[Mark, your article arrived in almost unintelligble form.  Your
editor (or Compuserve or something) terminated each line with
a carriage return instead of a newline (which is the standard
on the network).  I had to write a C program to fix it.  After
running that translation, I had to reparagraph it too.  Please
see what you can do to avoid this in future.  Also, please
remember to send it to "[log in to unmask]".  CRL]
 
My heart goes out to the owners of Frits & Cooper. Having lost a ferret
to tumors myself, I know what they are going through. A word of
encouragement: Adopting a new ferret will help you get over the grief,
and your other ferrets are always glad to get a new sleeping buddy!
We had a scare ourselves with Rupert, our 6.5 year old
neutered male sable. For most of his life, he's had an
enlarged spleen that never seemed to bother him much, so
our vet pretty much ignored it.  But a few months ago, Rupert
started getting very sick -- listless, dehydrated, drooling a lot.
Finally our vet decided that he was periodically injuring that
big old spleen and it it was putting him into shock! We went through
this three or four times -- our vet was kind enough to see us at
all hours of the night and on weekends. Rupert would pull through
with subcue fluids and prednisone. Finally, the vet said it was
time for that old spleen to come out.
 
Well, the last time we put a ferret under the knife, we lost her
because her tumor was inoperable. So this time around, we were
quite nervous about it.  The surgery went without a hitch -- although
the vet had to make a huge incision to get that spleen out of there.
One of the vet's colleagues said the spleen was the size of a small dog's.
Poor Rupert! No wonder he felt as bad as he did.
 
That was a week ago. Rupert is doing fine now. Doesn't seem to miss
that old spleen at all.  We know he's an old guy, and that he probably
doesn't have much longer to live, but at least he's doing OK now.
                                                                          
[Posted in FML 0184]