# Rats and their short life-spans..heartbreak?



## euphoria (Oct 4, 2012)

Hello, I am a big animal lover and am contemplating getting some ratties because after researching them I feel they are wonderful pets and the only negative I have come across is their short life spans. Is the heart-break worth it? The animals I have and have had have lived for an average of 10 years. I feel like I would be heart-broken to only have rats for 2-3(sometimes 4-5?) years.
I know I can get over it and see it as a part of life but I'm just wondering what you guys think.


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## SIN_sarah (Aug 25, 2012)

I guess it is a sacrafice that you need to make when you decide to get rats. For me the heart-break is worth it even tho i still cry sometimes now when i think about all my rats that have died. I must admit i have kinda got use to the fact that they dont live long, and im guessing most other people would be the same, but it donsnt make it easier i can jst accept the fact now. Just try not to think too much about how long you have with them because in the end they are one of the most loving, cute, friendly pets that you could ever own and i dont think i could ever give them up, it becomes an obsession.


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## Rat Daddy (Sep 25, 2011)

My first thought is that losing loved ones is a two way street. I just adopted a sweet loving rattie from a family that didn't want her anymore. After seven months of bonding and falling in love with a family, only to wind up being neglected and cast out seems pretty sad and lonely too. Perhaps ratties should wonder if it's worth having humans. 

Otherwise...

I think the short life span makes the rat a self-limiting design. Many people think of rats as prey animals, but I have my serious doubts. If you have ever seen just how capable an adult wild rat is, it's easy to see how it really has very few natural enemies of concern. Between big teeth and sharp claws, keen senses, lightning fast reflexes a wonderful compliment of adaptive instincts, camoflage, digging abilities, climbing skills and a finely tuned metacognative brain there isn't much thats going to take out a rattie especially if it travels with the added protection of a pack.

If rats got too old, they would easily overpopulate and corrupt their environments as well as have old non-reproductive adults competeing with their own offspring. In short, like humans, they would eventually take themselves out of history. Also having a short lifespan helps the species deal with feast and famine cycles, fast reproduction lets them take advantage of good times and spread quickly while short lifespan adjusts the population downwards when food is scarce without the need for mass starvation. Rats also don't reproduce very abundantly durning famines. Unlike a human child dying at two years old, buy this point a rattie has lived a rich and full life. It's life on fast forward.

I raised annual fish from temporary pools of water that dry up every year. Some have a 13 week lifespan birth to death. It's a kindness because otherwise they would all die as their enviornment evaporated, very likely living just long enough to eat their own eggs and wipe out the species.

Rodents have millions of years of selective genetic design tweaks that actually make them about as perfectly adaptable as any species is likely to get.

That said, we need to accept that the design is right overall, and that ratties can lead a very full and enriched life in the time they have. They have moms, and families, they love to explore and learn new stuff they make friends and care for each other and as far as pet rats go they absorb and return our love. I suppose the only sadness I feel is for rats trapped alone in cages to watch their lives blow by helplessly. If you took good care of your rattie and gave it a happy home and lots of opportunity to explore and play it's leaving this earth with a pretty full life lived, so it's not really as sad as it feels to us. After you raise a few generations of annual fish and you see how they live their whole lives in a matter of months, you realize that they don't miss anything that their long lived counterparts enjoy.... they just go through it faster skipping the down time.

Are rats worth the awful sadness that comes all too soon? No, nothing is worth the grief, literally nothing is even close to worse, except losing a human best friend or family member and the difference is in shades of black.

On the other hand... the reason you are grieving is because you had such a great rattie friend in the first place. Like dogs, your rats return unconditional love. They become your friends and family members. Would it be better never to have had a mom, or a best friend or a dad or a lover or a child because it meant that you would most likely lose them some day? The more appropriate question isn't are rats worth having because the die so soon. It's 'are rats worth having because they give us so much we would miss without them'. Rats aren't designed to be your best friend forever, they come and brighten your life and then they move on having lived theirs and a new rattie is born that needs your love and care just as much and will love you just as much as your old best friend did. If you look at your ratties generationally it's not so bad, instead of one BFF, you get to have several.

So perhaps, by a matter of who we are as humans and rats... it is far better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.


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## CapnKennedy (Sep 30, 2012)

I think its worth it. It's better to have loved and lost to have never have loved at all. 

Just realized Rat Daddy said that but I'm still putting it down anyway XD


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## Raturday (May 26, 2012)

It's a double edged sword, but in the end, I think it's worth it. It's very sad to lose them, but their wonderful personalities, cute quirks, intelligent behavior, and the overwhelming amount of love they can give you is too good to pass up. They're like family.


