Pet-sitting

Question
Hi there, I've had a traumatic experience this evening and hope you can help me alleviate my guilt.  We already have two syrian hamsters in our home. Both are now  two and still going strong.  My friend's son asked us to look after his hamster while he was away this week.  I was happy to do so and have looked after him before. He is a lovely little fella. Very nosy and is coat is beautiful. He has been happy and energetic all week. Tonight I took him home. My sons were holding him on their knees in his cage in the back seat.  When I got to my friends house she wasn't it so we waited for ages and in that time he was running around and playing on his wheel happily.  When her husband got home he didn't have a front door key so he went round the back to let us in the front.  I put the hamster cage on the door step and went back to the car for more bits.  When the husband put the light on I saw drops of blood in the cage. The hamster was lying on the floor of the cage but this was literally like 3 mins after he'd been playing in the car.  When we got in I took him out of the cage and his nose and mouth (or that area) were bleeding a lot and his breathing was very laboured. My friend's husband got onto the emergency vet straight away but while he was on the phone the hamster died in my hands. I was talking to him and stroking him gently willing him to live.  I thought maybe when I lifted him out of the car in the cage that he'd bashed his mouth but surely that would have been a more superficial wound and not terminal? SO i've looked up on google and have seen a few people report this same kind of thing.  Some people have said it's heart failure and it's very very sudden.  I worry that it is all my fault. I feel so bad for the hamster, I was really really fond of him and hate to think he suffered. I feel so bad for the boy who owns the hamster too - he wasn't there when it all happened.  Do you think it was somethign that I really coulnd't have avoided or did I mess up big time somehow. I think it's even worse because he wasn't ours. I mean, we know and love our hamsters but when the time comes we know how much love we've given to them and that the time is right. THis hamster seemed younger than my two - he certainly looked it - though I think he was the same age.
Any advice?

Answer
Hi Aileen

What a terrible experience for you.  It must have been a real shock to have found him like this.

Unless he was dropped at any stage or his cage bashed into something I cannot see that transporting him would have caused these types of symptoms.  I transport quite a lot of hamsters and I've never known this to happen before.

It is very difficult to know what happened, but I suspect it was more likely to be heart failure, or the blood was caused by a ruptured tumor or similar.  Hamsters of this age (anything from 18 months) are very prone to getting tumors and often these aren't noticed until they are causing serious problems.  For blood to come from his nose and mouth definitely sounds like something burst in his head.  

Whilst this is a real shock for you all, at least he was with people who noticed something was wrong and who tried to do something about it.  Chances are this would have happened anyway and perhaps your friend's son would have just found him dead in his nest had he not been moved.  

You will never know for sure why he died.  From the hamster's point of view this all appeared to have happened very suddenly and therefore he didn't suffer at all.  It could be that this situation was brewing for some time and it was just unfortunate that you happened to be transporting him at the time.

I know that it must be hard for you, especially having to explain this to a child, but you should not feel guilty at all.  I do hope that your friend's son can understand that sometimes things just happen that we can't explain, and that if he gets another hamster in the future you are not afraid to look after it.  Chances are this situation won't arise again.

I hope this helps you.

Regards