Back from the dead!
Seeing Frank for the first time in October 2017, I gasped. I’d gone to meet him after spotting a Facebook message about an iguana that needed rehoming.
Only Frank was much smaller than he should’ve been – barely 1ft long.
He was malnourished and he couldn’t walk properly.
Frank looked as if he was dragging himself along, his little legs unable to carry the weight of his body.
His toes had been cut off, his tail hacked, too. There was no question…
‘I’m taking him home, right now,’ I said.
I wasn’t sure who’d mistreated Frank so appallingly – I couldn’t imagine what the poor little guy had been through with a previous owner.
All I knew was that he needed a loving home.
No stranger to all sorts of animals myself, I had seven snakes, two geckos, a frog and a rabbit.
Oh, and my cat Alfie. Adding Frank into the mix didn’t bother me, although I knew that he’d need extra attention.
I guessed he was about 10 years old – pet iguanas can live up to around 20.
I got him a vivarium enclosure, and set it up in the living room.
I fed Frank two small meals a day to help him gain some weight. He had spring greens, salad leaves, broccoli, with a sprinkling of calcium powder for his bones.
And I let him out for half an hour a day to stretch his legs and get plenty of exercise.
In just a few weeks, Frank gained strength and weight.
When friends visited us, they were stunned by how much he’d grown.
‘He looks much healthier,’ they told me.
The snakes lived in a glass enclosure in a bedroom on the first floor.
For the first year, I kept Frank away from them. He was just so weak and vulnerable, I worried one would eat him up!
But by October 2018, amazingly, my Frank had doubled in size.
‘Time for you to move house,’ I told him, settling him into his new 6ft enclosure inside a triple wardrobe upstairs.
During the day, Frank roamed free downstairs, along with Alfie the cat.
Sometimes, he climbed onto the back of the sofa, hanging out with me while I watched telly.
If the sun was shining, I took him outside so that he could lay in the heat.
Iguanas, being coldblooded reptiles, need to stay warm, so he’d also spend time under a special UV lamp.
And in the evenings, I’d carry him back upstairs and into his enclosure for the night.
But, one morning in April 2020, I got home at 7.30am, after dropping my boyfriend Kirk, 32, at his construction job – and noticed that Frank wasn’t moving.
He was slumped over in his vivarium, his body drooping awkwardly over a log, his legs dangling.
Heart thumping, I rushed over and lifted him out. His body felt cold. ‘Frank!’ I cried, grabbing
During the day, Frank roamed free with Alfie the cat
some blankets to swaddle him.
Cradling him in my arms, I spent the next couple of hours sitting against the radiator.
If an iguana’s body temperature drops too low, their body goes dormant.
I prayed Frank had just got too chilly, that he’d warm up and be OK.
But as time passed, his body stiffened and his gums turned grey. I’d lost him. Devastated, I called my mum Gill, then aged 50, sobbing.
‘Frank’s dead!’
I cried, distraught.
Mum calmed me down, called the animal crematorium and arranged for them to collect him.
Because of the pandemic, I had to leave him outside in the porch, still wrapped in a blanket. I watched heartbroken from the other side of the door as they took him away at 2pm.
Kirk was at work, but I left him a tearful message and, for the next two hours, I was engulfed by grief. Only, then Mum called... ‘I think Frank’s alive!’ she blurted.
‘What do you mean?!’ I gasped, shocked.
Mum explained that the crematorium had called her. They’d told her that Frank had twitched and opened his eyes while the staff got him ready. A miracle! But, still, I couldn’t believe it. Not until
I saw it myself. Racing to the crematorium in disbelief, I spotted the staff around a car. They explained that Frank needed heat so, thinking quickly, they’d put him in the boot, with the car heating cranked up. I peered inside. ‘Frank?’ I called. Slowly, Frank opened one eye, turned his head and looked in my direction. I broke down, crying happy tears, before scooping him into my arms. My cheeky Frank was very much still alive.
The vet checked him over, but all the tests came back clear, with no real explanation or answer as to why he’d seemed lifeless.
It’d been a cold day, but all Frank’s heat lamps had been working.
‘I can’t believe it,’ Kirk said to me.
After two nights at the vet’s, Frank came home.
I worried, constantly checking on him. He was lethargic, his appetite a little smaller, and he needed to take antibiotics.
But soon, he was back to his sassy self.
‘You gave us a real fright,’ I told him.
I’d say his recovery was off the ‘scales’ – and ‘Frankly’, we couldn’t be more thrilled!