We got Brock our big male Bolivian BCA, my little man, over a year ago, as the result of missexing. He was born in '03 and got switched when he was sold. The female ended up in Europe, and the male ended up in America, the opposite of where they were supposed to go. Nobody noticed the mix-up until they were old enough to breed and Brock ended up having the wrong equipment.

Our friend contacted us. He had the only other sibling in America, and we'd always coveted that snake, so he thought we might want his brother. The breeder helped us buy him because he's a cool guy and it was a simple mistake.

I connected with this snake right out of the bag. He's been my baby, a dream to handle, a perfect eater, and gorgeous.

In May I was cleaning cages while my husband was at school. I cleaned his future girlfriend's first, and took some outdoor shots. Then I brought Brock out while his cage air-dried and sat outside with him, ready to take some pictures. Except he didn't crawl out of his tub. He started to, and then acted scared. He started coiling back over himself and flipping around in the tub. His head would shake, tremors, back and forth. He was honest-to-goodness stargazing. It was one of the scariest moments in my life. I called my husband in tears, and he tried to talk me down, saying "He's not stargazing, you're just paranoid." but he skipped his errands anyway.

He got home and took one look at Brock and told me to put a lid on the tub and we got in the car and sped to the vet. I'd taken a video of the incident, but the vet didn't need it, because the symptoms progressed by the time we got there, and he couldn't even right himself.

The blood panel showed elevated levels of calcium and phosphorus. They opened him up and inserted an abdominal catheter to flush his insides with a saline/glucose solution, which did help to bring down his calcium levels. Our vet basically leveled with us and said that if we were different people and Brock was "just" a breeder, he would've recommended euthanizing him, but he thought there was a chance, and he knew how much Brock meant to me, so we continued with treatment. He stayed over a week at the vet, having his saline/glucose flushes every couple of hours for the first few days, and then a little less each day until he was down to twice a day, and his levels came down low enough that he was stable for surgery.

Brock had his liver and kidney biopsied surgically (NOT needle-punch, actually inspected and samples chosen deliberately) and sent to the best snake pathologist in the country. He came back fully negative for all the big scaries, IBD, etc.

Brock had meningitis. Our vet suspected that in Brock's case, it was what he called a "lost parasite", or rather a parasite meant for another animal, like a cat ringworm, or something from a raccoon. It got confused because he wasn't meant to be the host, and ended up in his brain.

We were able to take Brock home. Our vet said that he seriously doubted there was any chance he was contagious, especially with our husbandry and quarantine practices, so we didn't really worry too much. He told my husband that Brock had about a 20% chance of recovery.

We had to flush him with 100cc's of the saline/glucose solution directly into his abdomen twice a day. He also had a couple different injections, and oral meds, which were near impossible to administer because he had such terrible control over his head. He regained control of his body, and his tail, though.

We stepped off of the saline flushes, and tinkered with the medicine until we were treating for what we assumed was parasitic in nature. He was on a mild antifungal as well, just in case.

Everything seemed okay, he seemed to be improving, but wasn't perfect by far. And then last night I came home and Joey sat me down to tell me that Brock had died.

He found Brock literally minutes after he died. He bit himself about a third down his body, and rolled, with the top half of his head rolled underneath him and his jaw flopping lifelessly. He'd thrown up blood and bile on his way out.

He had bitten himself so hard that transferring him from the cage to the box he didn't come loose.

He's at the vet's now, getting the necropsy done, and I'm a wreck. I've been crying all night and even though I knew he only had a 20% chance of recovering, since he made it five months and seemed to be improving, I thought he had a chance.

I'm just glad I didn't have school today. I really needed a day to wander around the house sniffling and drinking wine. I can't even go into the reptile room because his cage is there, empty, and it kills me. :(

I've been writing and decorating, mostly. Anniversary is on Saturday, so this place is lousy with orange lights and cobwebs.