Hi there, before I start, Mabel is better now and this happened in February but I wanted to get some input as this is still very fresh in my memory.

On February 9, 2020, my partner and I took out both rabbits one by one to clip nails. Mabel has always been skittish and uncooperative with this procedure, she twists and flails and tries to take risky jumps. She absolutely HATES being picked up and so I try to only pick her up when I need to, which was Feb 9. She is a beautiful black bun (BBB) and if you’ve tried clipping black nails you might know where this is going. I cut her quick, despite using a flashlight and the HRS pinch-pinch-clip method while my partner held her. The bleeding on her nail was pretty bad but I had styptic powder on hand and I used quite a bit trying to clot her bleeding nail. We weighed her and put her back in the bunny room where she immediately went under a box to lick herself and calm down and we left them alone because grooming day is always so hard on Mabel. I didn’t go back to the room until that evening with salad which she ate with gusto, back to normal!

Except when I went into the room the next morning she wouldn’t come out of her sleeping box.

I got on the floor to peek in and found her lying hunched in a ball. I thought she maybe had some gas and captured her to give her some ovol. When I placed her on the non-slip rug on my counter she couldn’t stand up and kicked her legs to the side repeatedly until I steadied her. She just didn’t know which way was up so I thought she had a stroke and even e.cuniculi entered my mind as it raced to figure out what was going on. So she didn’t eat that morning and I called the vet to explain what was going on. We took her to an emergency and it was declared she was ataxic and cachexic.

The ataxia part is an imbalance. Cachexic is massive muscle and weight loss due to underlying conditions. The emerg vet, who is trained in exotics, was pretty near close to crying and it took her a minute to compose herself. My partner and I both picked up on that and all three of us thought we were going home to say goodbye to Mabel. We were given antibiotics as a just-in-case for parasites. And we were given Metacam to help her with pain with instruction on a meal and medicine plan for the next ten days. I was grinding up hay and pellets with veggies and water to make a mash to force-feed her. I was putting diluted apple juice in too so she was getting hydrated. Two days after that emerg visit I went to my local vet for Critical Care (don’t worry, I already beat myself up pretty hard for not having that on hand in the first place) and continued this care regime. I had to pen up this sweet girl and she had to sleep separately from Hannibal which they did not like so I opened her pen so she could access the whole room again. Hannibal was being gentle with her and a cute little marshmallow friend to keep her warm. I had to chase her around 4 or 5 times each day to get the liquids, meds, and food into her. Her dewlap was constantly wet and caked with food, she wasn’t grooming herself and had wet hocks and a messy butt but we persevered.

It took two weeks of this dedicated routine and she actually got better. The ataxia we thought would never clear and she has gained back some weight. Her hip bones aren’t as sharp to the touch. She tends to keep her back feet together when she hops but they both work when she walks. Her front paws slide and she seems to have a hard time not sliding down to her belly all the time but she has made such a recovery like I don’t even know what to do with myself some days. Could I be Snow White, after all?

I know that was a long post but it didn’t seem right to post this update on Reddit.

This morning my partner and I were talking about how we need to clip her nails again but I am actually so terrified of this happening again. I went to my medicine cabinet and pulled out my styptic powder and discovered it expired in 2009! I didn’t even know it had a shelf life and here I let my senior rabbit lick it off her paws almost three months ago. So my ultimate question is can styptic powder cause a poisonous reaction in rabbits and what should I have on hand in case she bleeds again?

Here’s an older pic of Miss Mabel and her big sister Sansa.