surgery and behaviour

[SunnyGirl]

hi everyone

so I had to take my 7yo sun to the vet last week as she was acting very weird... turned out she had a massive egg stuck in her bum and actuyll had to have a surgery to get the egg out... the surgery was done on monday evening, got the fluff back home on wednesday evening and it's friday now so she has been home for 2 days now... she is doing fine, but she eats a lot and mostly just wants to cuddle and nap... she's still wanting to crawl under my shirt on occasion but I won't let her... the point is, she's acting very calm when before she was mostly hyperactive... is it because of the surgery and the fact that she is still healing and her raging hormones disrupted due to the medical stuff?


does anyone have experience or a bird that had to have an egg surgocally removed before? how did it go, what did you do afterwards? how has possibly the birds character changed?

 

[dhraiden]

Recovery takes more time. Your Sunny successfully survived surgery for something that could've been fatal! If you had undergone such a surgery to remove an impacted blockage from your intestinal tract, that was life-threatening, do you reasonably believe that you would be up and bouncing around a mere four days afterward?!


Give Sunny calm time to rest and recuperate at the pace of their own body and mood. And lots of love

 

[LordTriggs]

yeah I'd say it's normal to be more passive whilst healing, the body is putting energy resources into fighting off infections and growing new flesh to seal the body up so the extra food and general chilled nature I would say is normal

of course if there's suddenly a spike in lethargy and inactivity on top of this then I would get on the phone with the vet, just to be safe above all else

 

[SunnyGirl]

I didn't expect her to bounce right back, I actually don't want as much of a hyperactive fluff as she was, not meant in a bad way, but I'd love it if she would remain a bit more calm, as weird as it sounds... just wanted to meet some people who have gone through this with their fids and hear their experiences

nope, no sudden lethargy or similar, she gets very excited when her whole flock (as in me, my mum and gramps) are together finally... ugh this is probably just me not wanting to mess anything up with the fluff...

 

[clark_conure]

I wouldn't worry, but I'd pay for a checkup next week early with your vet just to make sure everything is healing fine etc.

 

[EllenD]

This is all perfectly normal behavior for 4 days after a major open-abdominal surgery...As I already mentioned, you use your abdominal muscles EVERY TIME you move any part of your body at all-your toes, fingers, anything, you will feel it in your abdominal muscles if you just had them cut-open...As someone who had an open abdominal Hysterectomy and Salpingo-Oopherectomy, I was out of work for 6 weeks, and even at 6 weeks I was still hurting every time I moved because my abdominal muscles were still healing, and they were also made much weaker than they had been because I wasn't using them at all for weeks. It just takes time.

**As far as her hormones go, she didn't have a Hysterectomy or have her Ovaries removed, so her body is still producing sex-hormones normally. That doesn't stop or even slow-down simply because she had an abdominal surgery to remove an egg. So it's extremely important that you do everything you can to try to curb her hormones so that she doesn't form Follicles/Eggs anytime soon, because she needs time to heal completely, from her Oviduct out to her skin, she needs to heal. So just like removing the "Hut" from her cage, you need to keep her out of small, dark, warm places...Granted that right now she's not feeling great and is still in a great deal of pain (they do try to hide the true amount of pain they are in, remember that, so she's actually feeling worse right now than she's acting like she does), so letting her "cuddle" under your shirt for a day isn't the worst thing in the world, but honestly it's better if you just stop her from doing it now so she learns that she can't do it anymore...

You're not going to notice any change in her behavior or activity levels at all unless you get her the Hormone-Therapy to shut-down her Reproductive System and she stops producing sex-hormones...Removing an egg surgically has no bearing at all on her hormones...And since she's already been through this once, she's more prone to having it happen again, so you definitely do want to get her the Deslorelin Implant ASAP...And you need to keep in-mind that it takes about a month for the Deslorelin Implants to totally shut-down her Ovaries and stop them from producing sex-hormones; also, it takes a good month or so for the sex-hormones already in her body to dissipate...So even after you get her the Deslorelin Implants, it will still take about a month for you to start noticing a difference in her behavior, and a good couple of months before she has no sex-hormones in her system at all...So the sooner you get her the Deslorelin Implants the better...I'd say as soon as she's recovered from this surgery...

So bottom-line is that the way she is acting right now is 100% due to the fact that she just had a major open-abdominal surgery 4 days ago where her core abdominal muscles were cut, and she's in a good amount of pain; It's totally temporary behavior, and as she'll feel a little better with each day that goes by, her behavior/attitude is going to become more and more "normal" each day...She's lethargic/tired, wanting to sleep, wanting to snuggle, etc. due to the pain, not due to her sex-hormones being at all effected by the surgery...She could very well already have Follicles formed...I hope not, but it's entirely possible...So the Deslorelin Implants can't come soon enough...

****Did the Vet give you any pain medication/anti-inflammatory medication to give her at home? Usually with such a large and painful surgery they'll at least send the bird home with an Anti-Inflammatory medication such as Metacam to help with the swelling and pain, and a lot of the time they'll also give them a narcotic pain medication, such as Tramadol, Turbogesic, Hydromet-Syrup, etc. And any of these medications, even just the Metacam, will make her very sleepy and lethargic as well, so you need to keep that in-mind...

***As long as she keeps eating normally and there's no vomiting, blood in her droppings, seeping from the incision, sudden increased swelling around the incision, sudden new redness around the incision, or any sudden "bloating" or any "bulges" around or under the incision, then she's fine and she's just tired and painful as is to be expected...I'm sure that you have a follow-up appointment next week for a re-check, right? And if you notice any of the things I described above happening, then get her to the Animal Hospital immediately...But it sounds like she's recovering very well and is right on-track...

 

[Laurasea]

She should stay a little quieter , it's a big surgery. But you also need to watch out that more eggs aren't developing, as usually they lay around 4. So if you feel anything, Extremely gentle like you are touched your eye, as she just had surgery! Or if very worried, take he back for another x-ray. You can call and ask vet if he thinks she is going to develop more eggs....let her rest and recover.

 

[SunnyGirl]

She should stay a little quieter , it's a big surgery. But you also need to watch out that more eggs aren't developing, as usually they lay around 4. So if you feel anything, Extremely gentle like you are touched your eye, as she just had surgery! Or if very worried, take he back for another x-ray. You can call and ask vet if he thinks she is going to develop more eggs....let her rest and recover.

that's the thing, I'm really worried that she'd just go and produce another egg... I'm doing everything to somehow prevent it, but yeah, you can never be really sure... I am letting her rest as much as she wants to, but as soon an my mum get's home, the bird goes into hyperdrive and wants to do stuff and go see everything...