It's all about the Freckles....

We've always said it's all about the Freckles (my long term behavioral foster) and apparently he's taken it to heart.

First, let me give you a little bit of background about our Freckles--when he came into the shelter he was a shall we say "a bit nippy". When we read the instructions his prior owner gave us, we figured out why.

According to her when he misbehaved we were to "strike him sharply on the nose". What that translated to, was a ferret who upon meeting someone (and for quite some time after he met them) he would "test" by biting pretty hard and then putting his head down-waiting to see if you hit him. So, obviously he couldn't be adopted out until we rehabbed him.

As a little bit of time went on--he didn't seem to be thriving at the shelter so I took him home (those of you who know me, know that I tend to take the fosters who don't do well at the shelter for various reasons) So, he came home with me and I worked with him--and he was pretty easy--all I did was when he bit me, hugged him and kissed him and told him that he would always be safe (mind you, that's not how I work with all biters--my method changes depending on the reason for the bite) As time went on, he completley stopped biting (he now smothers me with kisses and is a TOTAL mama's boy) but we found a malformed kidney that causes him pain if you move him a certain way and he has developed Adrenal and Insulinoma--so, we all know he is staying with me.

Yesterday, we had a big appt with the vet and I was going to the shelter early before we had to go. I decided to soup and medicate the kids who were staying home and I would soup and medicate the kids coming with me at the shelter. I've worked very hard to keep my kids on a schedule and I've seemed to do a very good job, because Mr. Freckles became very disgruntled when things were not as they usually are.

Everyone my house gets soup twice a day--but the healthy kids eat from the community bowl and the kids who are on meds-get their own bowl. Well, I put the community bowl down, put Meelo's down and put Prissy's in her cage. Because he is so used to his own bowl--he now won't eat at the community bowl (unless he has finished his and is still hungry). So, he walks over the to community bowl--looks at it, then looks up at me. He walks over to Meelo's bowl-looks at it and looks at me again--but this time his face says "excuse me mama--where is my soup" I tell him he will get it at Aunty's and put everyone in their respective carriers to go to the Shelter.

When we got to the Shelter, I took him out of his carrier and put him in one of the cages (because he is fresh with the other ferrets that were out--mind you-my guys have their own room at my house) I started getting everyone's soup and medicine together and I put a bowl of soup in the cage for him so I could continue to soup and medicate--but now, we are displeased and do not want want our soup (even though it's in it's own bowl) and are going to lurk under the (pink) blankets with just his eyes and nose showing -glaring with our little beady laser beam eyeballs at mama so she knows how displeased we are (and I know, you all know the look that I am talking about)

So, I took him out of the cage and had to hand feed him his soup--which mollified him a little bit because Mama was apparently showing the proper respect for "the Freckles" so he ate the whole bowl. When he was done, I put him back in the cage. But, that displeased him again so he proceeded to tear apart 'ahem, I mean "re arrange" the whole cage.

When it was time to go, we went around the room to collect weasle's and put them in their carriers-Diane happened to be closer at the time, so she opened the cage to get him (he was in one of the top cages) and he wouldn't come to her and was hovering back of the cage (I have to add, that he sees Aunty all the time and loves her) He was at the back corner of the cage--kicking up the litter box at her. She moved the box and now--he is standing in the very back corner with his back arched and all four feet touching so he can stay as far away as possible (think stereo typical Halloween black cat) So, I go over to get him, but she already gotten the stool out and had "retrieved the wayward weasle"

At the vet, 2 ferrets went into crisis, so I ended up staying so Diane could go back to the shelter to meet with a potential adopter and he went back to the shelter with her.

When I got back to the shelter--I greeted everyone, but all I got was a paw to the face pushing my chin away whenever I tried to kiss him.

He finally started kissing me again, this afternoon.

People tell me that rescued animals are always so grateful and I have to laugh--EVERY animal in my house is rescued and NONE of them act grateful--they all act entitled.

Well, they probably think that every single one of them have me wrapped around their paw!--and they'd be correct. LOL

Email from Diane....

