I could no sooner "home euthanize" one of my ferrets, than I could "home euthanize" my parents, husband, or children. Wherever I may have to go, they ALL will go w/ me, no matter what - age, health, "inconvenience", anything. It's the promise I made them when we adopted them & became their Forever Family. (BTW, my kids are adopted, too. Nobody wanted them anymore, either. I traveled half way around the planet, to Kazakhstan, to bring them home. It's all the same in my eyes.) My Mother's Day was horrible. At 10:00 at night, I had to hold my little Mason as she struggled & died in my arms. About a month-ish ago, she started breathing rapidly, & very shallow. Xrays showed what appeared to be fluid in her lungs, & a heart murmur that was never heard before was present. We started her on lasix & digoxin. She waxed & waned, but never got completely better, always going back to the rapid, shallow breathing. The necropsy our vet did at 10:30 on a Sunday night showed that we were all wrong - she died of lung cancer. Every organ in her abdomen, except her spleen, was affected. The cancer finally ate through her portal vein, & she bled to death internally, as I held her & my husband was on the phone w/ our vet. When we got home from the vet's, as he was doing the necropsy, our daughter told us that Ivan had been in & out of the litterboxes several times while we were gone, wasn't peeing, & was starting to whine. My husband put Ivan in a carrier & went right back to the vet's office ("he's there, & he doesn't have any other patients waiting to see him, after all..."). We'd treated Ivan for a urinary tract infection a little while ago, & we all assumed it was cleared up by now. It wasn't. Our vet had to catheterize him, & he got out a ton of thick, syrupy urine. He flushed him out w/ water & sent him home w/ some clavamox. Test results finally came back - he has a massive E. coli infection, w/more than 100,000 organisms per cc of urine. Everything that looked at the adrenal (he only has his right one now) & his prostate, all came back looking normal. So he's on the clavamox for at least 2 wks, & at the 1.5 wk point, we'll do another culture of his urine to see what we can see. I'm sure Ivan got the E.coli infection from the fact that his cage mate, Puck, isn't the brightest bulb in the box - he'll go to the litterbox in the cage, stick his head in, then poop in front of the box. Even though Ivan is pretty fastidious, he's managed to step in it a time or 2, I know. I've had to wipe his feet off a couple times, & I'm equally sure he's licked his feet clean, as well. And then there's our Max, who has been battling bone cancer for almost 7 mos, not to mention insulinoma. The cancer started in his right zygomatic arch, has spread to his maxilla, but being the little trooper that he is, he's still eating/drinking/peeing/pooping - making it to the litterbox each time - & while he sometimes has down days, he likes to play after he's had his meds & soup each night. He no longer happy dances, of course, but he loves fighting w/ your hands while he's in his beloved plastic Marco's Pizza bag, or juggling his crocheted balls & eggs, even running the tubes when he's feeling particularly energetic. Max shared his cage w/ Mason. I never *dreamed* healthy 4 yr old Mason would go before our sick, 7 yr old Max. But now, all the boys are in the same cage, which we couldn't do before, as Ivan didn't like Mason. Mason came to us last yr, w/ her cagemate Madison. Madison needed immediate surgery, as she had a massive fibrosarcoma on the right side of her neck, & a small one starting just behind her whiskers on the same side. Our vet removed them w/ no problem at all. They were both happy little girls, & were definitely attached to each other. One day, maybe 7 mos after we got them, Madison didn't look right one morning -she was standing very stiffly in her cage, hardly moving at all, & looking not at all right. Took her to our vet, who opened her up, & discovered what looked like long-standing hepatitis....just before her heart stopped & he couldn't bring her back. At any rate, Mason's ashes will go in w/ Madison's - they were always together before, & now they'll be back together forever. In light of what my wk's been like so far, I could never, ever, think about voluntarily euthanizing my babies over a "shoulda, coulda, woulda" situation. If one of us goes, *all* of us go. That's what families do. Lin, Max, Puck, & Ivan ~ Missing my angel Ariel - 20 April 2000 - 20 January 2007. Wait for me, my Baby Girl. I miss you so much. ~ ~ Missing my Oberon - 4 July 2001 - 5 May 2008 - I love you, my Big Silly Boy. Wait for me. ~ ~ Missing my Madison - ? - 9 September 2008 - Our time was too short, but my love is forever. ~ ~Missing my Mason - ? - 12 May 2009 - I wish there'd been somethng we coud have done for you, but thate *was* nothimg that could hae stopped this. ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ email me at: kay tee en eye el at double-u owe aich dot ar ar dot see owe em ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ [Posted in FML 6336]