She made a nice recovery, still had a head tilt but it didn't do her any harm, she was on medication for a while because the vet thought it might've been an ear infection. After a few months, she started deteriorating slowly, going scrawny and she wasn't putting on weight. We noticed a small cut on her nose and we thought that one of my other rats had bitten her, because they can be a little rough at times. The next morning we noticed her scab had come off so we moved her to a different cage so she wouldn't get infection in it or anything and booked her in the vets. The vet told us it was an abscess so she put her on medication and eventually it did heal over and she seemed perfectly fine, a few days later I noticed she was hanging out of her hut, I thought nothing of it, because she does sleep weirdly sometimes. When she came out, she practically fell down the side of her food bowl and she hadn't moved for at least 20 minutes, when I noticed this I moved the food bowl out of the way and called mum to ring the vets. It wasn't easy saying goodbye to her, because she was one of my first rats and she changed my view of them completely and I'll always love her for that. She was put to sleep on the 15th December 2014, after hanging on for dear life and not giving up without a fight, it seemed she had possibly suffered another stroke or something, because she couldn't move from her curled up position.









Sophie (3rd November 2011 - 15th December 2014)

I suffered yet another loss with my heart rat, I absolutely adored her and I'm still extremely sensitive over her death. Danielle was 2 years and 8 months old, I bought her and Cameron a couple of months into 2012 after Sophie and Melanie. Danielle was a lovely rat and she was loving and laid back, she'd let you do anything to her basically. Dani was a complete shock because I never expected her to go, she suffered with a lump but we didn't think anything of it, it wasn't growing and it didn't affect her, we took her to the vets and the vet drained some of the puss out of it to send it off for testing. The vet rang us a few days later asking how dani was doing, but no test results, so we assumed it was nothing and it was okay to just keep giving her the medication she had prescribed for her. It was about a week later when we noticed the lump had burst, covering her fur and everything in blood/puss, so we booked her back into the vet, I was pretty mad for a while and blamed the vets, because they never told us the test results, and I'm assuming it could've been nothing or it could've been something. We took her back into the vets and the vet drained the rest of the lump and put her on more medication and told us the choice of leaving it or getting it operated on. I took some time to think about it, and I was going to go for the operation once she was healthier and put some weight on, but dani wasn't acting like herself and it was obvious that the abscess / lump had affected her inside too, so she deteriorated slowly, and one morning she seemed fine, later that day i noticed her ears were drooping and she just wasn't well enough any more, so we had her put down that same day. I got to say good bye to her but it was even more painful with Dani than it was with Mel or Sophie, because I got to have some time with her and cuddle her before they took her in, she fell asleep on me and everything and it hurt so much, it was unbearable.









Danielle (18th May 2012 - 13th January 2015)

It's also an extremely difficult time because it'll be a year for my first rat who died on the 22nd February 2014, so I'm not in the best place rodent-wise.
I miss my girls so much.


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## DustyRat (Jul 9, 2012)

That's shitty news to hear. Hope you get some more ratties to fill the gap.


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## Sassmasteroli (Apr 24, 2014)

at the moment I have three girls, I don't quite have enough room for any others. I plan on looking into buying some more maybe next year, when I have enough space for other cages.


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## redcoat (Jun 7, 2014)

So sorry for your losses.


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## Jessiferatu (Apr 30, 2014)

So sorry. (((hugs)))


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