Update on Silas's health

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Jack Sparrow

Well-Known Member
Joined
Aug 30, 2007
Messages
2,352
Location
On the Black Pearl in Ottawa Canada
I have mentionned several times that Silas is not doing so well. At some point, I was afraid I would lose him. He has been diagnosed with a heart disease and had some medicine to control it.

Silas lost a lot of weight and at some point, almost stopped eating. He used to have a lot of difficulty breathing when things were the worst. He was very lethargic. He started losing some hair. The medicine helped him a little but not really.

For the last 2 weeks, I find that Silas has improved. He hair is back to normal. His breathing is much better and he has more appetite. I see him eating his lab blocks regularly.

Silas is still really quiet but he is more active that he was a little while ago. He is still skinny but not as much as he was 2 months ago. The vet told me to try to avoid any stress because of his heart condition. I find that things are going well right now. Captain Jack Sparrow and Barbossa are nice to him. I even put the 2 young boys with them and Silas handles that well.

Silas will be 21 months old on Monday and he is approaching 2 years now. I don't know if he will live that long but I am now much more confident about it than I was about 2 months ago.

So far, only 2 of my rats made it to 2 years and more. Dobby died at the age of 28 months and his brother Remus will be 3 on February 27. Silas might be my third rat to reach that age and I hope he will.

I am really happy to see that my big black boy is doing better.
 
It really is wonderful when our rats can reach old age. Silas is a fighter!! He's hanging in there for you.
And Remus, wow!! What a big celebration for him!!
 
Aww that's wonderful Jack...Lots of *stay healthy vibes* for Silas, and Remus...wow! :shock: Its pretty amazing being owned by an almost 3 year old rat. Moth is mine, they are incredible aren't they?
 
Gosh he's that old? It doesn't feel that long ago when you got him. I remember baby photos! :shock: Good luck to him!
 
Thank you all. I waited so long to have my black rat and when he has been diagnosed with a heart disease, I was shocked.

I am glad too that he has improved a bit. He is such a beautiful boy and he reminds me his father Tristan so much. Tristan and him were both big, solid boys. They were identical except Tristan was blue.

Silas is rather skinny now but he is still with me. At least he seems more comfortable than he was a few weeks ago.

I always wanted a black rat (all black, hooded whatever) since the beginning. It took 18 months before we had a black boy in all the litters that Carole had. We had black rats but they were always girls.

I want to keep my dream rat as long as I can. I'm glad too that I am going to have 3 black babies next week. Black rats are the most beautiful rats we can ever get.
 
I finally found out that zellers sell ensure in packs of 6 bottles so I don't have to buy 498247928347 bottles.

Since Silas is skinny, I want to boost it with ensure. Silas is very, very picky for eating and did not like BOOST at all. I ended up throwing his bottle.

He eats pablum but not a lot. Yesterday I tried to give him some pablum mixed with vanilla ensure and Silas loved it. He ate it all and I gave him some more. This time, he ate about half of it.

At this moment, Silas is 520 g and I would like him to reach 600 g. (He was under 500 g in November.) His breathing is still difficult but he doesn't look stressed like he did a few months ago. His eyes look better too. He is probably getting used to his heart condition and he probably knows what his limits are now.

Silas will be 2 years old on May 18 so he is not a young man anymore. I really hope he reaches it.

I am happy that he continues to do well. I hop that giving him ensure and pablum every day will help him get stronger.
 
At this point Jack, just try to maintain his weight of 520 grams and possibly gain a little, he will probably never make it to 600 grams at his age and health. :) Once they are older the body is nowhere near efficient enough to process the nutrients like it used to. So with respiratory rats I try to keep their weight stable or at least not snowballing down.

Cuddles to Silas. :)
 
Glad that Silas is doing better. As for Remus, I will check to see if he has birthday wishes on the Over the Hill thread. Wow, it must be nice to see him make it to age 3.
 
Glad that he is feeling better.
I would try to maintain his weight and keep him healthy.
Perhaps a bit of weight gain if he is skin and bones.
Being overweight or large can put added strain on the heart.

Good news that he is eating now :)
 
Jack Sparrow said:
I finally found out that zellers sell ensure in packs of 6 bottles so I don't have to buy 498247928347 bottles.
Click to expand...

I checked out our Guardian Pharmacy here and they have it by the bottle. You might want to check out the Pharmacys if you want just one bottle. I mean it might be more expensive but still it's an option. But it sounds as if you are happy with the 6 bottles so that is good.

Aw Silas. Get better little man.
 
Now here's what happening.

Silas has some difficulty breathing again which is a sign he has liquid on his lungs again. This is what the vet told me when I went. So I put him on that medicine again that is supposed to diminush the amount of liquid and help his breathing.

The vet told me that rat with heart disease do that sometimes. So I am back to where I was a few months ago.

Silas doesn't have too much appetite right now so he lost some weight again.

Today I checked his teeth and they seem to be somewhat too long. I know I could take Silas to the vet to have his teeth trimmed but that is a really stressful situation for a rat. I am supposed to avoid stress for Silas because of his heart condition.

I think Silas might need to have his teeth trimed. But that would be really stressful for him.

What should I do? Should I do ahead and trim his teeth or should I leave things as they are right now?
 
Are you sure they are too long? Rats teeth can get pretty long before it's needed to be trimmed. Are the top teeth crooked, sometimes they will get crooked if the bottom ones are too long to align.
It's a really hard call, you are right, a rat in his condition will become extremely stressed out at the vets.
 
His teeth are not crocked but I remember that Voldemort once has teeth like Silas and the vet trimmed them as they were too long. Voldemort was not eating very well because of that.

Right now, Silas is not eating that much so I wonder if the teeth has something to do.
 
Oh I see... do you offer soft foods for Silas? If he's got a heart condition, he's not going to eat well at all. I think for now, I'd leave his teeth alone, unless you can clearly see it's going into his gums.
 

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