Tigger was born sometime around the end of the summer of 1993, at the
same time as I moved out on my own.  I decided my home needed a pet and
researched ferrets.  I found an exotic pet store and put my name on a call
list for a new baby.  I was very impatient and called several times a week
and even a day as the time approached for the kits to arrive.  In the
meantime I had purchased a book, harness, treats and designed a cage which
was being built.
 
Finally the day arrived!  My call to the pet store revealed the kits had
flown in that day.  After work I borrowed a car and drove to the pet store.
After 2 hours my baby had picked me by falling asleep in my arms.  He
wasn't a girl or a sable like I had planned, but a little white boy with
ruby eyes and a black stripe down his back.  My baby had arrived, but it
was not love at first bite.  I would be in tears in the mornings as he
launched his attack on my feet and I actually chipped a tooth, grinding
them, but when I thought I had killed him after giving him some milk...my
hysterics revealed how quickly he had bounced his way into my heart.  It
was his bouncing that earned him his name.
 
Tigger and I had many adventures.  We went for late night walks so he
wouldn't be seen by the police or ferret catchers.  He loved to explore
but would paw at my legs every so often for reassurance, give me a kiss
and them ask to be put down to say hi to another tree.  He could open the
cupboard doors, even after I nailed them shut, just by being persistent.He
terrified me by having an adventure in the crawl space under the bath tub,
only to be found covered in dust, happily sleeping in a plastic bag.  he
once went out the front window of my third floor apartment, down the
drainpipe to the second floor roof where he made his way around the house
in the eavestrough.  He was happily rescued after I made it up on the roof
on a ladder some workmen had left behind.  We almost stayed up there, it
was a long way back down but I make it holding on with one hand to the
ladder and one hand to my boy.
 
When 4 year old Fredo arrived on the eve on Tigger's second birthday, I
was the only one to shed blood but they were never able to live together.
Tigger broke his toe at his second birthday party, and had blockage surgery
before he was 1.
 
He was not happy when the girls arrived 6 months later and became
depressed.  It was then that his love for me was apparent.  He would leap
into my arms, lay his little head on my shoulder and let out a big sigh of
relief.
 
We lived with the others in 3 different apartments, and saw the
legalization of ferrets finally happen in our city, but Tigger never got to
enjoy the freedom this new law would have provided.  Last spring, shortly
after my last move Tigger became ill.  I suspected a blockage, but took him
to my then regular vet.  They prescribed an antibiotic and pepto.  days
later we went to the emergency clinic.  I told them it was a blockage.
When I went to visit my boy before work the next morning they told me he
had a heart problem.  I had to leave work in tears, and move my boy to the
day vet.  These jerks got a lot of money for hospital stay, ECG and didn't
really seem to care that my boys paw was swollen and covered with water
blisters from the IV.  Tigger literally threw himself in my arms when the
bitchy receptionist told me I was in the way and had to leave, and I put
him in his cage.  I took him home, took him to another vet, even had an
animal communicator talk to him and bought him some stones for healing.
 
If they hadn't made a big deal about this supposed heart condition that
might kill him if we didn't fix it before surgery...if I hadn't just moved
and been painting my new place...if I had gone ahead with my initial gut
feeling my baby boy might still be here.  Instead I waited, afraid whatever
I did would kill him.
 
By the time he had his emergency surgery, removing a huge hairball that
hadn't appeared on X-ray, and a spleen 3x it's normal size, it was too
late for my boy.
 
He did survive the surgery, no heart problems, it was just that he had been
slowly wasting away due to the blockage that he couldn't keep going.  I
stayed home from work to force feed him, and help him to the litter box,
letting him cuddle with me in bed but on Friday April 17, 1998 he slipped
into a coma.  I waited thinking he would slip away, but I had to help him
go.  I held him as they gave him the shot at the emergency clinic and took
him home.  He passed on moments after I put him in my bed.
 
I had him cremated so I could always have him with me.  It was the worst
thing I've ever gone through.  He was the only one of my 6 ferrets who
showed his love, and I'm afraid my ignorance and fear for him caused him
further suffering.
 
He was followed 5 months later by Fredo, my 7 year old adopted boy who had
lymphoma, and is survived by Smokey aged 6 and Chaos, aged 4.  New to the
family are Baby Boy and Phantom.
 
Tigger was the ferret I called my natural child and I will miss him always.
[Posted in FML issue 2650]