Large dent in my late gerbil’s body, what does it mean?

[ani777]

The passing of my gerbil Thor was a fairly long and painful process. I realized what was happening to him in the early morning, but i had to go to school not even an hour later. He was lying in his tank not moving, however i could see the weak rising of his stomach as he slowly breathed. The worst part, however, was the large dent in his stomach. It wasn’t an open wound— just what looked like part of his side had been emptied or something. There was no mess from it and like i said no visible wound of some sort, simply the mysterious dent. He died somewhere around an hour later, still in about the same spot as when i had unfortunately had to leave him. That dent in his stomach still confuses me years later, and it makes me scared to get another gerbil as i have no idea what would cause such a scary, and probably painful thing. Does anybody have any idea of what this could be? I don’t have any sort of picture and have had no luck in finding any description online similar to what i found with Thor.

[betty]

Well, I can see why you might still be plagued by this years after it happened - what a strange occurence, bless him.

First thoughts would be that there was something there that was now missing - so one might assume a tumour or cyst had ruptured - leaving a visible hollow (like when you get up off a beanbag). This rupture, if mainly fluid-filled, could well have been his cause of death and so the dent would have stayed visible as there was no movement after this point to resettle the tissues.

Another possibility could be that he fell or was injured just before this and so his skeleton underneath his skin wasn't the 'usual' shape and so created the illusion of a dip. This could also have happened if he was a bit thinner under his fur than he looked (they can fluff themselves up when unwell or when moulting) and so when he layed down and deflated slightly he didn't look as rounded as usual.

Still sad whatever it was...

[catnut]

I noticed something maybe similar in my last gerbil, Kirby, who passed away last May- he had lost some weight before he passed due to teeth issues, I took him to the vets and he also had a slight ear infection, had his teeth trimmed under sedation but passed the next day either due to not being well enough to recover or just too much stress of taking him to the vets as he was very skittish. I was thinking it just happened to look different due to weight loss.