Freaking. OUT.

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Bronwyn

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jul 21, 2007
Messages
2,957
Location
Guelph, ON
A few months ago, as some may recall, my rats were under house arrest because an Advil 400 tablet went missing from my dresser. Presumably the cat batted it off as she does with everything. I searched for weeks and vaccuumed everywhere multiple times. Eventually I just assumed it was gone. My girls needed exercise and I just couldn't find it.

WEEKS later, I just retrieved a pen from underneath my dresser, a place I vaccuumed under a few times since the opening is so narrow, and found the freaking Advil in the middle of the floor. It wasn't there yesterday so I know they moved it today.

One third is chewed off.

The girls have been out all day like always and look pretty normal to me but one of them (or both!) have obviously chewed it and quite a bit of it. I've paged my dad (a vet) so hopefully he'll call me soon :*(! My parents are away for the weekend with the car so I can't even take them anywhere if there was anything that could be done.
 
I know that some people give their rats ipuprofen for pain and anti-inflammatory, so maybe it won't affect them?
Let us know what your dad says!
 
How long has it been that the girls were put back in their cage?
You would know very quickly especially with a rats higher metabolism if there was an ibuprofen overdose, my guess would be they would show symptoms in an hour.

Its very possible your rats took a nibble of the pill, went blech, another day took another experimental nibble, and so on. Were they coated advil tablets? That is rather sweet but advil tastes nasty.
 
Hopefully it'll be alright, I know one day my rats got into a tube of polysporin, I was worried they ate it! But silly rats just like the way the package feels when they chew it :roll: If they only had a little bit on separate occassions, it shouldn't damage them. Let us know how it goes!
 
I'm breathing now, I think, heh!

My dad said rats can tolerate acetominophen but he didn't know how much. He also said that since we don't know when or which rat, we can't do anything but hope. They definitely consumed the third as there was no surrounding white powder on the floor. They've been in their cage for exactly three hours now and both seem rather perky. o_O

I thought for sure they were done for! Or one was.

Thank you for the reassurances and information, I really have to learn to breathe in these situations. The odd thing is I can keep a level head with a crisis involving a person (and boy have there been many) but my pets are another story!

Edit: I hope I haven't given the impression I'm an irresponsible owner : x If it helps, in the year I've owned these two girls, the only other emergency involved a wee bit of carnations (which turned out to be fine). Oh, and Brie getting stuck in something but...fixed that. ¬¬
 
Hahaha...don't worry about it Bron, we all panic when something happens to our babies. And things like this do happen, doesn't make you a bad owner. How many times have any of us almost sat on our rats? :roll:
 
I stepped on one of my rats tails once.. I felt awful for a week, kept giving him my dinner and extra special treats to make up for it :lol: Things happen, and many times its either out of your control or an accident. Gradually I've learned to keep a cooler head, but most of the time if something happens I go into shock and can't believe anything has happened... which I suppose is good because I then work through it unusually calm until it settles in whats occured. (ie. my dog gashed his leg open on a metal beam.. silly boy )
 
Lol! *wipes brow*

When my sister lost my indoor cat in May, for those five days I pretty much didn't sleep more than two-three hours a night. I was a zombie! If only our pets knew how much they can put us through, lol.
 
Bronwyn said:
If only our pets knew how much they can put us through, lol.

I'll second that! One of my 2 cats went missing on December 20th in the early hours and hasn't been seen since. Now whenever her brother stays out a longer than usual time I go into meltdown, crying, unable to sleep. Then he wanders nonchalantly in asking for food! I think he did know he'd upset me the first time he'd done it though - he hardly moved off my legs on the bed for the next few nights.
 
I'm so sorry to hear that :( If it helps, many people just take in cats they find and don't bother trying to find its original home. She/he could be safe and well fed. :)
 
I'm glad all is well :D
Like Shelley, I was using polysporin on Savanna and couldn't find it the next day, looked everywhere, worried about alzheirmer's. Found it a couple days later on cage cleaning day hidden under paper in Savanna's cage :oops: tube well-chewed but she was fine.
*note* the stuff doesn't work from the inside out.
 
Nelly said:
Bronwyn said:
If only our pets knew how much they can put us through, lol.

I'll second that! One of my 2 cats went missing on December 20th in the early hours and hasn't been seen since. Now whenever her brother stays out a longer than usual time I go into meltdown, crying, unable to sleep. Then he wanders nonchalantly in asking for food! I think he did know he'd upset me the first time he'd done it though - he hardly moved off my legs on the bed for the next few nights.

Oh man if that would have happened to me I think all of my cats would immediately become indoor only cats and NO ONE would be allowed outside again unless on a leash. I could not bear to think of what could happen to an animal left to roam around unsupervised. But that is just me.
 
I blame by cat for anything these girls get into :lol: I put risky objects on a stand they can't access but Alice, my cat, makes a game out of batting whatever she can off surfaces. That's how the Advil went missing!

But as for missing cats I know we could never keep one of our cats indoors. She'd likely kill us in our sleep. :watching: But cats like Alice seem content enough indoors. This is the one who also went missing for five days when my sister stupidly left the back door open.
 
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