All throughout my childhood and early adolescence I made lists of what I wanted to do when I “grew up”. Most of the time they were small things, but some of the larger, and more important things, have transferred to things I want to do in my adulthood. When my fiancé, then boyfriend, and I moved into our first apartment together in the spring of 2014 I had no idea that I’d be making one of those desires become a reality.
Growing up I wondered what it would be like to own and take care of my own animals. I had family pets, like the German Shephard/Husky mix my mom had, or the two guinea pigs that were at my dad’s house, but I never really had my own animal to take care of. The nurturing “mother” in me always wanted to, though, and when I moved out of my mom’s house it seemed like a great time to find out what it was like. I didn’t know what kind of animal I’d want besides a cat or dog, which I couldn’t have because DB is allergic to them, so I started researching. Exotic pets, pets that go outside of the norm like dogs and cats, are much easier to come by these days than they were when I was growing up. So what did I want? I looked into foxes. I looked into sugar gliders and chinchillas. I even looked into skunks and prairie dogs. The one animal I didn’t look into, because quite frankly I thought I knew all there was I needed to know about them, was a rabbit. I was one of those people who unfortunately underrated the perfection that is a bunny. Until one day….
A few months after we moved into our apartment I was scrolling through my Facebook news feed when I came across a picture of a rabbit that my friend had previously owned. She had been in contact with the current owner, the one she had given the bun to in the first place, and the current owner was unable to take care of her anymore. My friend had asked her Facebook friends if any of them would be interested, and it was that question that sparked my interest in rabbits. After a night’s worth of research, and when I say research I’m talking I researched everything, and talking to my boyfriend we decided to tell my friend we’d take the rabbit. A few short days after that we became new rabbit owners.
Lola was a spunky, mischievous brown and white Dutch who loved to hop around and eat her “cookies”. She taught me what it was to nurture a living being. She showed me what it was like to be a “mom” in a sense that I had never known before. I don’t have human children, and I’m by no means trying to compare owning a pet to parenting a human child, but she made me feel more motherly than I ever had before. I learned more from her in our short time together than I ever thought I could. About 2.5 months after we took Lola in she started not eating, so I took her into the vet where she had an X-ray that showed a mass of some sort in her abdomen. We weren’t sure if it was uterine cancer, which is extremely common in female rabbits aged 2-5 years, or if it was a bladder infection. We treated her for a bladder infection, hoping that that’s what it was. The treatment helped a little bit. Throughout the time from her initial vet visit to the time of her death, I got little to no sleep. I was working, and when I wasn’t working I was feeding her through a syringe and giving her medications; making sure that she wasn’t in pain and that she was eating.
Three weeks later we took her back to the vet for lab work because she wasn’t getting any better, and we left with an appointment the following Monday to go over her lab results. She passed away in the comfort of my arms that Saturday. Her lab results came back inconclusive despite the fact that they showed abnormal uterine cells, which only leads you to believe it was the scary C word. You see, female rabbits are roughly 80% likely, according to a medical bibliography on The House Rabbit Society’s website (http://www.rabbit.org/care/bibliography.html), to get uterine cancer between 2-6 years of age. That percentage is too high to me, and unfortunately when I adopted Lola I failed to double check with our vet that she was desexed before it got too late. Her life ended because her owners, myself included, were irresponsible and ill-informed. I’m writing this article share my personal experience with Lola’s illness. If someone reads this article, and uses my personal experience as a basis for their decision in spaying their female rabbit, I will consider my job well done.
Her death hit me harder than I ever knew one could. I don’t remember being that distraught over a death in over 10 years. I guess I could chalk it up to the fact that she was my “baby”. I didn’t think I’d ever find room in my heart to open up to another bun, but almost a year later I was offered the chance to take in a gray Holland Lop named Yoshi. The love I have for that little ball of fur is immeasurable. He has saved me.
So there you have it, folks. Be a responsible pet owner and get your animals spayed or neutered. They need you to do it.
That being said, I’m going to go enjoy some quality time with my Love Bun. 
