Taking Care of Reptiles

Spencer Kills
Aug 28, 2017 · 3 min read

My first pets that I can remember were frogs I received as tadpoles in the mail.
Then I had a tank full of fish. An orange flamboyant one I called Paloma, a silver goldfish, one of those spotted ones that cleans the tank for you, and two others. Eventually, the silver goldfish ate them all, saving the spotted one for last. I remember seeing the skeletons at the bottom of the tank, the silver fish growing fatter and fatter.
Then I had a leopard gecko, a baby girl. She hated me, which has to say a lot about my lizard raising skills to begin with. She peed on me every time I took her out of her tank. Eventually, I got a boy leopard gecko that was mostly yellow. He was nice. She laid eggs and I tried to incubate them in the fridge. They all died, and she continued to pee on me.
After escaping from my mother’s to living with my dad in a tiny apartment, I received a baby bearded dragon for free. I watched him convulse before my eyes in the heat while using my laptop; I had left the lamp on in 90 degree weather.
I received two king snakes for free. One escaped at my ex’s friends house (in the backyard) when I collapsed from substance abuse. The other escaped in my home.
I received another bearded dragon for free; the last of the same litter I had got the previous one from. The “runt”. Twitch had been named by the child of the person who was giving the dragon to me. I hated that name, noticed the dragon had a slight bend in its tail. Later, I met the dragon’s parent, and they had the same kink. So I dubbed my new pet Twitch Kink: TK.
Still in the tiny apartment, I went down the street and purchased Feminazia, my new children’s python. A pygmy also from Australia. Recently, she passed.

I was recently dumped for the 20th time. This time he means it. After receiving “Play nice or I’ll tell [management] that the apartment is available [now]” I realized I had been in an emotionally abusive relationship. I had been living with emotional abuse for over two and a half years.
Even more disturbingly so, I had been living with emotional abuse my whole life.

We’ll touch on that in a different article, though.

Today I realized I can’t take care of TK. I couldn’t take care of any of my sweet pets. My ex used to tell me I needed a dog, to show me unconditional love. I’ve never seen a more acute example of derailment (why actually show me that love that you claim to have for me when you could just blame the nonexistence of an animal?). But I could not take care of a dog, or a cat. I couldn’t even take care of fish. I can blame my abusive environments, but more importantly, I write this. To take responsibility for all the little lives I endangered. To take responsibility for not being a victim. To take responsibility to know I do not have the funds nor time to take care of something other than myself.

I always preach about not wanting children for this exact reason, yet thought I was capable of taking care of a reptile.

I hope you can see from my anecdotes, I deeply cared for all my pets. Being in therapy since October has shown me how to let go. So please don’t tell me what to buy. Or what to do. Or how to take care of TK. I’m giving TK away tonight. I hope that he can be in a home where he is nourished and loved, just as I soon will be.

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