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Brownie
• Brownie was a sable female. She left for the Rainbow Bridge October 6, 2016. |
October 6, 2016:
Our rally was short lived. She is hanging on but eating almost nothing now, very little urination or BM’s although when she does have a BM very little but very dark. She is unable to really walk, pulls herself if necessary but really just wants to be held or buried in her blankets and bed. So hard to watch her decline and not be able to help her. I’m guessing we are down to days now. I will keep you posted.
PM Update: Hi there. She has moved on to a better place. Heartbreaking. Thank you so much for all of your help, guidance and wisdom these last five years. We appreciate it more than you know. I’m glad Ryan was able to be with her a few days ago. Helps ground me.
I would love to donate all of her stuff to the farm if you can use it. I have the cage, toys, bedding, food, ferretone, soup, etc. Even if its to give to a new ferret owner who may adopt from the farm. Let me know.
October 4, 2016:
Well, rallying a little bit I think. I have gotten her to eat some soup today so that is progress. I’ve been force feeding her meds as I don’t want to put in her soup as she eats very little of it and I want to make sure she gets them. She seems a little more mobile today and not as groggy. Maybe she was just giving me a scare and is on the road to recovery. Just don’t know, so hour by hour, day by day.
This is better news than I expected. The Pred if not given in soup is going to cause an ulcer so if you can get the Pred in a bit soup it will be better for her tummy. - Brenda
October 2, 2016:
Hi Brenda
Brownie has taken a turn for the worse. I really feel like we are going to lose her soon. She has only been eating soup since bringing her home and taking in very little water. Starting last night she had very little interest in food. Today she has absolutely no interest in food or water. She is extremely lethargic, not really moving around on her own at all. When I took her out of her cage this morning she barely walked at all and would just plop down on the floor. She has refused food and is content to just be wrapped up in her blanket and held, which we are doing as much as we can. I don’t want to force feed her and stress her although I did force feed her meds this afternoon because I guess I hoped it might perk her up but it has not. She seems very groggy and her breathing seems shallow and at times too fast but it seems to change.
Of course I searched the internet and these are all the signs. I don’t think she is in any pain but that is really why I’m reaching out since you of course have so much experience with this. Ryan is actually home for a few days as school is out Mon/Tue so he can be with her. I just want to make sure that keeping her here is the right thing to do, or is it more humane for me to take her in to see Dr. G? Because I don’t think she is in pain I am inclined to keep her with us and let her pass naturally, but I also don’t want to be selfish. Any advice you have would be great. This is always the worst part of having an animal, breaks my heart every time...
Yes it seems her Insulinoma is taking her from you. She is not. That is great for both of them. I would not make an emergency run to see Dr. G - we hospice here - keep in mind she may go into seizures if her numbers get really low, she may scream out if she does. They do not always go into seizures, I like to keep them home and hospice them so if you wish to that, it is best for them and you. If she starts seizures you may want to reach out to Dr G. it is uncomfortable to listen to. But again they don't always go into seizures, a lot of times they just slip into sleep and not wake up. She is not in pain, if she is happy being covered and held that is the way it should be. I am sorry to hear she is on the edge of life. I hope this helps.
It is - keeping in mind the love she had from all of you, the life she had was awesome - she lived a good full life.. we all die.. she could not have asked for a better family to love her. Brenda
Thanks for the info. I feel better knowing she is not in pain. We will do our best to keep her home and comfortable. I’ll have to take a look at my work schedule and see if I can arrange to work from home after Ryan goes back. If not I might contact you, but I really do want to try to keep her here.
Not going to lie, the seizure things sounds pretty scary but we will see how things go. Praying she just peacefully goes to sleep. I will keep you posted.
Yes that is better for her. They are scary and awful to listen to.. I've had them screaming all the way to Brockport to get them to Doc and have them die as I drive into the driveway. I will tuck you all in my God Box for her to slip away peacefully.
August 23, 2016:
Hi there
This is shorter notice than I usually work off of. Wondering if you might be able to take Brownie from Wed 8/31 – Tuesday 9/6? Our daughter is getting married that weekend and we have someone coming in to watch the dogs/cat and her but I’m thinking for her it might be better if you had space. If not that’s fine we can go with our house sitter.
