I'm an exsubscriber who read this forum for two years or so before regrettfully signing off due to a lack of time; I figure that I had learned enough that my time was better spent playing with my ferrets than reading. Now I'm desperately in need of advice for my poor sick ferret. I am working with a vet, but I live in CA, so while she is caring and seems competent, she hasn't had much experience with ferrets. Maybe someone can help us. Sprocket is almost three years old and has always been on the small and skinny side but energetic and with normal stools. She's my first ferret, I wanted to wait until they were legalized here, but after waiting 7 years I had to have her. Saturday before last I took her out to play and noticed that she'd lost more weight and had some diarrhea - she'd had a food change from TF to Iams when we ran out, but she has tried a variety of foods before with no ill effect. I isolated her from her cagemate (who still seems healthy) and when she seemed just too skinny and dehydrated, started force feeding her baby food and fluids (and Pepto and Pedialyte, thank you FML). Monday she seemed to have slightly better stool though still definitely runny, so when we couldn't locate a vet who would take her that day (our usual had broken his leg and was out) we didn't worry too much. Tuesday she was worse, and Wednesday morning she entered a new vet hospital. They did blood work, and checked her stool, and came up with nothing - no anemia, slightly low white cell count. They put her on an IV and antibiotics and she seemed a little better so I took her home Friday evening and gave her antibiotic shots and subcutaneous fluids twice a day and fed her a/d diet. Sunday she wasn't better, so Monday back in the vets and switched to .5 ccPepto, .5 cc flagyl, and .2cc clavamox, plus subq's, twice a day - I brought her home tuesday evening and Wednesday evening, she started to dry heave and her rectum looked like it might be prolapsing (to my untrained eye, it's big and red and swollen out). The vet said we could do an exploratory surgery Thurseday, but it's not likely she'll live. We still don't know what's wrong. She has a big oaf of a cagemate to get a transfusion from, but she's sooo skinny and wasted. She never actually threw up and seemed perkier, so we decided to hold off on surgery, since she's so skinny and weak the vet said it might kill her. Now it's Thurseday and she doesn't seem really better or worse - I've gotten a lot of food and fluids into her today, but the diarrhea is still watery and grainy, and she's weak...mostly sleeping. I work for a conservation corps, so I don't earn much - already this has taken almost my entire last months wages, but I will pay for surgery if it seems like it will save her - basically, I'm saying that cost is an issue, but she's very important to me, and a few months of debt is more than worth her health and comfort. I'm just afraid that I'm consigning her last moments to be pain and confusion of surgery....but if it's her only chance, I guess that we have to take it. What else - she hasn't had any contact with new ferrets (neither have the humans of the house) in more than a year, she only weighs a bit more than a pound and a half in good health, the worst she's gotten to in this has been ..8, but we got her back up to 1.1 or so. Do you know what this might be or how to treat it? [Posted in FML issue 2663]