July 10th, 2024 2:32AM EST~Cursed Mental Health


It has been... a ROUGH few months, to say the least. I'ts better now, but damn they had me in the first half (of the year) not gonna lie.
So, last update I had lost two babies, and this update is much the same news. It comes with the territory of owning and loving rats, they aren't here for a long time, just a good time. This time I lost my boys Lupin and Onion, one right after the other. Both of them passed painlessly in their sleep from old age. They were both about the same age (not from the same litter but I got them together from the same breeder) so they were just about 2 when they passed. I buried them myself, as they weren't emergency gotta-run-to-the-vet-NOW situations. When you lose a rat, it feels like a physical chunk of your soul is going with them. It's a chunk of memories and emotions that you can still look back on, but they belong to that rat forever. I miss all my boys that I've lost now, but it was a particular blow to lose Lupin. He was the one we hadn't expected! We weren't even supposed to adopt him, but he was so loving and so special that we couldn't leave the breeder without him, and he lived up to his adventurous and loving childhood til the very end. During his last ever free roam, Lupin spent his time cuddling and kissing me, too old to want to move around and play like the other boys, but no less willing to give everyone grooming and cuddle when they all settled down. It was shocking as well, to be honest, when we looked over to see him sleeping so soundly, only to realize he wasnt breathing. He had been getting over a small cold, and he was getting better every day, moving around and eating more. But it was just his time, and he went peacefully, and that is truly all I can ask. Onion went just two days later, in much the same fashion; It was morning, and time to give the boys their breakfast snacks, but even though all of the other little dwarf boyos hopped to immediately get some treats, all of them coming out of the same space ball where they were sleeping moments before, Onion was no where to be seen. That is, until we had a look inside the space ball they'd all been cuddling in and found him in repose, forever. He had died in a cuddle puddle of his brothers, and we buried him next to Lupin. I know he would have liked the spot, considering his lifetime of digging dirt tunnels in his bioactive setup.
Even though its hard, and remembering them does often make me cry, I think owning rats is one of the most fulfilling and stress relieving things I've ever done! These little guys love me, so much, and having them to remind me to get out of bed and feed them and myself is a blessing. Getting rats was a lifelong dream of mine, and it was the first big decision I made after finally getting medicated for my anxiety. I might one day stop getting rats, but that wont be for a long, long time. I'll remember my boys always, and I know their tiny lives were full.
It took some time after the losses to recover, I had a cold at the time and then immediately started my period, so that made recovering emotionally much harder. Once I had crawled out of my funk, mostly due to the fact that I had other boys to look after and I knew they were missing me, I had some more hard things to deal with. Namely, my new boys! Earl and Joe are doing very well, though they still arent fully integrated with the others as there have been some ~issues~. Things seemed to be going well, and we moved them all into a one-story critter nation together, with nothing but a toilet for the first day. Unfortunately, around the third day when we had added in some hides and stuff, the boys got into a pretty big spat, and since rats are so god damned fragile, it was an emergency situation. Earl's little nutsack got split by an errant claw, and we had to put him through a two week period of solitude and daily medicine. He's perfectly healthy now, mind you, but he did give us a huge scare for SURE. Due to the long separation, though, the entire process of introducing him and Joe had to be reset, so for now we are doing small playtimes together again, and ill move them back in together to see if they can co-habitate better.
The small boys, now down to just three (Scimmy, Dr Pepper and Sierra Mist) are also doing well. Scimmy is the oldest rat I own now, the only boy left from my original five, but even though hes over 2 now, he is still as fat and sassy as ever. The only health issues he has, and has ever had, are his excessive porphrin around his eyes, and im not overly worried about that. Sierra Mist and Dr Pepper spend all their time digging, eating, and sleeping, and Scimmy really only engages in the latter two activities, but he never was much interested in the dirt to begin with. I'm not sure what I'll do when their group is down to 2, I may try to integrate them with the standard boys, but we'll have to see.
In non-rat related news, I've been much more active on my kofi shop, and im really gunning it hard on pushing my sfw commissions. I hope to one day be drawing silly little dudes forever to make my living, and I've also been making a lot more varied adoptables to put up in my shop. I have a lot of other things going on, I gotta get tested and medicated for my (likely severe) adhd, and i need to renew my anxiety meds for the year, but I have high hopes for the next few months. At least, I'm going to try to be productive and positive.
I'll leave off here for now, hopefully my next update doesnt include a rat epitaph.