early death

Hi everyone, This is my first post and unfortunately an exceptionally sad one. I am doing this as much for myself as for anyone else who is unfortunate enough to be going through the same. This site has helped and comforted me and I hope I can do the same for someone else. So our darling...

Ophelia passed back in July, she was a curly haired blind albino rat. My baby Viola who just passed one week ago today had pneumonia for the second time and sadly this time it got her. Ophelia had pneumonia as well and passed. They are sisters. Ophelia passed at 6 months and Viola passed at 9...

While doing some general searching of pet rats, I found this study: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/943795 Basically it details that rats kept alone are more likely to die sooner and become way more stressed than rats who are housed together. I'm not a super fan of this micro-study...