An email from Diane to a mailing list that many people in the ferret community belong to.... I just thought it was so poignant and wanted to share...

Do you believe in messages or signs, divine intervention perhaps?

I know many times when coincidences happen we like to think that they are signs. Good messages from the bridge. While I can be somewhat subtle in giving some communications, I am somewhat dense when hints are being dropped in my direction.

While it may be wishful thinking on my part,

from the Reflecting Pool at the Bridge,

I believe I am hearing some splashing.

Here for your review, I submit the following for consideration:

My little boy Oreo of which I posted last week "Oreo Hopping to the Bridge" was quite an inspiration to me and many others. He was the mascot of South Shore Ferret Care and while all the ferrets are special, certain ones stand out, and teach me something. Like we have all felt, there was a empty feeling in the ferret room after Oreo was gone, it was a tangible and a heavy feeling. I was tempted to consider keeping a beautiful young ferret to fill the void but knew that there was another special ferret out there that really needed me.

A friend of mine and I were discussing a ferret who needed to be rescued from a bad situation, through the animal control officer a condemned house, vague and scary details. It had been a week or two and I hadn't heard anything about this ferret and hoped the situation was resolved. With everything else going on at the shelter, I didn't get a chance to follow up with her.

My friend Laurie called me on my cell phone on my way home to let me know that this ferret was now in custody and needed to go through the "ferret underground railroad". Although this was a serious situation, she sounded quite upbeat.

Ferret's coming to me in this manner don't usually have names but this one did..............OREO

I couldn't speak for a minute, was this a sign? I never have heard of another ferret with my Oreo's name.

My heart raced, was it him coming back? What did this ferret look like? I rattled off a million questions, what color? boy or girl? how old? None of that mattered, I knew this ferret was supposed to come to me!

As I walked from my car to the ferret entrance putting my cell phone away I looked down, there was a delivery,

it was my Oreo's ashes back from Angel View.

It's silly but I hugged the box, happy he was once again "home" and placed him in a place of honor next to my mom's ashes, top shelf.

Yesterday, several of us gathered at Rose German's house yesterday (Little Feet Ferret Retreat) for a luncheon, "Ferret Ladies who Lunch" (ha,ha), a welcome respite from my full time job as a mortgage underwriter (imagine how much fun that is these days) and other beyond full time job at South Shore Ferret Care.

There she was, a little black sable female, I spoke softly to her, blinked back a few tears, my mind drifting off for a second, crossing my eyes and hoping for some super special telecommic powers...........and then she bit me!

Yep, There's my sign!

It was as if my Oreo was saying "silly Mama, it's not me Oreo coming back, I just SENT her to you!

She has the same name so you would know that it was ME sending HER to you!!

Pay attention Mama, uncross your eyes! Huh, she doesn't even look anything like me, and she's a GIRL, hello!

I'm over the bridge splashing in the reflecting pool so you can't help but focus. You've got more work to do, so KEEP GOING! They offered to give me back my leg but I didn't want it cause you said it made me extra special"

After my first visit with the new ferret Oreo girl, and still sucking on my finger, too embarrassed to tell the others, Eleanor Mead gave me a special present. It was a special ferret figurine with beautiful blue wings lying down looking up with a "LuvU" look, guess what, the figurine has three legs and inspired Eleanor to make him just that way, on the bottom it says Oreo!

What a great day we had! We even called April at Totally Ferret and each one of us sang Happy B-Day to her to get as much as we could donated to SOS. When it was my turn we did dook-dook-dook-dook-dook to the tune of Happy B-Day!

Today of course it's back to work. A bit sleepy from being up late with Michele's help at the shelter last night and early up to soup and medicate everyone, I stumble into work at the mortgage company.

Sometimes vendors send us things to entice us to send them more business, but with corporate budgets being tight in these financial times those little perks have all but ceased.

What's this on my desk? It's from one of the closing attorney's we haven't used for a while, a big glass jar of ..........

OREO cookies...................

So you decide, fate, signs, coincidence????

Messages from the reflecting pool, SPLASH,

Thanks- Oreo!

Mama is paying attention and misses you too!

