Im feeling so guilty after 3 weeks

I had a beautiful dwarf lop eared rabbit named Jasper . My dog found him wandering around my garden one Christmas 5 years ago and he followed the dog into the back door. They became firm friends. Jasper was a real character, scared of nothing, trusting and affectionate. When I found him i took him straight to the vets to have him checked out as I already had Guinea Pigs and didnt want an illness that he may have picked up whilst he was running free. The vet told me there and then that if I couldnt find his owners(which I did try with advertisements) that he would be an on going cost as his teeth were in a terrible state from the wrong feeding. He was right as Jasper has cost me £100 every 3 /4 months to have his back teeth rasped. He had no front teeth so couldnt graze. But he worth every penny.
I have no excuse for what happened to him and I can only think that I have so many problems at the moment with losing my job, vet bills etc etc that my mind was elsewhere this week.. I remember looking into his bowl (he lived in the kitchen) and thinking oh he has plenty of feed in there , but on looking back I was looking at a bowl full of shavings. I dont know how many times this week I havent fed him because in my mind he had food ( Iknow this makes no sense at all) I fed him on Saturday and when Sunday morning came again i though oh he has food !! My daughter put him in the garden but she never filled his bowl up there either and I never thought about it. Jasper followed me all day whilst I was gardening and he seemed full of life chasing the chickens around the bushes (his favourite game) then sitting on my feet while I read a book. I brought him back inside with the intention of filling his bowl but the phone rang so I placed him in the cage and said hang on their Jasp Il be back in a minute. I did go back to let him out, to run around the house this time chasing the cats again full of energy .. He kept jumping up onto the couch and running up my chest to lick my chin and I stroked his ears as he used to fall asleep when I did that. I put him back in his cage before bedtime , fed the cats fed the dog and I have no idea how i didnt feed Jasper, he was right in front of me . I went to bed and in the morning Jasper had passed away. I have never felt such utter dispair at how I could have done this to him.. I have no excuses and I loved this beautiful little rabbit, his gentle character and I miss him deperately. How could I do something so horrific as to not feed him how could I forget??? I have torn myself up going over and over in my mind as to what I did. I cant sleep cant eat , cant stop crying. This is grief and remorse that I never knew could be an actual physical pain.. I cant take back what I have done, I would if I could. And I will never forgive myself. I hope he didnt die thinking that he had done something wrong or that I hated him. Above all please dont let him have died in any pain.. I am so Sorryx This has been 3 weeks now and the pain is still as strong forgive me Jasper.

I know lady who's gineau pigs water bottle was blocked and everytime she went to check on him she assumed her husband/one of the children had filled it up.

Fortunately she discovered after a good few days - possibly a week and managed to save him (or her ?)

I'm so sorry about what has happened - it sounds like you loved Jasper a lot.

If Jasper was in the garden, he would have been grazing I am sure. Also, although you had not put food into his bowl - did he have hay? Did he have water? If so, I doubt he has died because he had not been fed.

cara said:

If Jasper was in the garden, he would have been grazing I am sure. Also, although you had not put food into his bowl - did he have hay? Did he have water? If so, I doubt he has died because he had not been fed.

Click to expand...

This if he had access to grass its unlikely he starved to death and if he was hungry its unlikely he would have been so lively he would have been thin and tucked up and you would have noticed

Hi gaggan, what a sad first thread.

Jasper sounds very lucky to have found a home with you. If he was running around the garden, no doubt he would have been nommin on the grass and getting nourishment that way.

Unless you can be 100% that his death was your fault which you can't do, then I would try to cut yourself some slack.

Many bunnies can pass away for no reason. It's known as sudden death syndrome.

No indications that anything was wrong, nothing sinister healthwise.

These dear little animals really do tug at our heartstrings. You are not alone in having such sad feelings about the loss of a wonderful bunny.

You are on the right place here on RU to share your thoughts, feelings and ideas about......gorgeous bunnies!!!

I sincerely hope that you will feel less guilty very soon.

