It's been over a month since I last posted.
We lost my little boy a week ago today. You know those animals that just get under your skin, that steal your heart from the very start, and there's never any comparison to? That was my Simba. We bought him from Pets at Home, 2 years and 3 months ago when he was just a little scrap of a hamster at a month old. He spent the first few days in a tiny travel cage while my flatmate at the time got a cage off someone she worked with. We ignored the 24 hour rule and had him running around on the sofa with me sat on the floor. He curled up and went to sleep in my sleeve that night and I was instantly smitten.
That flatmate took him home for a weekend, shortly after we got him. Her mother wouldn't let him into the house and so he was relegated to the shed. He came back with a bad cold, a small case of wet tail and fleas. A £30 vets bill and 10 days course of Batryill later and the little boy was on the mend. When my mother found out what happened, she invited Simba home for Christmas, her soft spot for hamsters being almost as large as mine, and so Simba became part of the family.
When my flatmate announced she was moving home and leaving University I didn't worry about having to make rent on my own. I worried about who would get the boy, and luckily I managed to keep him. I lived alone for 6 months, though I never was truly alone because there was always him. I never came home to an empty house with him around, and he was there for me countless times and was my rock when I was 200 miles away from my family. My boyfriend fell in love with him too, and the pair of them were inseparable. Simba's face always lit up when R entered the room, and he truly loved that boy, this might have be influenced by a constant supply of sweets, treats and sharing of cereal, but R assures me it wasn't ;)
Simba moved house twice with us, and was loved by everyone who met him. He was an incredibly special hamster, he loved attention and would regularly come out of his bed and look cute so people would coo over him when we were travelling on the train. He was big for a hamster as well, he tipped the scales at 220g at his heaviest. When he got older and he started loosing some muscle tone he ended up with bingo wings under his arms to rival a flying squirrels, which we all found hilarious.
He used to love to eat. He'd come and try and steal whatever you were trying to enjoy at the time; he particularly loved chicken, steak, carrots and obviously hamster treats. That's a special small animal Easter egg above. He particularly loved Christmas, as my mother would plate him up a small meal all of his own, turkey and trimmings the lot, all served in a large cabbage leaf.
He was a special snowflake though. He loved to escape, one time scaring us for over 2 hours before R found him chilling behind the dishwasher. He escaped with a small scratch on his foot, which always swelled up when he was on wood shavings, so the precious little bugger had to go onto wooden or paper cat litter so as not to aggravate his feet. This must have cost us a fortune over his lifetime, but it was all worth it just for him.
A few weeks ago he started to look his age. You know how sometimes you can see someone or an animal every single day and one day they just look *old* that's what happened with our boy. He lost the use of one of his back legs, the vet felt it was a soft tissue injury but in light of what was to happen we think he had a stroke. Even if we'd have known this it wouldn't have affected the outcome of the story. There's little you can do with small animals when they've had a stroke, and especially at his age most of the options would be dangerous.
Last Friday, R went to go share his toast with Simba and found him lying on his cage floor, and not in a good state. He phoned the vets for advice, who told him to try and warm him up, when that wasn't working he rang for a taxi and rushed him to the vets, on the way there Simba had another stroke and passed on. The vet felt that he wasn't in pain, and even if we had managed to get him there earlier it would only have been a matter of time, or it would have been a case of euthanasia. The vet let R take as long as he liked and arranged for the cremation with ashes back, like we did for our Guthrie who passed in the summer. It's expensive, but the ashes come back in a hand carved box, and we might not live in Gloucester long term and would hate to leave them here if we buried them. Our vets are fantastic, and included a sympathy card with the ashes which is a lovely touch.
It's now a case of remembering the good memories. Those were cakes a flatmate baked him for his second Birthday this September, and he's trying to steal it off his daddy. There is a small gratefulness that he lived an amazing life, that he touched so many hearts and that he was a great ambassador for a species that is considered a "child's pet"; "nasty little buggers" and "boring", he was never any of the above. He was wonderful, loving, sweet, mischievous and he might have been a little bugger but he didn't have a nasty bone in his body. He seemed to have some sort of awareness about who he was with, he could squirm and climb your shoulders like no other, but he always sat still for people who were not too sure about hamsters or for children.
He loved everyone. I still can't believe that he's gone, and we miss him so so much. Small animals never live long enough for the hole they leave in your heart and I have a big Simba shaped gap that I don't think will ever heal.
I miss you boy. You weren't just "kind of a big deal" you were one of the biggest deals in the world to me. You stole our hearts (and pouched it for later) and life will never be the same without you. I know you wouldn't want me to be sad; and I know you want us to look after your "little brother" Ludlow and give him as fantastic life as we gave you, and I know when we're ready you'll send us a sign in the form of a rescue hamster to love as much as we've loved you, but there will always be a gap there in my heart with your name on it.
I love you <3
We lost my little boy a week ago today. You know those animals that just get under your skin, that steal your heart from the very start, and there's never any comparison to? That was my Simba. We bought him from Pets at Home, 2 years and 3 months ago when he was just a little scrap of a hamster at a month old. He spent the first few days in a tiny travel cage while my flatmate at the time got a cage off someone she worked with. We ignored the 24 hour rule and had him running around on the sofa with me sat on the floor. He curled up and went to sleep in my sleeve that night and I was instantly smitten.
That flatmate took him home for a weekend, shortly after we got him. Her mother wouldn't let him into the house and so he was relegated to the shed. He came back with a bad cold, a small case of wet tail and fleas. A £30 vets bill and 10 days course of Batryill later and the little boy was on the mend. When my mother found out what happened, she invited Simba home for Christmas, her soft spot for hamsters being almost as large as mine, and so Simba became part of the family.
When my flatmate announced she was moving home and leaving University I didn't worry about having to make rent on my own. I worried about who would get the boy, and luckily I managed to keep him. I lived alone for 6 months, though I never was truly alone because there was always him. I never came home to an empty house with him around, and he was there for me countless times and was my rock when I was 200 miles away from my family. My boyfriend fell in love with him too, and the pair of them were inseparable. Simba's face always lit up when R entered the room, and he truly loved that boy, this might have be influenced by a constant supply of sweets, treats and sharing of cereal, but R assures me it wasn't ;)
Simba moved house twice with us, and was loved by everyone who met him. He was an incredibly special hamster, he loved attention and would regularly come out of his bed and look cute so people would coo over him when we were travelling on the train. He was big for a hamster as well, he tipped the scales at 220g at his heaviest. When he got older and he started loosing some muscle tone he ended up with bingo wings under his arms to rival a flying squirrels, which we all found hilarious.
He used to love to eat. He'd come and try and steal whatever you were trying to enjoy at the time; he particularly loved chicken, steak, carrots and obviously hamster treats. That's a special small animal Easter egg above. He particularly loved Christmas, as my mother would plate him up a small meal all of his own, turkey and trimmings the lot, all served in a large cabbage leaf.
He was a special snowflake though. He loved to escape, one time scaring us for over 2 hours before R found him chilling behind the dishwasher. He escaped with a small scratch on his foot, which always swelled up when he was on wood shavings, so the precious little bugger had to go onto wooden or paper cat litter so as not to aggravate his feet. This must have cost us a fortune over his lifetime, but it was all worth it just for him.
I love you <3
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