Also an update on her. We had some trauma mid July. She was sleeping in Ryan’s sweats and he didn’t know it and accidentally stepped on her. We had x rays done and nothing was broken. We did confinement and pain meds for several days and she has recovered. She definitely does not have a normal walking gate anymore and ever since then she seems to have limited bowel control so I’m assuming there may have been some nerve damage L We’re just happy nothing was broken but I do feel bad for her and I know he feels awful. The month before that we had some more episodes with her insulin levels and needed to up her dosage but now we seem stable again. It’s hard to see her aging and knowing we can’t do anything for her other than to love her. But then again that’s the same with all of our fur babies.
OK, well enough of my story. Let me know either way. Hope everyone at the farm is doing well and you are enjoying the last days of summer!
June 16, 2015:
Brownie does have right adrenal gland disease and Insulinoma is back. She is scheduled for the implant next week, need to get her sugar stabilized first.
January 25, 2015:
Hi Brenda
Hope all is well at the farm. Looking at our schedule for May and we have an out of town wedding followed by a vacation. I know it’s early but I thought I’d see if you would be able to take little Ms Brownie while we are gone. You would likely have her from 5/21 – 6/1.
She’s doing great. Just had her annual visit and her glucose numbers were great, so for now the surgery seems to have been a success. She seems to adapt well to Ryan being at school, coming home for breaks and leaving again. Doesn’t seem to get too depressed which is a relief!
Let me know if those dates will work and if so we’ll touch base as it gets closer.
Lynn
July 12, 2014:
Lynn, I'm so glad to hear that Miss Brownie is doing well and that her little belly has all it's fur back. She is just so precious. Smelly boy shirts are a good idea.
Thank you for the update.
Peachbr>
July 10, 2014:
I just thought I’d send a quick note to let you both know that Brownie has been doing great since her surgery. All of her follow up visits went well and her bloodwork was great so she is presently med free. We’ll take that for as long as we can!!! It took a really long time for her belly to fill back out with fur but it finally has and she looks like her adorable old self. In August her beloved daddy will be heading off to college in Pittsburgh so she will be stuck with the ‘grandparents’ to amuse her until he comes home on breaks. She did really well for us last summer when Ryan went to Germany for three weeks so I’m feeling that she will be fine again, we’ll just give her a little extra TLC for a while and make Ryan leave me a few smelly boy shirts for her to cuddle with!
Hope everyone at the farm is doing well!!!
Lynn
March 27, 2014:
Hi Ladies
Just an update on Brownie girl. She is home from surgery. She did very well. Doc said he took 4 nodules from her. We won’t know until pathology comes back if we will expect a return or not. Also nothing going on with her adrenal glands so that was good news! In the meantime she is very sleepy but I did get her to take almost an entire cube of Soup after we got home, which is a good starting sign. I’ll send an update tomorrow night, just wanted you to know she’s doing well.
Lynn
March 29, 2014:
Morning. Didn't get a chance to send an update last night, but she continues to do well. She is still pretty tired and groggy, but she is eating her soup and resting and I can see her energy starting to return. I will send another update in a day or two but all is well
April 15, 2014:
Ah jeez, I meant to email last week and didn’t! Busy time of year for us.
Anyway, she is doing very well and is totally back to herself. The bad news is that the pathology that came back indicates that the nodules she had are the type to reoccur so Doc is pretty sure that she will have a recurrence, it’s just a matter of when. For now, we are just happy that she bounced back so quickly. We are stepping down the Prednisolone and will check her blood levels in another week. If he likes the numbers we will continue to step down and check her levels to see if we can get her off the meds completely for now. The good news is she takes the meds very well now so if/when she has to be on them forever I suspect she will be a good patient! I’ll keep you posted on how she does stepping down and if we are able to get her completely off of the meds for now at least!
