Guinea pig owners understand how difficult it is to tell when their beloved pet is sick or hurt, but that doesn’t stop many of them from feeling guilty when their pigs succumb to injuries or illness.
Unlike rambunctious dogs or friendly cats that outwardly demonstrate their interior thoughts and feelings, guinea pigs – though just as thoughtful and affectionate – are smaller, less demonstrative, and simply more fragile than other types of pets. So, when guinea pigs are sick or ailing it is oftentimes challenging, if not impossible, to determine what – if anything – is hurting them.
Pet Parenting Is an Act of Faith
Guinea pig parents should know that these profound and perplexing health challenges are not their fault. Not even close. In fact, by deciding to feed, raise, and provide a loving home for these vulnerable animals, guinea pig owners are giving them exceptional lives full of affection, compassion, and comfort.
As pet lovers, we’d like to think that all animals live comfortable and fulfilling lives, but that is not the case – not by a long shot. Guinea pigs, like other pets, are lucky to have loving parents, owners, and providers.
Any person who decides to offer a home to a guinea pig (or any animal for that matter) is making a profound and positive impact on that animal’s quality of life while here on earth. Pet owners, especially guinea pig owners, must never forget this.
Pet parenting is an act of faith, especially for animals that are particularly frail and vulnerable to injuries and diseases that can lead to death – a result that will inevitably involve the pet parent but that is never their fault. Pet owners should live in the now with their pets. The future is never guaranteed. All pet parents can do is to love their pets the best they can. It’s that simple.
[More pet loss advice, insights, and resources: How to Write a Pet Eulogy, Pet Loss Condolences: What to Say and How to Say It, and Life After Loss: 5 Signs It’s Time for a New Pet.]
Limited Resources Is Not a Moral Failure
Like any parent, guinea pig parents do their best to provide for their animals with the resources available to them. For most guinea pig owners, this means offering love, attention, food, and a safe place to play and sleep. Resources, however, require time, energy, and money. When a guinea pig owner does not have enough of those key resources they often feel guilty. Work takes up all of their time and energy. An unexpected medical emergency can lead to some profoundly difficult choices for a pet parent with limited financial resources. Not being able to afford costly vet visits and procedures can be devastating.
When a lack of access to those resources either directly or indirectly leads to the death of their guinea pig, guinea pig parents sometimes blame themselves. This is a common, but illogical train of thought. Grief, sadness, and the feverish haze of mourning muddle people’s ability to think clearly.
If you fall into this damaging cycle of self-blame, reach out for help and take care of yourself as you would for your pet. Your pet wants you to love yourself as much as you loved them. Having limited resources is not a moral or ethical failure. Life for every living thing is largely beyond our control. Always remember that.
Take Care of Yourself & Surviving Pets
Navigating the debilitating and tangled emotions after the loss of a beloved animal can be heartwrenching. Adding to those complex feelings, some guinea pig parents take care of more than one animal – and the deceased guinea pig was possibly friends with those other pets, which are frequently other guinea pigs.
Guinea pig parents understandably worry and feel guilty about the loneliness a remaining animal or pig may experience. Fortunately, as people, there are many things we can do to ensure our pets feel and know they are not alone and are safe and secure and in a place where happiness thrives. Show affection. Talk to them. Play with them, even outside usual confines. Engage with them as much as possible.
For guinea pig owners simple changes such as raising cages to human eye level encourage more interactions, as does placing cages in areas where people are prone to stop and show a little love. Tell them your troubles, make them healthy salads, and hold them carefully and routinely check in on their health and well-being.
Give them reasons to popcorn around the cage, squeak with glee at you, and run around the carpet. And remember to always take care of yourself. Deciding to care for an animal is a selfless act because we know – that at some point – we will most likely experience the death of that animal and suffer the grief and consequences of having loved something so ephemeral.
And we know, that despite those inevitable realities, being a guinea pig parent is worth it.