possibilities for bearded dragons death

[aouldnori]

my 6 year old bearded dragon, Beardie, just passed away about 2 hours ago. I’m looking for answers as to what his cause of death might’ve been for some closure as I am very upset right now. i can’t get an autopsy as he has been buried and i wouldn’t want to mess with his body anyways.

for the past 3-4 weeks he had not eaten anything. i tried offering his favorite foods but even those he wouldn’t eat. at this point he was still active and would drink lots of water. I started to suspect it was an impaction and bought him prune baby food to eat and would bathe him daily. we tried to get in touch with a vet and the only appointment they could do was for the 22nd, so we scheduled him for that. did the bathing and baby food feedings for about a week and this past Thursday his condition took a bad turn. I came home and his beard was black and he was very lethargic. finally got him in on saturday for an emergency appointment. The vet gave him an ultrasound and bloodwork. At first they suspected kidney failure but the bloodwork didn’t indicate that, the vet told us on the ultrasound they noticed swelling in his testes area and prescribed him antibiotics, an anti inflammatory, and a liquid diet because at this point he was very thin from not eating.

We got home and gave him the medicine and fed him. his condition stayed the same Sunday but he still was eating the liquid food. Today I gave him his next dose of anti inflammatory and fed him a bit later with the liquid. I put him on his log to bask but he started thrashing his head in strange ways. I took him out and soon he started throwing up all the food I gave him. At this point he was extremely weak and his mouth was hanging open. I took him to sit on a heating pad as he would gag a lot and occasionally throw up more food. then I picked him up and noticed his lungs had stopped moving. I touched his eye area and he didn’t close it like normally he would as a reflex. I did a few more tests on him and confirmed he died.

I want to explore some possibilities as to why he might have died. Could the swelling the vet saw have been cancer, and if so would the medicine have made it worse? is there anything I could’ve done better? I had no idea it was cancer, I wasn’t even thinking about that as a possibility. Any other ideas would be appreciated. Knowing why he died would give me a lot of closure right now. I feel like I did everything I could but of course I can’t help but try and think of anything else I could’ve done to help him.

 

[AHBD]

I'm very sorry to hear how your Beardie went downhill and ended up with a traumatic end. My heart goes out to you for having to see him that way.
Without a necropsy it's impossible to tell but cancer in beardie's is not uncommon. Neuro endocrine sarcoma seems to be the most common so I don't know but it might have been. You tried everything you could and although we may blame ourselves in these situations you didn't cause this to happen. My deepest sympathy to you.

 

[aouldnori]

thank you. I miss him a lot already, i feel like I knew him my whole life. something i noticed just before he passed was a few of his femoral pores appeared to be empty, like they had stopped producing secretions, not sure if that helps narrow it down. he was always a little strange too for a male, he wouldn’t get territorial ever. He didn’t bob his head or attack himself in mirrors until just earlier this spring, was his first time he ever showed signs of being territorial. I used to suspect he was a girl because of this. I guess that makes sense now with what the vet said, makes me think it could be some type of cancer that stopped his hormones from functioning proper.y That could just be him being his weird self but idk

 

[AHBD]

The death of a pet hits hard, we hate to lose them and that's the hardest part at the end of the fun + happy times.