Death Comes Unexpectedly

When E came to me begging for a guinea pig, I did what every sane mother who loves her daughter does. I sent her straight to her father. Who set up an arrangement that if she kept, she would then be allowed to purchase a pig. Heheh. Ummm, yeah.

Guess who kept her end of the bargain? Guess who got a guinea pig because R always keeps his word (it is his bond)? So, two years ago, we got a very handsome little guy from Petco. He was immediately frightened at the sound of so many female voices cooing over his cuteness and so many hands reaching toward him. He settled in nicely, and after a few months of reminding K that pigs bite when they don't like something, I think they finally came to an understanding of one another's personal space.

Last year sometime, E approaches her father about purchasing a second guinea pig. "They are herd animals, Daddy. He's lonely." Apparently, he was missing a different kind of herd than we provided. She confessed to wanting to give Chub a chance to spread his genetics. R thinking this would be a healthy way to show some responsibility, again, agreed. Remember, I kept myself completely out of the entire pig project.

So, a few weeks later, Yummi Puff, a very pretty parti colored blue-eyed guinea was purchased. She is shy and demure. Just what Chub wanted. We left for our trip to MO in November, and placed them in the care of our minister's family. I warned her that Chub was getting a little tired of her refusing him and had turned to more aggressive behavior. I called to check on the pigs and was told that I could be sure Chub had prevailed. Apparently they weren't too quiet and awakened the youngest son on Thanksgiving Day morning. I apologized for their lack of decorum.

We began to doubt when we saw no visible signs of pregnancy in "Puff." However, a few weeks ago, she all of a sudden seemed rather rounded. Sure enough, we felt the movement of wee pigs. So, began the vigil. We watched and pampered and feed lettuces and parsley and Broccoli and carrots and Pink Lady apples to the mother-to-be. We anticipated the birth according to the conception date to occur sometime this week.

This morning I returned home from my morning exercise (physical and mental, H and I discussed the doctrine of the Trinity this morning), filled my cup with coffee and cream and came downstairs. Before getting settled at my computer, I checked on Puff. As soon as I raised the box, I could see a dark something lying next to her. I set the cup down, and called to E. It wasn't moving, was cold and it's cord hadn't been properly removed. We rubbed and massaged. I blew a few gentle breaths into it's lungs. Nothing. We heard Puff begin to grunt, so I passed the baby over to E to continue our resuscitative efforts. Sure enough, another one was coming. She was having some difficulty. This one was at least attempting to breathe. Puff bit the cord and began to lick the pup. I don't know what went wrong, but she began to ignore it. Again, we massaged; again we breathed. We made every effort within our knowledge to help this perfectly formed little pup to live.

Although we were assured they were truly dead, we placed them back into the hutch with their mother. She lay down beside them, occasionally licking. We immediately recognized traits of Chub and Puff- one had a rosette, the other some parti-colors mixed in with his mostly black coat; tiny legs and paws; itty bitty teeth. We took Puff into the vet because she seemed to have some excessive bleeding, but by the time we made it there, she was doing better. The vet affirmed our efforts and took the pups. Out of curiosity, he weighed them and then weighed Puff. Their combined weight was one half pound. She weighed two pounds. They were rather large and he concluded that contributed to their deaths.

The girls were sad and disappointed. Death, even of the smallest creature is hard to understand, but healthy to learn to accept.