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Coloring: Brown Hooded rat with white belly
Personality: Loved to move around.
Favorite food: Spaghetti
d: 7/5/2006
Greta came to us as an older rat who obviously hadn't been very well cared for.
When we got her, she didn't move her tail like the others. It didn't take
long to realize that she didn't have any control over her tail at all. She
couldn't move it.
I took her into the vet and she confirmed that she had cancer. It wasn't terribly
aggressive but it was against her spine, which was probably what caused her to lose
her tail motion, and the vet didn't want to operate. So, we didn't know how
long we would have her.
She was quite the grandma rat. She would do her own thing. If we tried
to help, she would accept a little but then would go back to doing things herself.
About this time, we were experimenting with human foods to see what they liked.
We tried spaghetti and Greta loved it! She was very protective about
anyone coming close to her spaghetti. In fact, that's how Daphne lost her
eye, was getting close to Greta when she had some spaghetti and Greta lashed out,
scratching Daphne's eye, which was enough for her to lose it.
It was so much fun to watch Greta when we got out the spaghetti container.
She would come from where ever she was to get spaghetti. She would stick her
head into the spaghetti and try and get as much as she could into her mouth.
Then, she would prance happily away to a hidey hole to eat it all.
***
Once again, we had all of the warning signs. She wasn't doing very well.
She was lethargic. She wasn't eating much. We didn't see it for what
it was. I finally decided that she needed to go to the vet. So, I went
home and got her and went to pick up my wife, we were carpooling at the time, but
when I got to where my wife works, Greta was gone.
I was crushed. I couldn't do anything but cry over her. Should I have
been holding her? Did she know she was loved? Was it bad for her?
I didn't know. I was so sad.
We buried her that night, next to Lily and Lena.
I miss her.
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