Why we decided to get Amelie spayed
Hector and Amelie haven't been getting along with each other - we had to separate them as Hector was already humping Amelie but wasn't mature enough to get castrated, and after his castration we waited till he had recovered to put them together in. Although they saw each other every day under supervision, the little buns unbonded and it broke out into a nasty fight one day when Hector decided he didn't like Amelie any more, and Amelie hurt her eye (after eye drops for a week she recovered!). We separated them and decided before we start to try to rebond them that Amelie should be spayed, just in case we bond them and then she turns aggressive and they unbond again.
After the operation
Amelie had stitches on the outside that she could pull out, but the vet glued a special plaster over it and put a onesie/body on her. It was tiny and she wasn't a happy bunny. The vet said she wasn't allowed to take it off for a week (unless we have to wash it) as it's very dangerous if she pulled her stitches out - she basically made me terrified of the thought of Amelie getting to her stitches.
She came home on the same day - Thursday afternoon, but she didn't move much and was very cold - I gave her a hot water bottle (only semi warm) wrapped in a towel and she slept on it all night. I left a carrot with her and in the morning she had nibbled on it a bit, but she didn't eat more until the next day in the afternoon. On Friday evening she had managed to take her onesie off by herself (she is such a little ninja). I managed to get it back on her and after 10 minutes she had taken it off and was tugging at her plaster. This is literally where I panicked and didn't know what to do - it was the weekend and the vet was closed, there was only the emergency number but it wasn't really an emergency! We put a sock on her and left her to it.
The next day she had tugged the sock all the way down, so it was all crumpled up by her hips. I took it off her again and just let her be - although the sock didn't really cover the plaster it at least distracted her enough to stop tugging at her plaster and instead tug at the sock! On Monday morning I called the vet and they seemed pretty relaxed by the whole thing, saying it was common that the rabbits can get out of the onesie and I can bring her over on Thursday. I was relieved that they were so relaxed but also pretty annoyed seeing as I was panicking the entire weekend thinking she was going to die?! During the week bits of plaster was lying about everywhere but Amelie seemed a lot happier and was eating and drinking normally again.
The other problem was the pain relief and antibiotics - okay the metacam is honey flavoured but after the first day Amelie didn't want to eat it anymore from the syringe and was seriously annoyed at me, and the antibiotics she didn't want to have it from day 1. Luckily after the first day she was eating parsley again - so I just put the metacam on the parsley and gave it to her, and once she had eaten it I did exactly the same with the antibiotics and she ate that as well! Problem fixed.
On Thursday we went to the vet and she said Amelie didn't even reach the stitches so they were all still in tact. The vet took them all out anyway as everything was healed and that was that!
So if anyone has a recently spayed bunny my advice is, if you're bunny is tugging at her stitches/pulling the stitches out you shouldn't over panic! If it's the first or second day from the operation then I would call the vet, but after the third/fourth day hopefully the wound will be healed enough to not harm the bunny if she does pull them out - if my little ninja Amelie can't pull them out then hopefully your bunny can't too!
Nevertheless it was the most stressful weekend ever and I'm so glad that it's over and she's a happy and healthy bunny again! I'm waiting another week for her hormones to calm down and then Hector and Amelie will start having dates with each other in neutral territory.
I will keep you updated and I hope my experience will help you with yours! Good luck with your bun.
No comments:
Post a Comment