March 27, 2014:
Hi Ladies
Just an update on Brownie girl. She is home from surgery. She did very well. Doc said he took 4 nodules from her. We won’t know until pathology comes back if we will expect a return or not. Also nothing going on with her adrenal glands so that was good news! In the meantime she is very sleepy but I did get her to take almost an entire cube of Soup after we got home, which is a good starting sign. I’ll send an update tomorrow night, just wanted you to know she’s doing well.
Lynn
March 20, 2014:
That’s OK Brenda, I wanted to share the news with her anyway which is why I asked for her email address.
I did send an email to you yesterday Peach, but it is stuck in my outbox and won’t move for now. I’ll have to try to reboot my computer to see if that clears it, so you may get a separate email with the same info.
Brownie has Insulinoma. We started noticing a weakness in her back legs and she was acting a little off one Sunday. Of course the vet was closed and the emergency vet didn’t know about ferrets, but she had started acting fine again so we let it pass. Then the day of our blizzard the same thing happened but much more extreme because she was completely out of it. The vet was closed due to the blizzard. We emailed Brenda and while we waited to hear back from her we gave her a touch of honey and then she started acting better and we got her to eat. By this time we had figured out it was probably Insulinoma. Brenda called me a short while later and gave me some tips and what to watch for and has sent us some Duck soup. We took her to the vet the next morning and he did the bloodtests and confirmed what we suspected. She is currently on meds and doing great but we are going to do the surgery on her because she is so young. She will have that next week Thursday. While he is in doing the surgery he will also look at her adrenal glands to make sure they look ok.
I’ll email both of you next week after her surgery and let you know how she did, but the vet tells me ferrets are very hearty and usually do well with surgery.
March 20, 2014:
Lynn how is Brownie doing? Have you gotten her to eat soup? Is there anything I can do to help? -Brenda
She is doing really well on her meds. I have to go buy I've cube trays so I didn't make her the soup yet but have been giving her the baby food that she now likes. Going to grab the trays this weekend and start her on it prior to surgery next week. I will keep you posted, thanks so much for your help! Do you still have Peaches email address? I don't but would like to give her an update.
March 13, 2014:
Well, we got Brownie in to the vet today and she does indeed have Inulinoma. We fasted her about 3hours and her level was about 37. We have her on the Prednisolone right now but given how young she is we are going to proceed with surgery in the hopes that they can get the tumors and we can keep her off of meds for a while, but only time will tell. She will have surgery in two weeks. I definitely do want to get some Duck soup from you so that we have it on hand, although she really does like the baby food but she likes it from the syringe. I think she just likes to be babied. Let me know what we need to do for the soup, and I’ll send you an update after surgery.
Lynn
March 12, 2014:
Brownie is starting to have some issues and I wanted to talk to you about them. Of course there is a blizzard and the vets are not open I know our emergency area does not specialize in ferrets, they say if its life or death they can probably help and its not life or death but I think we are starting to see problems of possibly insulinoma. If you are able please call my cell. Couldn’t find your number…
Lynn
November 26, 2013:
Brownie is doing great! Things have been pretty uneventful, which is good. She is happy and healthy :)
April 8, 2013:
Here are a few recent shots of Brownie. She is doing great. She still likes to hide all of her toys in the corner and if we pull them out and put them in her box she proceeds to take them out and put them back where she had them. She enjoys splashing her water from her bowl and giving herself a mini bath. We had to rearrange the room because she was trying to leap from the bed into open dresser drawers and we were afraid she’d hurt herself if she missed! She’s still as sweet as ever and seems happy.
Hope you are all doing well!
Lynn & Ryan
April 15, 2012:
How is Brownie adjusting to being home? - Brenda
Lynn's response: She is happy as can be. She was so excited she never even went to sleep on the ride home. She performed a thorough inspection of her living area and deemed it unchanged and as she left it :o)
Thanks so much for keeping her! Lynn
April 4, 2012, Camp Day 2:
Hey dad - Aunt Brenda let me hang out in her space all night long - she said she wanted me to get some good out time my first night at camp
I am having so much fun - Brownie
April 2, 2012:
Brenda, Jim and Ryan will bring Brownie out to you at 5pm Wednesday. Thanks! Lynn
Brenda's response: At 5 it is - thanks. Remember we need water food and something of Ryan's that she can sleep in copy of her medical records please for my files. - Brenda
March 23, 2012:
OK, I'll let you know when we get closer if Jim will have her out there in the morning or if it will be at 5. She is up to date on her shots and I'll send her with copies of that, the water, something of Ryan's and her food. Thanks!
