When mucus is present and her mouth and eyes are tearing
and is off feed and seeks warmth 24/7 along with her activity
level diminishing, chances are good that it is a URI. The noise
or popping sound does not need to be present in all cases.

If the eyes are tearing and mostly closed, the fact that tears
and sand/dust don't mix is a good reason to clean out the
sand for now and lay paper towels down instead.

A heat rock is not a good idea. There have been serious
belly burns ... some proving fatal by heat rocks. When
they malfunction they can sometimes over heat, thus
causing severe burns to the ventral side of the lizard.
An under tank heating pad is much safer when installed
under the area where the hide or cave is set. This would
only be used during the cooler nights.

If you can raise your basking site and/or lower your basking
light, this is a good deterrent to using a heat rock. Reptiles
are not supposed to heat their bodies from the surface of
the ground or a rock but mainly from above where they
are more colorful and have better heat resistant scales which
which better absorb UVB rays more safely, unlike the lighter
less colored/more delicate ventral scaling.

You can also use a heat emitter if the bright light at night
is an issue. Or buy a black light bulb which emits a good
amount of night time heat with a low/dim glow instead.
You can also contain more heat in her tank by blocking
off some of the screen top. You can use cardboard or
plastic ... just so it's not in the immediate area of the hot
basking light ... for safety reason. Also by covering the
back and sides of her tank with insulation of even card
board.

I would be more apt to get her to most any vet and explain
that on this forum someone has suggested that she may be
displaying URI (upper respiratory infection) like symptoms.
They will likely get her on a baytril (antibiotic) regime.

This will be better than doing nothing and letting her continue
to deteriorate. Chances are better than good that she may
soon begin to rehab soon after the therapy begins.

Generally a lizard with a possible URI is not soaked/bathed
as this may aggravate the infection. You may feel she loves
her soaking but this may cause her some stress. Any added
stress at this time could maybe intensify her condition. If
you are orally hydrating her, this should be sufficient.

Sorry for the long post.
Good luck with her,
John

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