Jeans and Sneakers

I don’t think I really ever post about my chinchilla on here anymore.  I’m doing so today because I’m worried.  A few months ago Turbo was having trouble eating.  We’d give him a craisin, and it looked like he would wince in pain and drop the food.  Then he started drooling.  That’s a bad sign in rodents, as it is one of the main symptoms of malocclusion, a condition in which rodent’s teeth grow continuously faster than usual (all rodent’s teeth continuously grow, but it’s usually not an issue because they eat and chew on things often enough to keep them down to a normal size.  Malocclusion is when the teeth grow too fast or from the root up into the skull, which can’t really be treated).  Rob took him to the vet, and they looked him over, said he had some spurs growing off the sides of his teeth that were causing sores in his mouth, but that they filed the spurs down and he didn’t have malocclusion.  We took him home, watched him carefully, and after about 3-4 weeks he seemed back to the normal, happy, healthy chinchilla we love.

About two weeks or so later, he started drooling again.  Rob took him back to the vet, and they filed down his teeth again, but this time it seemed like a more minor treatment, as if the condition wasn’t as bad (they put him under the first time and the second time I don’t believe they did), and he came back home groggy.  We watched him again, but he seemed to not recover as quickly.

Last night Rob went to give him a craisin, and he could hardly eat it.  I don’t even think he ate the whole thing.  He called the vet again to ask what the deal was and if he could bring him in, but they told him that the dr. wasn’t there, and that he could bring him in today.  Rob got off the phone and went to pick turbo up, and that’s when he noticed that his left eye was incredibly swollen, and the lids were stuck shut.  Rob tried to clean them off with some water and a napkin, and lots of puss started oozing out.  Rob called the vet back and they gave us the name of an emergency clinic, but they said that they didn’t think the clinic had anyone who was familiar in the treatment of exotic animals.  So we cleaned out his eye with saline solution, and though yesterday we got his eye open again, as of this morning it was stuck shut again.

We took him to the vet, and now we’re waiting for the dr. to see him.  Last night I did a bunch of research, and I’m so worried, because I’ve read that eye problems can be a common symptom of malocclusion caused by the roots of the teeth growing upward through the sinuses and into the eye socket.  If the dr. didn’t take an x-ray on his first visit, they could have misdiagnosed him, and he might have malocclusion, and he could be in serious pain right now.  We might have to put him down.

Turbo is the first pet I’ve ever had (that was kept for more than a day, and wasn’t a hermit crab.  Those don’t really count.), and I’m worried out of my mind.  He’s only 4 years old, and healthy chinchillas can live up to 20.  I’m not really a religious person, but when I get scared, I still ask for help from anyone willing to offer, so I’m asking anyone who might be reading this, please keep Turbo in your thoughts and give him your best well wishes.