(The following message was written Saturday morning 9/21/96)
 
Hi Good Friends,
 
My heart and soul are breaking nearly completely today as in a mere 4 to 4
1/2 hours my Mom and I leave for Pendleton, Oregon to meet Ed Lapinski from
his Seattle Ferret Shelter, Ferret's Northwest I believe, to bring to him 9
of my shelter kids sick with ECE.  This man is truly my Godsend in all of
this horrribleness.  The only thing that could break my heart and soul
completely would be to lose any of my babies to the Rainbow Bridge only
because two people cannot possibly give 27 sick ferrets the complete
attention they require to beat this Damn ECE.  Yes, all 27 are ill with it
now and we cannot at all figure out where it came from originally due to
this tho we have tried and tried.
 
So with a very heavy heart and soul I will have to say goodbye to all nine
of the kids in one fell swoop.  At about 5 pm I will be holding, talking and
loving these 9 for the very last time and hoping with all my heart they can
understand that I love them with my entire heart and soul and that is why I
have to do this to them.  They will be Betty & Veronica, Kanth & Falcon,
Yacko & Wacko, Idgie, and the most painful of all Larry & Two Socks who I
feel have been with me forever.  Being as Ed's shelter has never even
attempted to place sets of three ferrets I chose to not bring him any and
instead am bringing only sets of two and Idgie who unfortunately is all
alone.  For that reason only I have kept Stryker and Mr. B here with me
since they were each a part of threesomes but seem to not be real close to
the other two and can hopefully be happy without them.  THANK the Great
Spirit that Sweetheart and Kitzka's prospective adoptive family talked over
all the ECE info.  and procedures I could give them and decided these two
babies needed them more than ever now or they too might have had to go
today.  I know taking them to Ed is best for them and that by doing this I
give them my final gift, being a much better chance to survive this awful
illness and to go on to be placed with a loving family in Washington.
Nevertheless I am dieing inside.
 
I am taking to Ed as many supplies for these furkids as I can.  I am taking
some Deliver 2.0, Science Diet A/D food, feeding syringes that arrived day
before yesterday after a rush order (THANKS Gary H.  for the info.) dry food
mix, and as much of the nutrical type supplements that I can give from the
wonderfully large donation we received from the company a long time ago.  I
hope this will help to keep them from having to spend too much to get them
well.  Also I am taking them a large bottle of Amoxy drops that we are
picking up at the pharmacy this morning.  My vet is not thrilled as appts.
are wall to wall today but is going to squeeze us in this morning to help us
quickly give Sub-Q fluids to all that need it before we go.  I'm afraid Mom
and I are so new to this that we are still a bit slow at getting it done and
we simply do not have any time to waste this morning before leaving.  I
would appreciate it if any of you out there considering donating to a
shelter soon might think of sending it to Ed's shelter for help in caring
for these 9 wonderful fursouls and as a THANK YOU from us all for being
there in the time of great need of another shelter.
 
This will leave us with 18 ferrets still here but we finally had a
brainstorm Thursday night very late and we bought the babies a large
watermelon the next morning.  All my personal kids love this and many of the
shelter kids do too.  They have been gorging on it and we are happy to see
very few of them showing signs of much dehydration now.  Out of the nine I
am taking to Ed I believe 2 or 3 are actually in very very good shape and
require little aid.  That should help too.  I need to THANK David Caudill
for taking a risk today and coming to stay with the 18 babies still here.
From noon after he is off of work until we return he will be with them.  I
was very worried to leave them alone for that long and finally broke down
and asked him to come since I have not asked before due to his having
ferrets of his own at home.  We have a disinfectant now that kills Parvo and
all else so perhaps that will help.  He will leave fresh unexposed clothes
at my parents house on the way here and then go there afterwards and bathe
and spray the disinfectant all over himself and the new clothes and then try
to find a place to hang out for a couple hours until he goes home to his
crew of eight.  I pray to the Great Spirit this will be enough precautions
and that his ferrets do not get the ECE from helping us out this one time.
If they do it may very well destroy me.
 
I also want to THANK VERY MUCH both of the shelters in Oregon.  I spoke to
Christine Mathis and Melanie Ellis and they were wonderful.  Since neither
have been exposed to this killer I did not want them to even consider taking
in any of mine.  Melanie pointed me to Ed who is truly a wonderful man that
must love ferrets as I do and she was also trying all else she could think
of before calling me back later on to find Ed was going to take them.  He
had no hesitation in agreeing to take my nine since they are already an ECE
shelter and no hesitation in agreeing to meet us halfway so I could get back
to the other 18 sick waiting at home before too much time had passed.  Both
Melanie and Chris have offred to help in any way possible including
medicines, money or anything else required.  They are generous and loving
people that I shall never forget as long as I live for this.
 
I have only one really nice thing to report and that is that Otee, after
receiving Sub-Q fluids day before yesterday for the 1st time even tho he was
only mildly dehydrated, has begun to eat his dry food on his own.  My Mom
thought perhaps we should skip the fluids on him as we had done about 12
already and it had taken us 6 hours to do them all and we were nearly dead.
I have no idea why but I said that maybe if we could get him fully hydrated
he might begin to eat on his own and hot dang he did!!  That is at least a
small load off our minds as we prepare to leave the kids here for a minimum
of 10 hours.  I have to be honest tho and say that all the poeple that told
us Sub-Q fluids were easy as can be must be off their rockers!!!  Maybe if
the ferrets are ill enough that might be the case but out of all 12 to 15 we
have done only 2 were good and they were the most ill.  The rest fought like
demons and that does NOT make for an easy time.  I hate doing it too as I
feel I am torturing them even tho I know I am only trying to help them.
Getting the needle in etc..  is not bad but trying to keep them from jerking
so bad that the needle is not forced back out is.  Oh well, we perservered
and got them all done in the end, then we had our nervous breakdown's!
 
And so to those of you who believe in it I ask you to pray for the entire
FANG GANG today as some go on a roadtrip to a hopefully brighter future and
others wait patiently for their Mommy and Grandma to return to them.  To
those who do not believe please still keep them in your thoughts and wish
them well.  THANKS to all that have helped me and Mom during the most truly
awful time of our lives.  TNT!!
 
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*           Kelleen Andrews & The FANG GANG!            *
*   Founder & Operator of FANG Ferret Shelter & Club    *
*       (Ferret Association of Neverending Glee)        *
*         405 S. Orchard   Boise, Idaho  83705          *
*         208-342-7292    [log in to unmask]         *
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*    I'll take a good animal over a good mate anyday!   *
*    All they want is lots of love and great chow.      *
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[Posted in FML issue 1700]