Diane Wall

South Shore Ferret Care

PS. The new girl he sent me will be called "Aria" we have made friends, despite her biting my ankle this morning, because my heart can "sing" again.............

On a Sadder note....

We lost our little 3 legged guy Oreo this morning.

More on Meelo's bionic knee....

Well, as most of you know--Meelo was one of the OH guys that I rehabbed this past October-and I ended up keeping him as one of my own. Since I've had him, he's had a knee injury--he favors his right back leg and can't really bend it. Knowing some of the atrocities that those kids experienced, we could only surmise that it was an injury he had experienced while he was at the "bad place".

The vet and I had spoken about it-- the current "standard" of treating an ACL injury in an animal under 10 lbs is rest. I attempted to "rest him' as best I could (insert incredulous laughter here), but we all know that it is near impossible to rest a ferret for an indeterminate amount of time (they have to come out of the cage eventually and then they would be more maniacal than ever) . So, I left him free range and gave it some time . As as he started to feel better (he had some bad teeth removed and was put on Prednisone for Insulinoma) he's become more active (he's also put on some more muscle mass--he is now almost 4 lbs) and I can see him trying to run around and dance. So, I feel as though his knee is impacting his quality of life. I also fear that with his attempt at more activity and his increased muscle mass--he will blow out the knee completely.

So, I brought it up with the vet once again--asking if she thought there was ANYTHING that we could do--splint, etc--and she seriously recommended surgery. I made an appt for the next week to have him assessed again.

Truth be told, I hadn't much experience with ACL surgeries, other than knowing about other animals had had it done--and what happened after--I didn't know the nitty gritty details.

When we went back, we went through all of my questions, along with her giving me a detailed step by step re: what was entailed in this surgery. As far as either one of us knows, ACL surgery has not been performed on ferrets (or at least, been documented). but, we decided to go ahead and do it.

So, here's the bottom line:

To my knowledge, an ACL surgery has not been done on ferrets, so we don't know how it's going to hold up (CON)

My vet is extremely knowledgable re: ferrets (PRO)

I totally trust my vet--and wouldn't recommend a sugery for the money or excitement of a new surgery unless she truly believed it would be beneficial (PRO)

She is super honest will me and has stated that since it's not been done before, we have no way of knowing how it's going to hold up (PRO--because of the honesty) I actually am not paying for it because it is a teaching case and we have no way of knowing how it will turn out

She has also done tons of ACL surgeries on dogs and cats so is very comfortable with the basic mechanics (PRO)

Although she is comfortable with the mechanics, there are some things that have to be done differently, regarding the size of a ferret (for example: they usually use a special type of fishing line, that has proven itself--with Meelo she will have to use regular sutures and although strong--we are not sure how it will show itself over time regarding stretching, etc) (CON)

Since ACL injuries seem to be diagnosed in ferrets more often recently--this is an amazing opportunity to see if a more effective way of treating is possible (PRO)

Although he is a small animal--for a ferret, he is large, so he is a good candidate to be "first ferret" (PRO) when he had his teeth out, she told me that was the beefiest ferret arm she's ever put a catheter in... LOL

After surgery, he will have to have cage rest--but that is doable, since the only thing we have to be concerned about (re: reinjury) are his sutures--and once the incision starts to heal, then he can move around more.

I requested to observe and she said I could, however, the surgery is going to be so small, I wouldn't be able to see anything. The vet has told me that she is going to document everything--and I am going to keep a log and pictures for documentation also.

Please, keep him in your prayers/thoughts/well wishes. I will keep you all posted.

Meelo and his bionic knee....

Ha ha, just kidden. I don't have much time, but I figured it was time to write something--and since I finally have something other than helping someone to the bridge, I thought I would share.

I have a vet appt tomorrow to discuss a potential ACL surgery for Meelo. Now, did I mention that they typically don't do ACL surgery on Ferrets? The treatment for anything under 10 lbs is typically "rest it" . HAHAHAHAHAHA--that's so funny. At this point, I don't have any details, I am just considering the options-so, I will post back once I've have more of a handle on it.

Be well!