OMG another emergency- RESOLVED

[lagadvocate]

I just gave Charlie his nighttime pellets and after a few bites I heard him choking. He ran to hide behind the couch. He keeps choking making this awful noise. I don't know what to do, I don't even know what's happening. He's opening his mouth when he makes this choking noise and he almost looks like he's wretching.

 

[pamnock]

How is he doing????

Pam

 

[lagadvocate]

Ok now he is not wretching but he is sneezing and suddenly his nose is all wet. I'm not sure if it's spewing from his nose or if it's from him trying to clean all of the mess off of his face. He's not wretching right now but the sneezes sound really wet. he was not sick at all prior to this sudden event



eta: he seems scared, trying to hide a little bit but now all of a sudden he's back looking for the rest of his pellets, I took them away though

 

[lagadvocate]

Is it possible that he was sucking the pellets in too fast? The sneezing continues, very wet sounding. Fewer sneezes though now.

 

[aurora369]

Zeke did something similar once. He was making these awful noises that sounded like he was choking. We rushed him to the vet, and he got some oxygen but as per normal, he seemed fine once we got there.

The vet told me that they can't actually choke on food like we do. There nasal passage and esophogas are completely seperate. I'm not sure if that is correct or not.

He was making awful noises for about 15 minutes, and then he stopped. No ill effects.

Keep watching Charlie carefully, but it sounds like the worst is over.

--Dawn

 

[SnowyShiloh]

Oh my goodness, how scary! I hope Charlie will be okay!! It makes sense that the nasal passages and esophagus are separate, but surely bunnies can breathe through their mouths, too... I mean, aren't they breathing through they're mouths when they're panting in distress? If they can breathe through their mouths I'd think they could choke on something.

 

[pamnock]

Hopefully, he'll be fine by tomorrow. I've seen a couple incidents of rabbits choking on their pellets - very frightening



Pam

 

[lagadvocate]

Well, he seems to be calm now. Hasn't choked or sneezed in about 10 minutes. He is looking for food again. He is also coming to me to pet him.

Good grief that was terrifying. I'm still on pins and needles waiting and watching. I'll be up with him tonight for sure.

But now that things have settled down a bit, I just really want to say thank you from the bottom of my heart for being here. Just seeing your immediate responsePamhelped me more than you know. I'm so thankful that in the middle of the night, when crisis happens and the vets are unavailable, I have such a wonderful group of people on RO to turn to.

 

[SnowyShiloh]

I'm glad he seems to be doing better and I hope the night is uneventful! I would be terrified too. Is there any sort of bunny heimlich maneuver out there? There's something you can do with ratties if they choke so I wonder if there's something for bunnies.

 

[Bo B Bunny]

You know - mucus like from his nasal passages - is how bodies try to get rid of foreign materials that don't belong! When we choke, sometimes we'll get all nasaly and our eyes water, we get the item out and still we'll have that "clear your throat" feeling.

That's probably what happened.

Thank God he's ok

 

[maherwoman]

WOW...what a huge scare...I'm so happy to read that he's okay...

:hug:

 

[slavetoabunny]

Thank goodness he's OK. I hate when the buns give us scares like this.

 

[lagadvocate]

Well, the night went ok. I slept on the couch and he stayed up there with me snuggled into the blanket.He even woke me up acouple of timeswhen he started digging on the blanket--so I guess that's a good signthat he wasplaying a little bit.

This morning I was too nervous to give him pellets so I gave him a small salad. He was happy to see it and he ate some but didn't finish it. I don't know if that's because he was really wanting pellets or if something else is wrong.

I'm thinking that I might want to take him to the vet. I mean, I don't want to stress him out un-necessarily but I dunno, maybe I should?

Oh and Mods: please feel free to change the title of this thread if you'd like tosince it's not an emergency anymore--don't want to panic anybody.

Thanks again

 

[pamnock]

Glad to hear all is well! I'm sick, so was up a lot last night, and happened to see that you posted. . .

Pam

 

[Haley]

Max used to choke like that when he had a huge abscess in his jaw that affected his breathing. If Charlie's nose is stuffed/runny, it could be causing that.