Alright, well, I was gonna plan this out better and maybe do a campaign of some kind, but with the Tufts appointment now being TOMORROW plans have changed. I don't know what all will be done tomorrow, but the original estimate was $3K and I needed to raise $1K more to reach that.
If you are able to help out at all,
My PayPal is [email protected]
And my Venmo is amandabl89
I don't know what will happen, but money will be used to pay vet bills, gas to drive her the 3 hours there, meds, and to make payments on mine and my partner's care credit cards that are also maxed out.
Should things not go well, funds will also be used for cremation.
I want to say more and be more, I guess, eloquent, but I'm so frazzled right now. I'm sorry.
Thank you for everything 💖🦜
I'm glad that I am in a position to do this. I'm glad I can spend $2000 to make sure my birds are healthy and know what killed my sweet girl. Even in the midst of such world shattering grief, I am so lucky.
I'm also lucky that I got to be there for her final moments. That i got to hold her in my arms and know it was the last time and tell her I loved her and would miss her. I got to be there for her for the past 7 years and make sure she was as happy and spoiled as I could make her. I get to determine what happens to her remains and find my closure in that. Many people, including people I know and love, do not get that for their pets.
I spent my life loving her and I'll spend the rest of it missing her.
We begin. Birds are safely tucked away. Current state of the bird room + some close ups of the areas I'm most excited to get cleaned up. I haven't had a steamer up until now, so I'm hoping this makes everything much easier.
Step 1: Vacate the premises — Complete ✅
Removed all objects from the room and the cages, threw away the newspapers from cage floors, swept larger pieces of debris, and vacuumed the floor.
This will be an awesome cage refresh, all perches cleaned and rearranged. I opted to throw away a lot of toys that were 1) porous and 2) easily replaced, so pretty much all cardboard, lots of cork bark and mahogany pods, a lot of toys that Holly loved but my other two don't care for. Taking down the perches/toys in Holly's cage was difficult... I have this rope being that is too small for Merlin, and Cusita chews rope, so idk what to do with it.
Next step: Steam Everything >->o
I'm excited for the steamer making it easier to clean dust. I think the combo of heat + wet will help decrease how much dust gets kicked up in the process of cleaning. Then I just wipe it off!
Holy shit this is tedious.
In the interest of making sure my birds are back in housing by the end of the day, I have had to adjust the scope of this project. I fully wiped down Cusita's cage before realizing it was the smallest and still took me over an hour. So I have opted for Merlin's cage to wipe off the worst of the surface gunk, scrub the floors, and then wipe Holly's cage as completely as I can, then spray everything with the chlorohexidine. While that dries, I will clean off perches, and depending on what time it is then, give everything a final steam.
Lunch break. Everything is drying from the chlorohexidine. Once I'm done eating I will start on the perches
Done 😭. I will deal with the blast zone on the rest of my house this weekend because dear God do I need to shower and Sit Down
I'm so sorry to hear about Holly. It is so hard to believe on my end, I can't even imagine how you are feeling. You did everything you could for her and she had such a beautiful life full of fun and love. It was cut so incredibly short but the quality of it was superb, I promise. <3
Thank you. Its getting easier. I'm mostly past the stage where I forget she's gone until something reminds me and my heart breaks all over again. Now its just background, constant knowledge. I think that planning what to do with her remains is helping.