Fishy Medical Condition

Before you get all worried, no, there is nothing wrong with any of us. Well, I take that back. There is plenty wrong with ALL of us here in our house...but that's not what I'm talking about.

We have a lame fish. Not lame as in: "God, does his personality suck!". But lame as in: he lists to one side. One morning a few weeks ago I went into the kitchen and glanced over at his little bowl on the kitchen counter and saw him floating on top of the water motionless.

Ian was with me, so I made breakfast while trying not to draw attention to the future sushi roll not 4 feet away from us. All of a sudden the little fucker sprang to life and started bolting around. The fish, that is...not the boy.

Okay, so I fed him and went about my day. Every time I was in the kitchen I would look over and sure enough he'd be on his side looking at both the top AND bottom of the bowl at the same time. This went on for a few weeks, but every time you would tap the bowl or feed him, he'd perk up, swim around and then just kind of stop and hang out. The funny part of watching him is when he stops swimming he slowly tips and rolls over on his side. Instead of Aloe, we should just call him Tim-berrrrrrrr.

Anyway, I was telling my neighbors that I was considering Bettacide because of his ailment. Now don't get all freaky on me, hear me out. No creature deserves to live with one eye permanently glaring at recessed kitchen lighting. What a confused little fishy he must have become! One eye blind and one eye looking at clear glass rocks at the bottom of the bowl. How would you like to go about life always looking through a kaleidoscope? I call it high school and college, but I wouldn't want it to be permanent!

So anyway, I was telling my neighbors about it, and going through my proposed methods. Hmmmm, do I need to stop here and elaborate on my proposed methods of eliminating a 3oz lopsided fish? Because, yes, I have given this thought. Okay, you win. Here goes:

Choice A: Pull a Finding Nemo and flush him out of sight, out of mind. The problem I have with that is that in the movie, Nemo is flushed down the spit sink and out into the ocean. In case you have never been to my house I neither have a spit sink nor an ocean nearby. The closest Aloe would come to the ocean is the septic tank in my back yard. Not a very pleasant choice.

Choice B: In-Sinkerator. Also known as my garbage disposal. Once again, hear me out. Surely he's in pain. He can't be comfortable. And flushing him down the pipes into the septic tank would be a slow and ugly death. That would be a really CRAPPY thing to do to him.

So I came up with the idea of tossing the floppy little bastid down the sink drain and flipping the switch. At least it would be a quick death, as those things are sharp, fast and mean business! But fear not, as that is not the way that Aloe will meet his demise. I kind of get a chuckle out of my reasoning for NOT doing it, so I will share it with you.

I decided not to go this route, because..... Okay, when you use the garbage disposal you need to keep water flowing to the drain, right? You need to do that because it helps keep what your chopping and disposing of moist and lubricated and choppable. I'm actually not exactly sure why you need to keep the water flowing, I just know that you do. But my answer sounds good doesn't it?

So you need to do that, and if I WERE to go that route, I'd want to place something over the drain (like a plate or something) to both stifle the scream and keep fish bits from flying up onto the light fixture above the sink. After all, who wants to clean pet remnants from a light fixture? And if I do that, water wouldn't be able to go down the drain to keep all the bits of Aloe nice and wet.

So basically Choice B is out because I'm too lazy to clean fish shit off of everything. (Before I go on: yes, I have realized that nothing else splats out of the drain, so why would he. I'm using that as a reason because knowing me, it WOULD happen. That kind of stuff happens to me all the time, and thats a whole 'nother sack of potatos to write about).

Anyway, back to my original train of thought. I was telling my neighbors this, and while her horrified expression was leaving her face, she told me that she had a fish who did the same thing. She googled it on-line and diagnosed that her fish had an (are you ready for this??) Obstructed Bowel.

She said it sounded exactly like what happened to hers, so it boils down to the fact that my fish can't take a shit. How funny is that?? Aloe can't squeeze out a turd! She read that feeding him peas would help, and that she gave him a few every day. And after about 6 months, he righted himself and was better. Wow, 6 months. That must have been some murky water the day he became 'well' again.

I tried giving Aloe some frozen peas but the poor little guy couldn't right himself enough to eat it. He flippered his way over to it and tried, but it was just too big for him.....and then the pea thawed and sank. I then tried thawing them out for him and THEN giving them to him, but they just sank right past his hungry little fishy-face that was desperately trying to get some fiber.

So now I'm at a crossroads. What do I do? I still feed him regular food, but I don't know if it's helping him. The peas cloud up the water faster than you can say "Does this topic really deserve it's own blog?", so I don't want to keep feeding them to him if he's not going to eat them. Should I call the vet and see what she thinks? (You can bet your ass I'm not going to call the vet about a $4.99 fish that I bought out of sheer boredom). Or should I just break down and go to the pet store and see what they think? I'd prefer not to do that, because, well, the kids have fun at the pet store and who am I to bring joy into their lives?

In reality, that's what I'm going to do. Not that they are marine biologists over there at PetSmart, but maybe they have an idea. And if not, we'll welcome home Aloe Jr.