Laila was the last of the 7 siblings I had here called the Wildlings. It was not just a cute nickname for skittish rats but they were a ½ wild, ½ domestic rescue litter. She is survived by 2 of her brothers Victor and Fred in a wonderful caring home with mamarat.
Laila was a returnee along with 3 of her other sisters on April 20, 2007 from a former adopter. She was the bravest and sweetest one of them all. I thought she was the alpha at the time.
Sadly I realized that these 4 girls hadn’t been handled or worked with as much as my present crew of Wildlings that I had had since 5 weeks of age, 2 neutered boys Ortiz and Beni plus Teya the girl. And to my shock some of these 4 bit and made me bleed badly. Mine were nervous but wouldn’t even mouth me. Laila thankfully wasn’t one of them for the most part.
My wild babies had to teach me (and boy was I a slow learner) that Hands were terrifying and could easily be bitten in fear. We had to compromise with bags that I would ask them to jump into. Once they realized I had figured it out they were for the most very obliging about their new transport
Ortiz was the first to leave us with CHF (my first case so he didn’t get treated in time) at 13 months, at 21 months I lost a lot of them to CHF, and strange tumours that popped up.
It left sweet Laila with Faerdae who were fine for awhile except Laila would steal from the smaller Faerdae. Then Faerdae passed suddenly at the bottom of the cage. I was sure little Laila would soon follow. No way!
November 9th, Our Saga truly begins. Little Laila has lost a lot of weight and I start treating her for CHF since she’s not really showing any respiratory signs, but is definitely going the way her brother Beni did.
She gets lots of attention since she is alone. I had tried to intro her to others but it was a disaster.
And she starts to look at me differently.
Nov 13th she’s not feeling well and has adopted Her Basket. She actually let me touch her, and even seemed to enjoy it a little.
Nov. 15th I added dex to her baytril along with the heart meds
Nov. 16th she’s feeling very very good
So good that we are back to normal…hehehe
and she’s living in my Livingroom, so I have a wild little roommate...she looks very proud of herself here. :P
It’s the beginning of the up/down phases, very hard on the heart but she always came though, so very happy to be Free for once, and even coming to seek me out when she’s not feeling well for comfort and meds. Our relationship started to grow. I think she finally grew to love me and want to be touched and held. Until at the end it was ALL she wanted.
I made her a little home by my computer and moved her cage there so she had everything within easy reach/hop.
And a few days ago she was enjoying Ensure syringed into her mouth, give it to her in a bowl and it just wasn’t that yummy
But then her time started to draw to a close, and she ended up waiting for me to come home from work, and then crawling onto my legs or my chest while I lay on the couch. She got many kisses and strokes, and we fell asleep on the couch. I woke up at 5 am and she had taken off somewhere. Her Wildling instincts had the final say and my sweet girl took herself off to die quietly.
After the trials and heart ache of the Wildlings in my life, my brave little Laila made up for it all, by coming to first trust and then love me at the end, letting me touch, kiss and hold her like I had been dying to do to the Wildlings all their lives. I will never forget what she did for me.
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