Hair Loss Fungus or mites?

If the food is coming out of her mouth, you're not getting it far enough back in her mouth. If you get it back to her molars, she'll chew and swallow.

Also, put a towel on a table so she won't slip around. Snuggle her in the crook of your elbow, and hold her head FIRMLY with that hand, partially covering her eyes with your hand. If you're holding her correctly, she won't be able to jerk away from you.

bpatters said:

If the food is coming out of her mouth, you're not getting it far enough back in her mouth. If you get it back to her molars, she'll chew and swallow.

Also, put a towel on a table so she won't slip around. Snuggle her in the crook of your elbow, and hold her head FIRMLY with that hand, partially covering her eyes with your hand. If you're holding her correctly, she won't be able to jerk away from you.

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I set up a table in her room and tried with holding her as you described, I'm still having issues with her spitting out a lot of it but I will keep trying to get better at it...It is a lot easier than what I was trying before though. I tried with holding her mouth closed which seemed to help a little bit, its just at the initial point when I'm squirting it into her mouth she starts moving her tongue all around pushing some out. It's a really messy process. Hopefully I'll get the technique down better and it will be a lot more efficient. Thank you so much again.

I switched from the 6ml syringe down to a 1ml syringe with the tip cut off and its made it a lot easier to feed her without it squishing out of her mouth. I'm feeding her 10ml every 2-3 hours and getting at least 60-70ml total through out the day. Is it recommended I get up during the night to feed her as well? I felt really awful this morning when I came in to check on her and she seemed to have gotten weaker over night from going the 7 hours without food

Absolutely she should get a middle of the night feeding if she's not eating anything on her own. Maybe two, depending on how much you're getting in her. Cavies MUST eat all the time -- no more than 2-4 hours between feedings, depending on what else is going on.

I'm glad I asked. I feel silly now but I assumed they sort of slept through the night like us.

Nope. They're crepuscular, which sounds to me like a terrible case of acne but actually means that they're more active at dawn and at dusk. However, they're not awake all day, and not asleep all night.

I can't believe I didn't know that before. There always seems to be something new I don't know about them. I'm really stressed because we have a 6-night trip booked and paid for and we are supposed to leave on the 29th, in 2 weeks...I don't know what is going to happen. I have my mom already to take care of Mimi, but she has never done any kind of intense care for an animal like this before and she has a full time job. I'm thinking of asking her to house sit and do all the feedings she can but I'm really not sure it will be enough. The only other option I can think of is that I know that Mimi's vet offers boarding for guinea pigs, but I don't know any details about it if there is a max length of stay, if they do it even on Sundays when they're closed, if they can do the force feeding etc. I'm going to call first thing tomorrow to check with them about all that and I'm really hoping they will be able to care for her while we're gone

There really shouldn't be any reason why she can't be over this before you leave on your vacation. If you're still having to hand-feed her in two weeks, something is very wrong.

You don't have to feed her during the night unless she's not eating on her own. You just put the food in the cage so she can get to it.

I really hope so. She won't eat or drink anything on her own right now. I keep offering the fresh veggies pellets hay etc. they're all in the cage all the time for her but she hasn't touched them for 5 days or so. Well, she touched them but didn't get anything into her mouth, she just pushed things around a few times. For the last day or so she hasn't shown any interest in them at all. I tried chopping things super finely and putting veggies in her mouth but she couldn't/wouldn't chew or eat any of it yet.

Food chopped super fine is not necessarily easy for a pig to eat. Slivers the size of matchsticks are easier if their teeth are actually meeting, because once the sliver gets back to the molars, the grinding motion will help pull it into the mouth back toward the teeth that are doing the chewing.

I've been trying thin slivers as well, I have rolled up lettuce and put it back to her molars, chopped carrots and peppers into matchsticks etc. she just has no interest in the food at the moment but I'm definitely going to keep trying until she is able to eat it again. She just weakly spit out anything I put back to her molars so far

Did they give her any pain meds after the dental procedure? As @spy9doc says, it's very hard to work in a cavy's mouth without nicking something with the drill, and she may be in pain.

The other possibility is that you could flavor the critical care with something she likes. Doesn't matter what if it gets her to eat. My pigs have all been willing and happy to kill to get watermelon. Cilantro also works for mine. But blend whatever her favorite, strong-tasting food is in with the CC and see if that helps.

I do have the pain meds for her and have been splitting the dose into the twice a day like you guys recommended So far I've tried flavoring the cc with different flavors of baby food...I tried apple, pumpkin, strawberry banana, pear, carrot...I have a bottle of 100% watermelon juice though and I'm going to mix that in with the cc in the morning to try that. So far she doesn't like any of it enough to take it voluntarily beyond a few first mouthfuls, then she gets tired of it quickly.
I'm sure you're right about her mouth though. I noticed she has been drooling a lot, could that be because there is a cut in her mouth or something from the dental work?

Yes, the drooling could be because of an injury in the mouth.

Is there any odor to the drool? That would indicate infection.

bpatters said:

Yes, the drooling could be because of an injury in the mouth.

Is there any odor to the drool? That would indicate infection.

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Poor Mimi Yes there is kind of a faint odor, I thought it was just general mouth smell. Should there be no odor at all?

Well, it'll probably smell a little bit like food. But odor from an infection can be fairly noxious, and definitely won't smell like food.

If she's not eating more by tomorrow morning, I'd take her back in and ask them to have another look in her mouth.

bpatters said:

Well, it'll probably smell a little bit like food. But odor from an infection can be fairly noxious, and definitely won't smell like food.

If she's not eating more by tomorrow morning, I'd take her back in and ask them to have another look in her mouth.

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Ah okay, I just called the vet this morning to update her with what is going on and I'm waiting for her to give me a call back. I'll take her in again if she doesn't improve, she' been to the vet like 4 times in less than a month now.

This should be covered as aftercare from the dental work. I'd really push back if I got asked to pay for it.

bpatters said:

This should be covered as aftercare from the dental work. I'd really push back if I got asked to pay for it.

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Well the vet I spoke with on the phone today didn't sound very optimistic or have any helpful things to say. I got an appointment for tomorrow at 2:30pm anyway so hopefully they can check out her mouth and see maybe why she's drooling etc. and get her some fluids...She's not doing as well today with the force feeding, I did get a lot better at getting enough into her mouth but she's taking a very very long time chewing and swallowing. She started shivering a lot, even though she is nice and warm held in a blanket. Now she's sitting in her cage and I just saw her making a rocking motion every few seconds. She never leaves her bed to walk around the cage or anything beyond just the couple times barely looking at food and then going back into the bed

mimipig said:

Well the vet I spoke with on the phone today didn't sound very optimistic or have any helpful things to say. I got an appointment for tomorrow at 2:30pm anyway so hopefully they can check out her mouth and see maybe why she's drooling etc. and get her some fluids...She's not doing as well today with the force feeding, I did get a lot better at getting enough into her mouth but she's taking a very very long time chewing and swallowing. She started shivering a lot, even though she is nice and warm held in a blanket. Now she's sitting in her cage and I just saw her making a rocking motion every few seconds. She never leaves her bed to walk around the cage or anything beyond just the couple times barely looking at food and then going back into the bed

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I hope they can help your piggie.

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