Goodbye Tweet(t)y

I have sad news to share. Mar's bird Tweet(t)y is no longer with us.

She's in a better place.

It started last Saturday when we noticed Tweet(t)y acting funny. As Mar observed her, she thought, perhaps, that Tweet(t)y was trying to lay an egg. Since Buddy's been gone for over 5 months, that seemed a little curious.  Mar did some research and discovered that yes, female parakeets can lay eggs without a male around (I assume the same is true for chickens, right?). Since Tweet(t)y had never laid an egg before, this was all new to us. She would lean over her perch, drop her tail feathers, and pant. She seemed to be trying to squeeze the bulge on her bottom out (it definitely looked like labor to me). 

This continued all day Sunday. Mar did some more research and discovered that parakeets can be "egg-bound," meaning that the egg gets stuck, and that, without intervention by an avian vet, the parakeet will die. She discovered this news while we were google chatting Sunday evening with the out-of-town kids, and immediately had big tears streaming down her face.

"We have to take Tweet(t)y to the vet," she said.

I promised I would call around the next morning to find a vet, and hoped that Tweet(t)y would just drop the egg while we were all sleeping that night (I'd dropped a chunk of change earlier in the week for Jack and Ava's check-ups, and did not cherish the thought of dropping more for a bird). Nope.

As Mar left for school the next day, she asked me to come get her out of school when I took Tweet(t)y to the vet. I told her I would "see," since very likely I would just be dropping her off, then picking her up once the egg issue was resolved.  As soon as offices were open, I started my calls.

After locating the nearest avian vet that had an opening ("Can you bring her in right now?"), I threw on some shoes, grabbed the birdcage, and debated if I should go pull Mar out of school. I decided that I would (I call it personal revelation... divine intervention...), called the school to notify them I was on my way, and headed out the door.

Dr. Summar was great.

Before he picked Tweet(t)y up he said, "I think Tweet(t)y is a boy."

Female parakeets have pink at the top of their beaks, and male parakeets have blue. Tweet(t)y's had started out pink, but over the past 6 months or so had turned blue. Mar had even mentioned it to me.

(My initial reaction was to chuckle thinking that, perhaps, Tweet(t)y had been a boy all along. Then I wondered if birds could spontaneously change their gender...)

He picked her up, carefully took a look, then said, "I'm sorry to tell you that it's not good news."

*Start tears*

He explained that it wasn't an egg, it was a tumor on Tweet(t)y's ovary. The weeping tumor was excreting testosterone, which probably caused the color change in her beak. She had lost most of the muscle in her chest, and was struggling to breathe because the tumor was closing off the access to her lungs. She was going to die. He asked what we would like to do, and I asked for a few minutes alone with Mar.

We chatted briefly about what the compassionate thing to do was: let Tweet(t)y go now. We had observed her suffering over the past three days, and it would only get worse.

Amid tears, Mar held her on her finger and sang "You Are My Sunshine."

(As I look at the pictures now, I can see how sick Tweet(t)y was. She definitely was not the vibrant, healthy bird from a few months earlier.)

The vet came back in, took Tweet(t)y in a soft cloth, had Mar pet her one last time, then left the room. Within 5 minutes he was back with Tweet(t)y neatly wrapped and ready to be taken home for burial.


I am so grateful that I took Mar with me to the vet. It would have been devastating for her not to say goodbye had I needed to make that decision for her. Tender mercy.
Heavenly Father loves her!

She is such a sweet girl with such a tender heart. She often talks about how she wants to be a vet someday. On our drive home, I asked her if she would still want to be one, as it would include this sad side of the profession.

"I would think about all the animals I could help," she said.

We had the funeral Tuesday evening.

Now Buddy and Tweet(t)y can be together.
Mar says she is never moving from this house. Ever.