lost both of my girls and i’m afraid it was my fault

[johnbltz]

I got my sweet girls Bianca and Bridgette last August 2016. They were Flemish Giant sisters who had been bonded from birth. I had planned on only getting one bunny, but I just couldn’t break these two up. The woman I got them from is a breeder, she said that they had had complications with pregnancy, which was why she was selling them. She also claimed that they were about three years old.

Almost exactly one month ago I woke up to find Bridgette dead in their litter box. I was devastated. I couldn’t figure out what went wrong and I was so heartbroken. I was worried about her sister Bianca so I kept a close eye on her. She seemed fine, kept eating and drinking and pretty much being her normal self. After a few days I figured we were out of the woods and everything was okay.

This past weekend I flew out of town to see my family. The first few times I had to leave them alone for a day or two I had someone drop in on them to make sure they had enough food and water. I never had any problems, so when I got the hang of how much food, water, and hay they needed I would just make sure they had plenty if I was only going to be gone for a few days. I had Bianca in a nice new hutch I have inside, which I’d gotten for both of them before Bridgette passed. When I got home Sunday all of her food and water was still full and Bianca was on the upper level, laying there as if she was sleeping, but she was dead. I was – and am – so incredibly heart broken.

I just don’t know what happened. I had been a little worried they might have fleas. I brought them with me to Florida over a long break this past winter, the fleas are terrible there and they caught them. The vet I took them to for their spays gave them flea medicine, and I left Florida figuring it was taken care of. I got worried though when I recently noticed lots of little bites on my ankles, like I get when the fleas are bad in Florida. But Bianca didn’t seem to be scratching any more than usual, and I never saw any fleas on her. I’ve always been a magnet for weird bug bites, and we’d just had severe flooding in the area, so I figured it was nothing. I was also concerned about Bianca getting depressed after losing her sister, but she was eating fine and actually being more affectionate than usual. She was always pretty stand offish, not one to be bothered with petting, so I would just let her out an enjoy watching her play before she’d eventually return to her hutch, which was honestly usually pretty quickly. But recently she would actually hop up on the couch and let me “groom” her, petting her head. She still didn’t like being touched anywhere else, and would definitely let me know when she had had enough, but it was kind of nice that she was being more affectionate, and I thought it was a good sign that she wasn’t too depressed.

But now I’m so distraught that I may have gotten my girls killed. Could she have had a flea infestation serious enough to kill her, that I somehow neglected to notice? Was she actually so depressed that me leaving her was too much, and she just stopped eating? I can’t bear to think that I left her, and she got so lonely that she just laid down and gave up. I can’t stop thinking that its all my fault, that if I’d been a better caretaker they would both still be alive, playing and snuggling together in my living room. Was this all my fault?

[Bam]

I’m sorry you lost Bianca and Bridgette. It’s not possible to say what took them without necropsies. Fleas seems highly unlikely. Really really bad cases of mange can kill a bunny, but the outward state of a bunny that heavily infested with mange would be horrific and not something that could be missed. I think you can rule out fleas as cause of death.

Buns often die unexpectedly. Mostly because they’re so very good at hiding illness that we rarely get to find out that sth is wrong before its too late. You’d not notice anything subtle, because the bun’s body does all it can to never show any symptoms. It’s an important survival mechanism in the wild, but it’s really impractical for us bun owners who really would want our buns to tell us when something isn’t right so we can bring them to the vet in good time.

I’m glad Bridgette and Bianca got to come live with you. It was great of you to take them both, even though you were planning to get just the one bunny.

Binky free ****Bridgette**** and ****Bianca****

[Luna]

Please don’t blame yourself. Bam is right that there isn’t a sure way to tell without a necropsy, and the breeder said they had complications beforehand, so there may not have been anything you could have done to save them. I’m sure they are grateful that you gave them a home and kept them together.

Binky free Bridgette & Bianca

[johnbltz]

Thank you all so much for the kind words. This is what my partner has been telling me, but it’s nice to hear it from people who have been through the same thing, helps me get at least a little bit of closure. Now it’s time to make a nice picture of them to put up on my desk 🙂

[Author]

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