My rat had a stroke??

I woke up this morning and I looked into the rat cage and my rat Doris looked awkward.
Her head was tilted in one direction (and her head would kinda slowly swing in one direction. not very fast but you can notice it turning)... and when I "say" her name she comes running to the side of the cage so I said her name she came running but looked like she was half drunk. She fell over and didn't look very happy at all. She even bumped into the food dish a few times.

Now I think it's a stroke because my Pom had the same problem before he died. And the vet told us it was a stroke, and I think a few of my hamsters, when I was little had the same problem.

Anyone know what I should do??? Put her out of her misery??? I wanted to breed her again but it looks like that's not a good idea right now.

It sounds like head tilt. Strokes in rats are uncommon but head tilt (a bacterial infection when sudden / can also be a genetic deformity) are very common.


Options: Take her to the vet to verify and get antibiotics. Some will recover but usually not fully (enough to be good pets). I have had a couple over the years that have gotten it and gotten over it and lived many more months...but I would never breed them again (as you just cannot be sure it isn't the genetic form of the disease)

Sorry to hear that.

Well that sucks! :sniff:
I'll give her a day or more and see if she changes any, but if not I think I will put her to sleep.
The only bad part about that is I cannot feed her to my BP. She's way too big to be used as food. Poor girl will have to go into the ground and wasted.

Head Tilt... Weird... never heard if that before.

Well thanks and hopefully I get some new rats soon so I can start another breeding project

Thanks for the input!

Poor thing; I would take her to a vet.

Yeah I kind of want take her to one too, but I bought her in the first place as snake food, not as a pet but as she got bigger and after she had her babbies it is now impossible to use her as a feeder.


Like I said I will give her time but I dont really want to spend money on saving the life of one of my feeder rats.
And unfortunatly I don't think I will ever look at a rat as a pet. If I did, I'd never be able to feed snakes... :(

Poor Doris... I'll check on her when I get home. Personally I rather she die on her own but If I have to do it, I have to do it I guess...

I may even just give the vet a call and see what she says. Maybe she can help me for free or even cheap. We will see...

I'm working 13h shifts for the next two weeks so I wont be dealing with her anytime soon so hopefully she can recover on her own. But I have my douths :(

Please :please: for my :rat: Doris!!!!!

She has an ear infection, it's not a stroke. She needs antibiotics from the vet, such as clavamox, cephalexin, Baytril, etc. She is NOT going to recover without the proper medication.

Feeder or not, all animals deserve respect and proper veterinary care when they require it.

I have mixed feelings about the name of your rat, but I hope all goes well for your rat Doris. Get her to the vet and some meds.

Well..... Sadly Doris has moved onto a better life... :tombstone
:stupidme: I didnt get to read the post from "SatanicIntention" and "Ladydragon AKA Doris" until just today.

From what a understood from "lord jackel" Doris had head tilt.
I went home that night at about 9:10 and my mother came to me and said Doris was looking pretty bad. So I went into my room, woke Doris up, and she could hardly walk out of her tissue box. She was falling everywhere.
I put my hand in to pet her back and she started rolling around really fast.
I tried again to pet her and did for a few seconds and then all of a sudden she flipped over and grabed my hand and scared the :omfg: outta me. (but she didnt bite...)

She then tired to go back to bed but couldnt seem to get her nose into the door and was having trouble just finding the entrance. :dizzy:

So I said to myself, enough is enough and I'm gonna put her out of her pain.

So like I said... Doris is in her happy place. I wasn't very pleased because I had trouble doing the deed and that made it so much worse... but it is over now and had I known it could have been an ear infection I would have not done that at all... Not anyones fault but mine ( I learnt a lesson )
I just felt that when I was looking at her it was just ALL going downhill.
I felt super bad and didn't want her to have to deal with that kinda pain any longer...

I feel just sick about it now... and still every morning I wake up and look into the cage of Doris and think about her...

But this weekend I'm going to get 10 new rats from the pet store and keep another girl and breed her... well I guess Ill need to keep a guy too but I wont let him get to big that I cant feed him to Mitch or Shiri... I was thinking about naming the new rat Dorothy this time.

but anyway thanks for everyones input and next time I know that it can be a few different things and will look into more then I did this time. I just felt so bad for her, I couldnt watch her anymore. But I learnt something throughout this experience!

Thanks again!

Wow that's really sad. Sorry for your loss, but I woulda have prob done the same thing. I don't like to see animals suffer either.

I'm still not very pleased about the whole situation really... :crying:

Thanks!!!

Exactly what method did you use to put her down?

Do I really have to give you the details... :no:
I dont really want to personally...

But next time I know a better way...
I can use baking soda and vinager and make the CO2....

I used a bag and a hard wall... usually the same way I deal with my feeders.

