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Crying Right Now... Possible Cold Or Uri

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Rochester Piggy

Teenage Guinea Pig
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So when I woke up this morning Cali was making a funny breathing sound. I called for my boyfriend and he listened and agreed it was abnormal. The vet opens in 29 minutes, I'll call then. I checked and she has been eating, drinking, peeing, pooping normally. She was not making the sound yesterday. I weighed her yesterday and she was 1133 grams. She also passed her health check. My boyfriend is going to take her to the vet and I'm going to stay home because he's better at remembering information than I am and also I would be freaking out and probably have a literal panic attack at the vets.
 
Oh poor Cali and poor you :soz:
All paws crossed for you all, massive hugs dear :hug: x
 
@Tim @PiggyOwner I just went and checked, Cali isn't making the noise anymore! My girl that I sadly had to rehome, Paisley was one morning making the same noise, and it stopped also! The thing that scares me, is 24 hours later, Paisley started showing signs of illness. We rushed her to the vet and she had internal parasites. My boyfriend nursed her back to health, and I always call him the piggy hero because if it wasn't for him, Paisley would have died. I'm still going to take her to the vet just to be cautious though.
 
Oh blimey! You're doing the right thing by taking her to have a check over :) x
 
Hey, she probably had a little bit of hay dust up her nose, this sometimes makes them whistle and hoot then clears.. I am sure the vet will listen to her chest and give her a clean bill of health. Try not to worry.
 
UPDATE: Just talked to my boyfriend. Cali looks great, but because of the funny breathing, she's going to go on antibiotics for a few days! He's not even home yet and I've already worried myself sick. I feel like a horrible pig owner, I can't even keep her healthy. I've watched countless videos and read countless articles on how to keep your guinea pig healthy, but none of its working to ease my worries. I'm also worried people on here will attack me for letting her get sick.
 
I'm sad that you think so little of everyone on the forum, you should know by now that no one on here would attack someone.

Just like having children you can't keep pigs in a protective bubble, everyone and everything in this world gets ill. It can't be helped, we just have to treat it.

Tbh watching that many videos and articles is probably giving you serious paranoia and will worry you more. You'll feel better to take a bit of a step back and find Cali a friend to look after her. If you're stressed your piggies are stressed, so the best thing to do is just eat, nap, repeat. That's what I aspire to anyway!
 
((HUGS)) to you and Cali! No one is going to attack you for having a guinea pig get an illness... we have all very likely been there at one time or another. One of my pigs was treated for a respiratory infection a couple of months ago to- it's not down to poor care, sometimes illnesses just happen and we have to treat them and deal with them. Hopefully the antibiotics will do the trick!
 
@Rochester Piggy If having an ill pig means you're a bad owner then that's saying probably everyone on the forum is a bad owner.

That's obviously not true. Yeah, you can cause illness in a pig, by not feeding them for example but some illnesses we just can't prevent. My last boar was PTS due to a neurological issue. I have no idea how I could have caused that.

So try not to stress. You didn't cause the breathing issues.

What antibiotics were you given? If it's Baytril then it would be worth getting some probiotic to give afterwards to prevent possible digestive issues
 
I hope the trip to the vet goes well for Cali, and she gets a clean bill of health. Somethings like sickness are just beyond our control. You take great care of her and it isn't your fault. Hugs to you both. :hug:
 
You are not a bad owner. People don't get attacked on the forum... and no one is going to think you are a bad owner.

Sounds like the vet put Cali on meds as a precaution due to the breathing. I am sure she will be okay, try not to get yourself all worked up - i know it is hard but you got her to the vets as quickly as possible and now she is being looked after and I am sure will be right as rain after a few days of AB's. We have often had our piggies picking up both URI's and UTI's it is not soemthing you can guard against, they get ill like we do.

Hugs and love to Cali
 
@Rochester Piggy: Not even the best owner can prevent illness or death. You are NOT omniscient and omnipotent God, you know - and by expecting yourself to be god-like with absolute control you are inevitably setting yourself up for a fail. It is as simple as that and has nothing to do with being a good or bad owner, but everything with giving yourself unrealistic and unobtainable expectations.

A good owner should:
- provide their guinea pigs with a decent sized cage/hutch that is protected from the extremes of cold and heat and that is safe from predators and if possible regular run time.
- make sure that their guinea pigs are fed and watered at least once a day, cleaned out once or twice a week and groomed/checked at least once a week.
It does NOT include killing yourself and putting yourself at risk when you are very ill or have an emergency and don't have a partner/family member to take over your duties as long as your piggies are not going hungry or thirsty. It does NOT mean that you cannot leave the house or go on holiday and dare not trust any strangers to look after your piggies well enough.
- see a vet when you notice that something serious is amiss and have it seen and treated within a reasonable period.
It doesn NOT mean rushing a piggy to the out-of-hours vets every time it sneezes or has a single funny poo, only when it is in serious distress, like bad bloat, runny diarrhea, very crackly or heaving breathing, lethargy and totally of its food.

Being a good owner does NOT mean that you hover over your piggies every minute of the day checking for the least sign that something could be amiss and instantly searching the internet for all the horror stories that come with any set of symptoms. If that is the case, it is you that needs to see a doctor, not your piggies!

