Sending these heartfelt wishes youre way.
 
I missed the whole dang thing--- It was the New Year whe n shelter Dad
popped in to say it's 2006-- I had found Gravy in decline at the time of
his soup feeding & evening run so I had been down in the shelter working
on him to give him yet another shot at life.
 
Sigh This boy is on his 6th life now and I am praying he makes oit fr a
while longer with quality.  If any of you remember Gravy & his cagemate
Biscuit arrived here in 2002- abandoned for a week in a deserted mobile
home they were starved within hours of death.  We received them from a
police dept the officer who picked them up called us after the ferrets
had been stabilized.  It took a while but we got the two 3 -4 ish year
olds fat & healthy.  Gravy was clearly the worst with aggravated renal
condition form dehydration.  The about 18 mos later Gravy started
vomiting a LOT- he also had stiff coat slightly thinning - so an
exploratory was done removing massive hair from his gut, his very
enlarged spleen and the left adrenal.  Things went well for Gravy until
about 8 mos later when the adrenal symptoms returned he was losing hair
on his haunches and base of tail and rear feet-- so he has been on lupron
first and now Melatonin implant & lupron, for the past 9 months.  I
noticed the past few days he was sleeping in a round bed on the first
floor every day... Tonight I found out why- he has acute insulinoma and
it took nearly 2 hours to bring him out of his coma like state to where
he could swallow.
 
He has been stabilized.  Dosed with pred after being fed first nutrical
and the soup.  I thought that he might not even see the AM at first he
was so slow to respond.  AS I type he can motivate but is understandably
very tired after 3-4 steps.
 
Now on to Orion who though he does not have a fever did drastically
lose half his body weight after admission / transfer.  He will eat only
chicken baby food when he is fed either off a spoon of if I hold the bowl
for him.  If I try to feed ground kibble in the chicken he spits it out
and then stops eating.  I had som success with Ensure for 2 days i
addition to the chicken baby food but Orion has lost interest in that as
well.Woe is me.  I really did miss the New Year arriving -- but hope that
soon I will get a little break to see what the daylight looks like.  LOL!
 
I send belated New Year wishes to all of you on the list- and send what
little energy I have remaining to my co-shelterers who undoubtedly are
dealing with similar issues with shelter kids.
 
May the BNew Year bring us renewed energy, Happy ferret residents and a
kinder , gentler world.
 
Alicia D. www.ferretwise.org
[Posted in FML issue 5109]