Poor Sky - rat in a straight jacket

[olivia]

Poor Sky - yesterday she went in to have two big lumps removed from between her front legs.

I asked the vet not to glue the wound as it makes it itchy so they are much more likely to chew it, but the vet went ahead anyway.

I got her out when I got her home last night to find she'd chewed the stitches right out and had a nice big open wound, so straight back to the vets who restitched her last night. They kept her in overnight but by this morning she had them out again. So another anesthetic and she was stitched a third time and this time they've put a wound dressing on. Except because it is so far forward it's really restricting her movement. She is on UNHAPPY rat.

Although she does look SO funny - so here are some pics!!!




Aren't I a wicked mum....

[nic]

awwwwww they look cute!!
poor lil thing!

[nars]

Aww, she looks like she has a cute, little jacket on. I hope she heals quickly.

[zeldalithgow]

Oh poor Sky, but she does look very cute in her little jacket

[leannwithconnie]

Aww bless her!!
Poor little girl. Hope it all heals quickly.

[tinkerdorisalison]

she does not look impressed!

there ought to be something like they put on dogs and cats (like a big cone)

[harveydales]

Awwww, bless! Looks like the vet did a good bandaging job.

[PonyGirl]

Poor bugger. I do hope it heals quick.

[valerie n scout]

yeh healing vibes to her, she does looked a bit miffed tho xxx

[Debbie]

Oooh, she looks ticked. So how long do you think before she chews through the straight jacket? Afterall, you did warn them.....

Fingers crossed for a fast mending at this point

[olivia]

Well she is now in sooooooooooooo much trouble.

She has been really distressed by it all, and I was getting very worried about her eating and drinking so I gave in and took her straight jacket off (rats heal phenomenally fast (once had a rat post lump removal who was completely healed in under a week - it's really freaky!) so 36hrs is quite a long time). Instead of eating or drinking (or even going to explore the floor where I put her) she sat there and ripped her stitches open again - she was looking so good too - all the skin was starting to knit together.

SO - she's back in her straight jacket in a tiny carrier. She's not a happy bunny, but if I leave her be she'll just make it worse and worse.

I don't want to even think about what the bill is going to be - two lots of emergency surgery isn't going to be cheap :/

Olivia

[cadeby]

You could try making her an Elizabethan collar out of a yoghurt pot. She'd spend so much time tying to chew her way through the plastic it might give the wound a chance to heal?

Hope she gets better soon, she's a beautiful rat.

Helen

[olivia]

Unfortunately buster/Elizabethan collars don't really work on rats. Because their heads are very narrow (as narrow as their neck/shoulders) they are virtually impossible to keep them on (it's why rats can get through teeny tiny holes into your feedbins )

If you do keep them on the rats are normally so distressed that they go bananas and injure themselves further - also they cannot eat or drink at all with one on.

She's just taken her jacket off again and has really opened the wound up. So I've redressed it AGAIN and I'll take her back in in the morning. Little ..... Monkey (that was SO not my first choice of word there!)

[Debbie]

Oh dear.... I wish I could give you some advice, but there's no way to even fit a proper muzzle if you wanted.

Do calmatives work at all with ratties? She must be getting awfully distressed through all of this. I know ignatia amara tablets work well for that.

Silly Sky, keep your knitting on so you'll heal sooner

[Daftmare]

You could try smearing in with manuka honey which will make it heal in double quick time and also prevent any infection