Annabelle (Annie) Gisicki-Goacher was born around the 19th July 2011. We brought her home around 8 weeks after that. She was a little "blue/grey" dutch bun. We got her from Pets At Home in Leigh (UK). Andrew wanted the black and white dutch bun at first, but I was besotted with this little girl and he quickly fell in love too.
We boxed her up and brought her home, set up her new cage in our kitchen and welcomed here into our lives. We expected to have her for at LEAST 6 years. We knew that having a rabbit would bring us heartbreak after a few short years (compared to parrots - who we should have for 30+) but we didn't expect to fall so hard for her so quickly and then to have her taken from us not even 2 years later.
She was precious to us; she was so bonded to us. She used to mark our fingers with her chin. She used to bound over fiercely to give us love and play 'chase me'. She used to demand the top part of her double hutch was left open so she could 'cuddle' the side of it as she napped. It was adorable.
After over a year, we got Annie a partner in crime. "Bigfoot" - a French Lop with a lotta attitude. He's pretty chilled and she's highly strung, so they're a great pair. Before we got Bigfoot, we got Annie neutered. We knew we had to at some point anyway as Dutch rabbits have an incredibly high chance of getting tumors on their reproductive system. (We had her spayed sometime in September 2012)
Anyway, to make what would be an incredibly long story short. She got sick on the 7th May. She was walking funny and being very skittish - very out of character for her. So I rang the vets, bundled her into her carrier and dashed her down to their practice. She was seen to within 20 minutes (felt like an absolute life time) and Iain, our vet, decided she would have to have xrays and potentially surgery as her intestines didn't sound okay. So we presumed a blockage. He said he'd keep her overnight and take her home with him after surgery so he could keep a better eye on her without having to too and from the surgery himself. We felt it was a better thing to be doing for her as we'd rather he was with her the entire time then her getting sick for the few hours he's back at home! We waited for the phonecall about her diagnostics and he told us he found nothing on the xrays and so had to do exploratory surgery. We were then told that she had fatty lumps on her reproductive system. He removed them, sent them off for surgery and told us she was dealing with the surgery well.
Next morning we had another phone call to say that although Annie was doing well from the surgery, eating 'okay', drinking etc. She had lost all sensation in her back legs. We were obviously very conflicted as to what to do, but decided to give her a shot and see how she coped with it. We brought her home later that day and it was horrible. She was unable to clean herself properly and looked messy and so unlike our bun. We had to help her pee and she wasn't pooping at this time; but eventually had to help her do that too. She was set up in her own little 'hospital' cage and wasn't eating. After 2 days we managed to get her doing her own thing and eating some.
But only if it was warm, smushed with hot water, and off her green spoon!
She was approximately 14ml of meds per day. (Her metacam was measured "by kilo") and my partner asked me to make up a chart of meds for him!
Annie began to learn to deal with her current disability. Our suspicions were that E.Cuniculi (a worm) had been "activated" in her system after the stress of the surgery, causing paralysis. Our Vet had consulted with many others around the UK about the cause of her sudden paralysis after surgery and most agreed that this could be it.
Here she is enjoying some downtime with mummy. She was able to clean her paws and face properly when lay like this as when she was sat down, she'd keep scooting backwards by accident!
Unfortunately, despite all our best efforts, daily trips to the vets for check ups and shots (to get her gut moving, etc) she never made it past Saturday night. The paralysis began progressing and moved up to her lungs so she struggled breathing. We rushed her to an emergency vet's to see if we could do anything for her but we decided that it was unfair to let her suffer any longer and that we should put her to sleep. She'd been an absolute trooper through the entire ordeal and had smashed down every brick wall she was faced with up until this point. But she just couldn't this time around.
Me and Andrew were with her the entire time and cuddled our little princess as she went to sleep for the last time. We've both never been so heartbroken about losing a pet because she was our first together and my god she was something special. We could have done nothing more for our princess, our binkybum and we're so sorry we couldn't fix her.
We got the results back from the samples Iain took from Annie's surgery and it appears she'd had a bad reaction to the sutures from her spaying months before; which caused the discomfort and blockage; which in turn caused the E.cuniculi to flare.
We hate that we got her spayed for it to result in this - but as rabbits (especially dutch!) have such a high risk of developing tumors, we knew we'd have to anyway. Alongside this, rabbits (when neutered properly) should have such a low chance of developing side effects from things like sutures (rabbits have their own type!) but our girl was just that unlucky one in a million case. Our biggest mistake was not worming Bigfoot as soon as we brought him home. We had both our buns vaccinated and Annie was wormed originally; but we were so wrapped up when we got Bigfoot that we overlooked worming him and so we believed that he passed on his E.cuniculi (which can lay harmless in a bun for years) to our Annabelle.
So yes, we blame ourselves, but try not to let us eat us up. We did everything we possibly could for Annie in the time we had her, from the day we brought her home until the day she died. She had the best care, the best home, the best love and treatment she could possibly get. But this is just a reminder for all who skim over preventative health care for their buns; don't. It really can save your buns life.
We do, however, want to say a massive thank you to Vets4Pets Warrington for their outstanding care for Annie and their ability to go that extra mile every single time. Every phone call of "Just an update for you all, she pooped!" was met with cheers and delight from the staff; you really felt they were with you every single step of the way and I could not say a bad thing about their treatment of my baby girl (and my other baby boy too!)
Annie passed away on May 11th 2012.
Forever in our hearts babygirl.
xx