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## IOVERATS (Aug 25, 2012)

Rats are just like us, they will pass on someday, and coming to terms with it can be difficult. But when you accept it, it makes it a whole lot easier, my cousins first two boys were her best buddies, she was 10 and people were bullying her. She didn't care much for rats at the time, believing in those horrible people who say they were vermin. But her parents tried to stop the bullying but instead it got worse, the school did nothing to stop it, and so the bullying escalated until they were beating her up, throwing stones at her. And as a kid her mum had, had three male rats and the breeder who she got them from was having her last litter before she retired from it, so they quickly rung her up, but all her boys and girls were taken, they searched for other nearby breeders but found none. Then a week later the breeder rang up and said that the person who was going to get the rats was allergic to them and he said that he couldn't keep them, so she got these sweet little boys. And she was overjoyed! They were amazing! They free ranged around her bedroom whilst she did homework at her desk, but they would climb up the chair and onto her shoulder and sat there, then they would run around her desk knocking stuff over and they were amazing! They loved her more than anything!They lived until 2, she came running in from school to see them, and she saw Moo licking Otis, Otis was lying so still, my cousin ran up to her room and burst into tears she couldn't stop crying, her parents told me to come round so I did, and I tried to stop her from crying, I told her that pets are friends and then they move onto a newer place, I said 'You know that you change their cage around every week, well this is their way of doing this, and Moo really needs you know. It stopped her from crying but she hasn't ever gotten over their deaths. They brightened her life up so much, they brought happiness that she would have otherwise never had of got. Moo died of depression three days later. She cuddled Moo all day at the weekend and she pretended she was ill on Monday to have Moo out all day, she took him upstairs with her when she went to bed and cuddled him, knowing she was going to lose him, she was scared to go to sleep, and when she felt his heart thump more slowly she cuddled him against her face and he slipped away. She cried so much, she couldn't stop, they were more than friends they family, brothers, she couldn't face it, they only lived for 2 years. So rats haven't got many flaws but their lifespan is right up the top of the list. I am not going to answer that question because its up to you how you view this, you may feel like it's not but I know I do, I'm getting my first pair of boys soon and I'm not thinking about death. You have to look at what you have now and accept that one day you will lose them. I know it may sound harsh but of course you will cry and you will be devastated but I accept that they don't live long and will only look to the near future with them.The rat stops gnawing in the wood, the dungeon walls withdraw, the weight is lifted your pulse steadies and the sun has found your heart, the day was not bad, the season has not been bad, there is sense and even promise in going on.This quote reminds me of my cousin for so many reasons, but I don't know why. Rats are friends, family and like Rat Daddy said, they come to brighten your life, not to stay forever.... Like the other people have said- Its better to have loved and lost than never loved at all.

2 years old sounds so young to us, because we can live for awhile compared to rats and other small pets, but at 2 they have already done more stuff then we could ever do. They have met more people than we would, they have explored more stuff then we would do at this age. For us to die at 2 would be horrible, we wouldn't have had a full life but a rat has, this is where we think that 2 is young, but for a rat, it really isn't!


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## IOVERATS (Aug 25, 2012)

Rat Daddy said:


> My first thought is that losing loved ones is a two way street. I just adopted a sweet loving rattie from a family that didn't want her anymore. After seven months of bonding and falling in love with a family, only to wind up being neglected and cast out seems pretty sad and lonely too. Perhaps ratties should wonder if it's worth having humans.
> 
> Otherwise...
> 
> ...


I cried at this  It was very inspiring and thank you for posting


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## RatzRUs (Feb 5, 2012)

I'm just going to put this out there. I believe rats are worth having. It's not the matter on how short their life span is. If everyone stopped having rats because of this reason none would have loving homes. I love mine dearly,but I also know I give them a full life everytime. They are loved very much and well cared for. Yes it hurts when they leave. It's heartbreak,but I always think of it like this everything has too leave us one day as well as us. I will always see my beloved animals again. They live short lives so that we,the people who know their true personalitys can save more. They leave too let us have another one that may need too be saved. People always get grossed out when they find out I own rats,but I just look at them and say have you ever owned one? When they say no I tell them you have no idea what you are missing out on. I suffer from extreme depression I should be on medicane for it,but since I have no health care I can't. When I got my rats I realized how great they are as anti depressants. I don't think I will ever sto having rats as pets and when I reach 80 i will be them oldest woman too own them! Lol. I it worth owning them because their life span is so short? Yes!!! They are!!!!


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## Ratmaster (Sep 21, 2012)

Ok so i just thought i wiuld say this.
When you lose a pet it is very heartbreaking. You see them everyday, play with them, watch them and then just like that they are gone. You really have to just accept that you gave them a great life while you could and they loved you. Thinking of that makes me feel better when losing a pet.
But to be totally onest i only greive for a day or two.i dont want to sound heartless, but acknowledging they arent coming back and that its the cycle of life does help. Also think about this...your pets wouldnt want to see you sad and grieving. They love you and care about you. If your pet could talk to you he would be telling you to move on.
Overall while losing a pet is sad i think its important to have the correct mindset. Everytime a death happens, yes its sad, but because of it dont give up on having that animal. They are still wonderful pet and you will have the satisfaction of knowing the had a full life


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## Ratmaster (Sep 21, 2012)

I hope you still will consider ratties even though they ave a short life


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## euphoria (Oct 4, 2012)

Thanks for your responses, read them all. Very encouraging. Once I heard their life is so short because it lets you experience the many personalities and different beings of ratties so it's kind of a plus!


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## binkyhoo (Sep 28, 2008)

Every rat I have ever had , had a different personality. That is a way too look at it. I cry much when I lose one, but on the other hand I have a new little life coming in to take care of. Who will this new rattie be? .......


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