We put The Captain down today. He was the best little guy we’ve had and over the last few weeks he’s been on medication. It started with a head tilt and wobbling and I said to dismal, “ok but I need one more symptom” because head tilts can be either an inner ear issue or a neurological/tumor issue that can’t be treated. He ended up presenting a runny nose. To the batcave!

We cleared up his respiratory infection and he was looking better halfway through treatment but over the last week or so has been going downhill again, reminding me of Michael J Fox without his parkinson’s medication with the waivering around and dismal said he was walking in circles earlier this morning.

I have, in the past, due to financial constraints, euthanized a rat at home.

It didn’t work so well this time.

The most humane way is a 2 dose gas chamber. You use carbon dioxide and gently get them to sleep and then another flood of it to kill them off.

When I say gently, I mean it. Overkill on the first dose of gas can create irritation and the rat can start twitching and coughing. Something didn’t go right today.
I couldn’t take him to the vet because they were closed for easter. His eye was bulging and reminded dismal of the last rat I had with cancer. Her eye actually popped and she had more than a half dozen mammary tumors.

Well, we kept gently putting the gas in for 20 minutes until he fell asleep. The larger doses had him in a coma for about 45 minutes until I got another form of the gas and then within 10 minutes he was done.
This entire process should not take more than 20 minutes maximum. That includes the time you leave them alone to make sure they are gone and can’t be revived.

Today went really wrong somewhere. It took way too long and he just kept holding on.

What a bunch of bullshit.

Afterwards I cleaned him up from the scent of the gas and washed and dried him and held him awhile and took a few pictures of my baby. He looked better in passing than he has in the last month.

this sucks.