We do understand.................because we care so much about.........................bunnies.xx

Take care. x

hi welcome to the forum, sorry its in sad circumstances, however if your bunny had been outdoors, he would of had access to grazng feed like grass and plants like others have said, so would of got his food from these sources, i had a dental bun once that needed regular dentals he unfortunately died young too at 4yrs 10months

I'm really sorry to hear this but as someone else has mentioned, if Jasper was starving you definitely would have noticed. He would've been listless and hunched up. It doesn't sound like this was what happened to him. Please don't think that you did him wrong, you loved him very much x

cara said:

If Jasper was in the garden, he would have been grazing I am sure. Also, although you had not put food into his bowl - did he have hay? Did he have water? If so, I doubt he has died because he had not been fed.

Click to expand...

The OP said Jasper couldn't graze because he had no front teeth

I'm so sorry you lost your beloved bun, but I'm sure he wouldn't have had so much energy if he was starving, he might just have been old xx

ripminnie said:

The OP said Jasper couldn't graze because he had no front teeth

I'm so sorry you lost your beloved bun, but I'm sure he wouldn't have had so much energy if he was starving, he might just have been old xx

Click to expand...

Thank you all very much for your response .. In time I will get over this but I never thought that such small beautiful animal would cast such a web round my heart.. And if I caused his death it is unforgivable. He was full of energy during the day but he may has used most of it up running around. And as i said he couldt eat grass because his front teeth were missing.. I know he had to have adlib nuggets available thats what is really getting to me, the fact that his bowl was left empty for over 30 hours. i will never forgive myself!

gaggan said:

Thank you all very much for your response .. In time I will get over this but I never thought that such small beautiful animal would cast such a web round my heart.. And if I caused his death it is unforgivable. He was full of energy during the day but he may has used most of it up running around. And as i said he couldt eat grass because his front teeth were missing.. I know he had to have adlib nuggets available thats what is really getting to me, the fact that his bowl was left empty for over 30 hours. i will never forgive myself!

Click to expand...

I hope that in time you will forgive yourself.

I've owned bunnies for over 17 years and I know for certain that I did things incorrectly for my first bunny.

Over the years I have learnt so much.

Jasper sounds like he was much loved.

And unfortunately things do happen.

I understand your sadness.

Please take care.................and remember we will and do understand here on RU.

Thank you for all your support .. People I work with just dont seem to understand my absolute grief as they say "get over it it was only a rabbit!" he was part of my family and we loved him dearly. I dont think people who are not animal lovers quite understand that losing a pet causes as much saddness as losing someone you love. because they really do.

Hi Gaggan.

I'm so sorry you join us under sad circumstances.

Yes, it's not ideal that you didn't feed him, but to have so much energy, as others are saying, he wouldn't have been starving. He may have been eating things he shouldn't to maybe keep his energy up (maybe the shavings, maybe plants in the garden, maybe his faeces, for example), though.

I'm involved with the RSPCA and have sadly seen several starving bunnies and they go very dull and their eyes go dull and lifeless a few days before they die, and when that starts to show, it can be possible to save them. It doesn't sound, to me, like starvation, from what you are saying.

All that said, I can understand the horrific feeling you will be going through right now. Last year something I did did cause a direct death of one of my bunnies. It's not a pretty read but you will see that I'm not the only one, and if this was something you did, you're not the only one either. http://forums.rabbitrehome.org.uk/showthread.php?281892

Grief does bring on the extreme feelings of guilt, especially when you are dealing with something like this, and again, I can relate to that as well. On poor vets advice we had one of our bunnies on a very restricted and inaccurate diet and she died of an accidental overdose at the same vets and I'm sure that she would have lived if she hadn't been on such a horrendous diet- I should have known better.

What I can tell you is that how you're feeling is ok, and that you need to give yourself time, patience and kindness, and also reach out for help to help you along the greiving process if you feel you need it.

Really though, you don't need to go blaming yourself, it's just a case of learning from what you have posted about so that if you get another rabbit, it won't happen again. You can't change the past, and you can't ever really know what happened to him so try not to beat yourself up for it. I know that telling you that doesn't change how you feel, but try to be aware of it and in time hopefully you won't beat yourself up.

Take care.

A very well balanced post Sky-O