It is normal to be more jittery after your lost a piggy unexpectedly with similar symptoms, but try to take a deep breath if you catch yourself at that. Coincidences can happen, but they are rare.

It is very important that you keep in mind that you have your pets on loan only so for so much time, but you cannot control for how long they live and what they ultimately die of - the same goes for the humans you love. All you can do is to give them a happy life as much as you can and to enjoy and treasure every day you have with them. What counts is not the quantity, but the quality of life you give them - that is the area you are responsible or and can control. It doesn't mean being perfect all the time, just caring.

That is what being a good owner is about - to go on a journey into the unknown and to enjoy this journey with all the getting lost and found again, the dead ends and the jumps across fences. Being a pet owner is an adventure; if you turn it into a tightly scheduled safety-mad trip, you take all the fun and the good bits out of it. Let each piggy or other pet teach you a bit more about love and joy and who they are. Let yourself go to be open for the new so you can then carry your gained knowledge onwards to the benefit of future pets. Be aware that you often learn more from your mistakes than from desperately avoiding to make the least mistake. Pet ownership is a life long learning curve, it is not a "know it all and be perfect right from the start", as sadly so many new owners (and parents) seem to think they have to be. ;)
 
I fully agree with the rest of the users here, I lost my Teddy from an aneurism in April 2016 and found myself getting nervous. As Minja passed from something exploding in her stomach after multiple vet visits and syringe feeding in Feb 2017, I've gotten more and more safety mad. I'm starting to learn to relax a bit more, baby steps but within time, this means keeping away from testing sticks lol. Hope you and Cali are ok :)
 
Stuff happens, you can never duck it all. Guinea pigs can go downhill ever so quickly and with only the vaguest symptoms, or no obvious symptoms at all. If you had your piggy vet checked and your vet didn't find anything amiss, then you can bet that there was nothing you could have picked up on or could have prevented.

The crucial bit is how you deal with it afterwards. Feelings of guilt and failure are perfectly normal for the onset of the grieving process. But there comes a stage where you either go on blaming yourself for everything irrespective of whether it was within your control and knowledge or not, or whether you can look at it again step by step and can eventually say - I am very sad and totally upset about the loss, but I would make the same decisions again with the knowledge I had at the time. I may be able to make a more informed decision next time round, but I have done what was within my means.
 
Wiebke said:
Stuff happens, you can never duck it all. Guinea pigs can go downhill ever so quickly and with only the vaguest symptoms, or no obvious symptoms at all. If you had your piggy vet checked and your vet didn't find anything amiss, then you can bet that there was nothing you could have picked up on or could have prevented.

The crucial bit is how you deal with it afterwards. Feelings of guilt and failure are perfectly normal for the onset of the grieving process. But there comes a stage where you either go on blaming yourself for everything irrespective of whether it was within your control and knowledge or not, or whether you can look at it again step by step and can eventually say - I am very sad and totally upset about the loss, but I would make the same decisions again with the knowledge I had at the time. I may be able to make a more informed decision next time round, but I have done what was within my means.
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Thank you Wiebke. You always help everyone here so so much! I lost a pig in December 2016 to pneumonia and I always check my current piggy for symptoms of it. She is currently taking Baytril, .3 mg every 12 hours for a week. It is to prevent her from getting any illnesses because of the funny breathing.
 
Jaycey said:
@Rochester Piggy If having an ill pig means you're a bad owner then that's saying probably everyone on the forum is a bad owner.

That's obviously not true. Yeah, you can cause illness in a pig, by not feeding them for example but some illnesses we just can't prevent. My last boar was PTS due to a neurological issue. I have no idea how I could have caused that.

So try not to stress. You didn't cause the breathing issues.

What antibiotics were you given? If it's Baytril then it would be worth getting some probiotic to give afterwards to prevent possible digestive issues
Click to expand...
It is Baytril. What type of things should I give her to prevent the digestive issues?
 
Rochester Piggy said:
Thank you Wiebke. You always help everyone here so so much! I lost a pig in December 2016 to pneumonia and I always check my current piggy for symptoms of it. She is currently taking Baytril, .3 mg every 12 hours for a week. It is to prevent her from getting any illnesses because of the funny breathing.
Click to expand...

Pneumonia is one of those things that can hit out of the blue and can kill within hours. It is one of these terrifying things that are the stuff of our nightmares. Losing a piggy to it is not a failure of either your vet or you; there is nothing more you could have done.

Just take a deep breath!
 
Rochester Piggy said:
It is Baytril. What type of things should I give her to prevent the digestive issues?
Click to expand...

In most cases baytril doesn't cause any issues. In a few cases it can cause diarrhea and hit the appetite. You can give a pinch of probiotics either 1-2 hours before (current US recommendation) or 1-2 hours after (UK recommendation) before you give the baytril if you wish to.
If the appetite goes, start syringe feeding and add probiotics to the syringe feed.
 
She was being really picky over her hay this morning, but my boyfriend threw all the tiny pieces out and gave her big, thick pieces. She's eaten a TON today! I just gave her veggies and she is munching away.
 
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