Hello everyone. It has been some time since I have come here to BB and posted on the forum.
About 7 years ago, I brought home my sweet baby girl. I had never had a rabbit and I had no idea what I was doing. I do believe on the first night I attempted to give her cucumber and was confused as to why she wasn’t eating it. I bought the worst possible bedding and expected her to use a litter box. Instead, she just lounged in it like thats what its purpose was. It was a lounge chair.
I was able to stumble across binkybunny.com and was guided by the wonderful knowledge and support of this forum. It was an exciting journey. One of which my darling little Lullabelle and I have shared for the past 7 years. I have made many friends from this forum on the outside, and these friends are for forever.
I have posted since my sweet little Lullabelle was diagnosed with cancer last year. The beginning of the journey was difficult and again this community was here to support me and listen, and offer their guidance in tough decisions I made.
I did make a seriously hard and possibly selfish decision to go forward with more surgery for Lullabelle, and this surgery was able to give me another year with her. A happy year with her. It was only in the past month where there was a significant decline in health. For many months, Lullabelle was able to live a wonderful life full of love, happiness, binkys, and raisins.
Last month the horrible vicious sarcoma returned in her mouth. I even went as far as to take her to a teaching hospital for a second (third, forth, and fifth by the time i actually left) opinion. The prognosis was grave; if i proceeded with more surgical intervention Lullabelle’s quality of life would be extremely compromised. Despite my perfect capability and want to be there to nurse her back to health, and be there for her no matter her condition, i decided to place her on hospice care. Her quality of life was most important to me.
For the past month I have cared and watched over Lullabelle. On Monday 2/17/2014 I was getting ready for work, bringing her morning breakfast of pureed pumpkin and critical care, when I saw her have difficulty getting in the litter box. I set the bowl down and watched her attempt to jump out of the box. But instead she just fell to the ground, not able to move her hind legs. At that instant I understood what was happening; what I must do. Despite the fact there was a snowstorm that day, I rushed her to the vet and made the decision. They thought the cancer had spread to her brain. We don’t really know. I don’t think Lullabelle was in pain that day. I do think had I of taken her home without doing anything, she would have declined rapidly, and possibly passed on her own when I was not there to care for her, and to assure she was not in pain. So this was the decision I made for her that day.
Unfortunately that is not where my story ends. This is the difficult part I need this forum’s help with. It was not an easy end for Lullabelle. The process took several hours. I do not know if she felt pain, I don’t think she did. I don’t know. We began the process with one method; a standard one. For some reason this only caused her to react. She jerked every few seconds and put her nose to mine in between jerks. This was not doing what it was intended. So the vet tried another method. This seemed to calm Lullabelle down, but she was still awake and with us. She laid in my arms and continued to nuzzle me. They came back with yet another shot. This did the same as the first; woke up her. My tough girl fought it. She was not going out without a fight. Finally the vet said she was going to get another dose of whatever it was and I said no. No more. If she doesn’t want to go, I am not making her. I don’t even want her to go. The vet said she gave Lullabelle enough to put asleep a medium sized dog. They were confused. But I wasn’t. Lullabelle wanted to go home. That’s where she wanted to be. So I packed her up in her carrier and drove back home in the stupid snowstorm. When we go home, we curled up on the bed as we have so many times before. She struggled to breathe, had very little control over her body. We cuddled together until she passed a few hours after we had gotten home. She just stopped breathing.
So many awful feelings I felt. Had I made the right decision? Why did she not get a peaceful ending? Did she suffer? Was she in pain? Did she hear me tell her to stay if she wanted to stay? I don’t know the answers to these questions.
This week has been especially hard not only with Lullabelle’s passing but my mother had 2 strokes the next day. That’s a separate struggle!!
I have decided to keep her ashes on the bookshelf where she liked to lay. Today I removed her things from where they had been since I moved into this apartment. I threw away her litter box, her mats, and washed her blankets and have no clue what to do with them. I rearranged the room to better accommodate my needs. But its missing Lullabelle. I contemplated leaving it the way it was. Never moving anything. But I don’t think I would ever be able to move on if when I came home I saw her empty area.
So i’ve come here to this forum to share this with people who understand. Thank you for reading and allowing me to sharing my story. It feels good to get it out.
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