Kat wrote:
>I should have prevented this. It shouldn't have happened. They are in my
>care and I failed them. Oh, I know it was a careless young child who left
>the door open, and no one had any idea it was open, and it was the dead of
>winter and why would anyone even open a door in the first place? But
>they're gone and I feel sad and guilty, and like I don't ever deserve to
>have another ferret ever again.
I wish I had some magic words that would make the guilt go away, but I
don't. It's been almost 2 years since I lost my first guy, Arlo, after
owning ferrets for about the same amount of time, and I still feel guilty
occasionally. It was probably some careless friends that permitted his
escape, but the responsibility ultimately lies with the owner, and there's
no getting around it. Like you, I questioned my competence as a ferret
owner. Unlike you, I stopped posting the ferret boards for a while because
I didn't feel it was my place to comment. You're handling things better
than I did.
One encouragement I can offer is Mike (yeah I know, dumb name), who came to
me as a roundabout result of losing Arlo. Mike matched Arlo's description
closely enough that a local shelter called a "lost & found" registry, which
called me, and I drove up to take a look. Wasn't Arlo, but I ended up with
Mike, who was and is a gentle, healthy, well-behaved ferret. He was
probably one year old at the time, and *must* have escaped from someone who
took good care of him. For a month I forced myself to view him as a guest,
because I didn't want to get attached, and for three more months I worried
about a call from the registry, because I didn't want to give him up. Now
he's mine.
Some lost ferrets just trade owners.
swamp
"Who, me officer? What's a ferut? These guys?? No, they're Polish cats."
[Posted in FML issue 2211]
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