It is with a heavy heart that I write to you all.  Phoenix, the ferret
that survived massive blood loss from surgery complications, my miracle
child who was dead and then alive, beyond all expectations, who earned
his name, Phoenix has been helped to the Bridge.
 
After the horrible events of his double adrenal, where the vena cava fell
apart and was put back together, Phoenix recovered with amazing speed.  He
was back to his obnoxious, stubborn, super energy self in record time.  He
was put on a low dose of pred a few days after surgery when he started to
crash.  The pred did the trick.  He never needed Florinef.  The one
problem he had was that he wouldn't gain any weight back.  He was terribly
thin.  I hadn't realized that he was actually losing weight; I just
thought that Chris, his cagemate, was gaining weight finally.
 
Then one night, as I went to give Phoenix his pred, I found his tummy
messy and as I cleaned him up, I saw that he was leaking pus from his
bladder.  He also wouldn't take his meds, even in the heavy cream that
he loved.  Off to the vet he went.  I had to drop him off and go to work,
but the news wasn't long in coming: best case scenario it was a massive
infection and worst case scenario it was renal failure.
 
As I was scheduled to take a weekend trip to visit relatives, Yvonne of
Fuzztek agreed to take him home with her (Bless her!).  He was started on
injectable baytril and fluids.  The only thing she could get into him was
ensure.  This went on for almost a week, with Phoenix remaining active and
alert the whole time.  Yesterday, October 31st, he was taken back in to be
checked.  The antibiotics hadn't done a thing.  He weighed a half a pound.
Yvonne decided that he was now suffering.  He was put to sleep.  Necropsy
found half-sized kidneys, a pus-filled bladder (sorry to be graphic), and
an odd spot on one lung that looked like a 'cigarette burn'.  The lung
will be sent for pathology.
 
I will pick Phoenix up as soon as I am able to bring him home (I go for
gall stone surgery tomorrow.) He deserves a loving burial after all he's
been through.  He was only here a couple of months, having been dumped at
a Petco with a companion, both older and with advanced adrenal.  In that
short time though, he worked his way into my heart and has now taken a big
piece of it with him.  I'm going to miss that skinny, stubborn, head shy
brat.  I miss him already.
 
Anastasia Kidd
[Posted in FML issue 3589]