I lost it this morning : A Mouse's Plea

[squid_ink]

He was just an ordinary mouse, nothing special. He lived, very briefly, 237 years ago, in the laboratory of a great chemist, Joseph Priestley.

There were lots of mice in Priestley's lab. He had made his reputation as one of the first scientists to identify oxygen. He studied mice to figure out what happens inside animals as they breathe. This meant he regularly opened them to examine lungs, veins, arteries, to see that blood changed color when it moved through lungs. And since tuberculosis -- or "consumption" -- was the scourge of that era, lung research seemed like a valuable thing to do.

But animals didn't last long in Priestley's lab, especially mice.

his lab assistant wrote a poem and jammed it between the bars of one of the cages.

For here forlorn and sad I sit
within the wiry grate
And tremble @ the approaching morn
Which brings impending fate

The well taught philosophic mind
To ALL compassion gives
Cast's round the world an equal eye
And feels for all that lives






Source : Early Animal Rights Poem Discovered: A Mouse's Plea (NPR), with more pictures and info


A day doesn't go by that I don't think of the cow who's tissue is in my heart. I haven't eaten meat, of ANY sort, even before the surgery, for at least a decade and now I know I never will. I hope s/he knows how much I appreciate the sacrifice, and I hope s/he was treated with kindness especially in the last days of life.

Comments

[marci-ny.livejournal.com]

Oh sweetie!! (((tight hugs))) <3 <3 <3 <3

[rhodielady-47.livejournal.com]

Err, are you sure it was a cow? (I thought they usually used pig valves...because of the difference in heart sizes. A cow's heart is the size of a football or bigger. A pig has the same size heart as a human.) Whatever.......
The important thing is that we have you here in the world still! I hope you have many more years of life and good health yet to come.
:)

[sammason.livejournal.com]

I think you're right, it's pig valves. Iirc there are some other biological similarities, too, which make porcine tissues a good choice for human implants. But I don't recall what those similarities are.

Anyway, I share your concern about the animal's welfare, squid_ink. Animal welfare is truly important. I say this as a meat-eater, doing science which is funded by the meat industry and which has involved animal work. I'm proud of the strict way my country regulates what people like me are allowed to do with animals. Things have changed hugely since Priestley's day. On the other hand I'm ashamed of the way my country allows people to mistreat pets, especially children's pets. If I had to choose between being the average pet rabbit, and the worst-treated lab rabbit in modern times in the UK... well it would be no contest. I'd want to be the lab animal.

I'm getting off your original topic here - hope you don't mind. It's really moving to read about how you honour the donor animal of your heart valve.

[squid-ink.livejournal.com]

I didn't have a valve replacement. I was born with an atrial septal defect (a hole in my heart) and I had a bovine patch.

I'm just concerned as to how animals are treated.. obviously so many strides have been made in research, and lives have been saved as a result. It's just important to remember they come not just from hard work, but at a cost

it makes me feel all that much more thankful every day.

PS the man who performed my surgery passed away suddenly from a heart attack @ 52, two years after performing my procedure. I can't imagine how stressful it is to be a surgeon and make life and death decisions every day. I didn't know him that well (I was unconscious for most of our time together LOL) but I am ever so thankful to him too. The entire time I was in hospital he was there all the time, every day, well into the evening.

I'm sure this took a toll on him after so many years.

[rhodielady-47.livejournal.com]

People forget all too easily that the path that leads to deviate treatment of others often begins with cruelty to animals while a child.
:[

[squid-ink.livejournal.com]

I didn't have a valve replacement. I had a patch put into my heart to fix an ASD (a hole in my atrium). Yes it was a bovine patch.

[rhodielady-47.livejournal.com]

Now that's something new I haven't heard of before.
And yes, she would have led a good life. We're not talking a cow that was slaughtered for food here.
:)

[the-lighthouse.livejournal.com]

The whole using animals for research thing is a rough topic any way you slice it. I'm certainly glad for the cow's sacrifice in your case and I hope someday we become advanced enough to find a way to test surgical methods & drugs & such without the use of animals.

[squid-ink.livejournal.com]

it just makes me really thankful to be lucky enough to have received the part from the animal. Realistically, the poor beast was probably cut up for meat (apparently they're not used just for the heart) but I like to think I honor it's memory in a little way every day. That's the best I can do.

[sammason.livejournal.com]

I've often wondered how it feels to have had a major decision made on your behalf in early childhood. Of course we're all powerless when very young but for you, a choice with ethical implications was made. If you'd been adult you might (or might not) have made a different choice.

Do you like the writing of Ursula le Guin? My all-time favourite book is her noval 'Always Coming Home'. In the society she imagines there, human people consider animals, plants, streams, rocks and dreams to be people too. Humans eat animals but it's essential in their culture to 'speak to the death.' They say

Beautiful one
For your death my words

Me, I buy meat with the Freedom Food label whenever it's available. I prefer to buy a whole carcase to remind me of whose death I'm eating. Obviously that's easier when the species is a small one such as a chicken but when I've had the chance to buy a share of a beefer, from the farmer who raised it, I've done that. That particular farmer is somebody I've worked with a lot because I sampled tissues from his sheep. I like his attitude to his animals. When dissecting lambs I invented a small ritual to make the process sacred.

[biting-moopie.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much for posting this. You've identified the main problem (I feel, at least) with our use of animals - we don't honour them or their sacrifice. We don't see them as living creatures, they're just things for our use and disposal. (And I think we see some human beings that way as well, which most likely stems from the same mindset.) The ideal is to live in a world where we don't need to use animals for what we need but until that day, we should at least be aware of the creatures who give their lives for us.

Your respect for the animal who gave his/her life so you could live is truly touching and says lots of nice things about you. I am sure that the cow is having fun now in bovine heaven, chewing delicious grass and mooing at anything that moves, and thanks you for thinking of her/him!

[qlewkr.livejournal.com]

:( Yeah.

You need to go visit a farm sanctuary and hug a cow. :) I've really been feeling the need to do that myself lately.