It's been almost a week and still feel horrible. :crying:

To be completely honest as I read this it was hard to believe some of your "sentiments". Could be I was reading this completely wrong and if so I apologize.

However, in your initial posts you said this, so I was curious.



[QUOTE=Jonny2184]Well that sucks!

I'll give her a day or more and see if she changes any, but if not I think I will put her to sleep.

QUOTE]



Secondly, IMO if you had the time to post this info you certainly had the time to search forums for humane ways to euthanize than slamming the rat against the wall. I do believe this method is done by many here, although I am not one that advocates any inhumane treatment. But that's opening a whole new can of worms.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by ivylea77

To be completely honest as I read this it was hard to believe some of your "sentiments". Could be I was reading this completely wrong and if so I apologize.
However, in your initial posts you said this, so I was curious.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Jonny2184

Well that sucks!
I'll give her a day or more and see if she changes any, but if not I think I will put her to sleep.

---

Secondly, IMO if you had the time to post this info you certainly had the time to search forums for humane ways to euthanize than slamming the rat against the wall. I do believe this method is done by many here, although I am not one that advocates any inhumane treatment. But that's opening a whole new can of worms.

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YEAH... I hear ya...
But If you don't think I'm sad about it... I'm not going to try to prove it...

I also did research on how to kill a pet or feeder humanely. And that id how I came up with that baking soda and vinager CO2 thing...

Now your probably wondering why would I do the research AFTER the fact.
Well... like I said I usually kill my rats in that fashion. *wack em against the wall*... Well this time, it didnt go as planned...
I closed my eyes, and gave her a good swing... but she was so big and heavy that she came flying out of the bag... and was still alive but this time in a ton more pain... "which caused me a crap load more pain too"
So I had to pickup my half dead pet and swing her again... Not a fun experience

So the next day I researched how to "euthanize humanly". Now I know for next time... and thats why I said I learnt something from this experience...

So don't worry... I realize I made a big mistake and my pet had to pay the consicenses.
Now I'm all worked up again.. gesh... sorry if I sounded kinda mean eh!!

I cannot seem to see my last post so I'm gona post it again...weird!

A reply to - ivylea77



YEAH... I hear ya...
But If you don't think I'm sad about it... I'm not going to try to prove it...

I also did research on how to kill a pet or feeder humanely. And that id how I came up with that baking soda and vinager CO2 thing...

Now your probably wondering why would I do the research AFTER the fact.
Well... like I said I usually kill my rats in that fashion. *wack em against the wall*... Well this time, it didnt go as planned...
I closed my eyes, and gave her a good swing... but she was so big and heavy that she came flying out of the bag... and was still alive but this time in a ton more pain... "which caused me a crap load more pain too"
So I had to pickup my half dead pet and swing her again... Not a fun experience

So the next day I researched how to "euthanize humanly". Now I know for next time... and thats why I said I learnt something from this experience...

So don't worry... I realize I made a big mistake and my pet had to pay the consicenses.
I'm all worked up now...sorry If I sound like a bad person eh!

((Very strange little quirk there, Jonny. I only see a blank post as well...but when I click on the "EDIT" button to delete it, I can see the text that you had originally left. I'm gonna leave it as is for now, and get our technical guru (Iceman25 :D ) to take a look at it. ))

Quote:

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Originally Posted by JLC

((Very strange little quirk there, Jonny. I only see a blank post as well...but when I click on the "EDIT" button to delete it, I can see the text that you had originally left. I'm gonna leave it as is for now, and get our technical guru (Iceman25 :D ) to take a look at it. ))

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Yeah I noticed that too! Thats how I did the copy paste thing...
Sounds good to moi! no problemo!

I'm not sure what exactly your trying to prove or why you'd even be so graphic in your post.

I'm glad you finally did the research. Perhaps now at least your feeders will be humanely euthanized.

Regardless, its a shame that it had to happen this way, and I'm sure your regretable as well.

Unfortunately, out in the back woods over here there are people who do the whole wack thing. I find it is more common around the farmers. [not just rats im talkin but all small animals] my friend mike had to put down a pheasant in that fashion because a lady had hit it with her car, and her kids were in the car and freaked out. So he had to put it down in a manner that was pretty sad. *keepin it pg-13* It happens alot, and they don't really seem to care. Freaks me the eff out.

But really, how is that different from stunned rats? I don't know how they stun them. I would def prefer the CO2 chamber

I do apologize for being so graphic "ivylea77'.

But I just felt that you didn't seem to think that the whole thing really bothers me, and I thought you kinda wanted to know? and I guess I figured if I explained it in detail you would understand the pain that both me and Doris went through.

But I'm am sorry if it bothered you!

But the good news is that I'm gonna go get some more rats on the weekend, and pick my favorite girl and name her Dorothy.
I'm gonna try to hold this one more so she doesnt always want to bite me.
I was really scared to hold Doris...