March 22, 2012:
Hi you guys - I just saw I have Brownie on my calendar for April 4th to come to camp - are we still on for her coming to camp? The 4th is a school day so the time of drop off is going to be very important. - Brenda
Yep, we are planning on dropping her off on Wednesday the 4th and picking her up on Saturday the 14th. I know you get up super early so tell me when you need her by and we'll make it happen. Also what should be bring for her? Thanks!
Brenda's response: If you can get her here between 8:30a and 1:00p that would work great. If you cannot and need to come after work I would appreciate as close to 5 as you can. I do not get home from my afternoon run until 5, I need to move kids and do meds as soon as I get home, by the time I am done with shelter duties it is my bed time.
Getting Brownie here at 5 will allow me to settle her while I am doing shelter duties - there will be a boarding form to fill out before you leave - she is current on vaccines correct?
Please bring a copy of her documentation with you so I can keep it in her file and some water – so she does not have to adjust to ours quickly, (tummy ach) – her food and something of Ryan's she can sleep in so she knows he is coming back for her.
I look forward to seeing you and meeting Brownie.
October 18, 2011:
Brenda,
Just wanted to let you know we did the Advantage treatment on everyone and things seem to be improving. All have stopped itching and I'm not seeing any of the little critters on any of them. Thanks for the advice! We'll just continue to use that every month to avoid issues in the future....
Lynn
February 8, 2012:
Hi Brenda, Hope all is well at the farm! My computer crashed and I lost all of my contacts (and everything else!). I've been wanting to email you and Peach with an udpate on little Ms. Brownie - do you have her email address?
Ryan and Brownie are doing great! They've got their routine down pat (except for the occasional mornings Ryan oversleeps, then he gets a ride to school instead of taking the bus so they can have their morning time...) She comes up every night while she's all sleepy and cuddles with me. I have to take her then because once she's awake all she wants is either Ryan, or to run around like a crazy girl.
October 11, 2011:
Hi Brenda, Just a quick question for you - we've just found that all the animals have fleas (yuck!). Not sure what is safe to treat Brownie with? Planning on giving the dogs and cats flea baths this week and then removing all of the critters, Brownie included, while the house gets treated. Is there a safe flea shampoo for ferrets? Any suggestions appreciated!
Other than that she is doing fantastic! She has a great little personality and Ryan is really enjoying her.
Hope all is well at the farm!
Lynn
July 27, 2011:
Hi! Things are going really well. Brownie is eating and drinking and not showing any signs of depression. Ryan is having a lot of fun with her. We've introduced her to both cats. One completely ignores her, the other plays with her a little; mostly she likes to chase him around! We've let one of the dogs smell her and her cage but are taking that step much slower. Lot's of time for them to get acquainted. She has even put herself to bed a few times when she gets tired, it's really funny! Attached is a picture of the two of them. So far so good!!!
Lynn
July 19, 2011:
Brenda, Actually, yes. I just spoke to carol last night; she is going to give Brownie to us. Ryan and I will be going to pick her up on Saturday. I've assured her that we can send her pictures and she can be kept informed about how Brownie is doing so hopefully that will help ease her mind! I will let you know for sure once we actually have her in hand!
Sounds like things are slow going on turning around I hope Dexter and Brooklyn pull through. You and Mindy must be exhausted but thankfully they have you to take such good care of them!
Be in touch this weekend... Lynn
April 12, 2011:
Can you find the real ferret below?
April 2, 2011:
Sara, My presents came today and I'm so excited!!!! Here are pictures my mom took of me checking them out. She also had to send a picture of me playing in my water dish!! Tell Mum I said Thank you, Thank you so much.
Lots of Ferret Kisses,
Brownie & Peach
