My Heart is just broken.....

[Stasia]

After a long night at the animal ER last night, we lost our little parrotlet Pedro. I am so very sad and my heart just feels so broken like I'll never ever get over it. I just can't stop crying.

He had a bacterial infection that he was being treated for and he just finally seemed to be all better. Then around 7 pm last night he started to shake and then to limp and then couldn't stand at all. The vet said they don't know the exact cause but that it was something neurological. He kept asking if he was exposed to lead, but there is nothing in my house I can think of that would have done that. It's killing me not to know what happened. We have to go get our tiel to have some tests run this morning just in case they said. Although Marley had a full avian blood panel, chlymadia, polyoma, and ppbfd before he was ever exposed to Pedro and he was given a clean bill of health.

After thinking about it all night (or early morning I should say) I think he had a stroke. Can birds have strokes? After going back over the details, after he first started to shake and limp, I looked at his legs and one foot was fine and the other foot was like jello. He wasn't grasping my finger at all and I couldn't get it to react. Is it possible that because he had the infection and was resting for so long and staying in pretty much one spot, that he developed a blood clot and then when he started getting better just yesterday and moving around again the clot let go and caused this stroke? I just feel I need to know why he died. It would help ease me a little I think.

Our other bird can definitely sense something is off. He had been so worked up for the past few days, and is suddenly more quiet and sweet, keeps looking at the empty cage which I am deperately trying not to look at. I loved him just so much, my heart feel in a million pieces.

Stasia

[Casa Amazona]

Ah, Stasia, I'm so sorry to hear about your loss of Pedro. Here's a huge (((HUG))) for you. The same thing happened to a sweet little lovebird in my home a couple of months ago -- almost identical symptoms to Pedro's -- and we were unable to save him.

[Breelynne]

I am sorry to hear of both of your birds passings. I am not sure if birds can have strokes but I had a cockatiel several years ago that did almost the same thing. Bo bird just statred shaking and gasped a small last breath and he was gone. He was walking around on my table while I was having some toast for breakfast, and then he was gone. IMO mine had a stoke he was about 15yrs old or so. No matter how hard we try there are somethings we have no control over though we try our hardest to provide the best care we can. We may not understand why these things happen and we can never prepare ourselves for this types of situations even when they are expected. I have owned numerous pets in my life and each one that I have lost leaves a footprint in my heart. ((Huggs)) go out to both of you, as well as a prayer

[Stasia]

Thanks so much for your kind thoughts. I am suprised to hear that you both had similar experiences and I'm so sorry to hear that too. Did your birds by any chance also have an infection before their symptoms od shaking began?

Stasia

[Alika]

I'm so sorry to hear about your little bird. It is so hard to lose one of our feathered companions. Sending you hugs from my whole flock.

Do you know what his cage and all his toys were made of? Sometimes cage and toy components can have high heavy metal contents. Your vet seems to suspect heavy metal poisoning, and I think the most common cause of heavy metal poisoning in birds is chewing on their cage bars and toys.

[kensbuns]

Sending Big Hugs Of Comfort!!!

[cfulhage]

So sorry for your loss!

[Franciscus]

I'm sorry for your loss of Pedro. It's important for you you have a necropsy done on him to determine cause of death because you have another bird. If disease was the culprit you may need to treat the other one.

[LMPego]

Stasia,
I'm so sorry for the loss of Pedro.

[Stasia]

Alika,

Now that you say that, we WAS chewing lately on his cage bars. because his beak was itchy from the infection he just started doing that recently. Thank you for that suggestion, i am most definitely going to go find what that cage is made of just in case that was it.

Stasia