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hi all, i have a leopard gecko named cleo, i'v had her for probably 4 years now.. and she has been fine since the day i got her, but now i worry... hey tail is skinnier than usual, she seemes to always have her eyes closed unless she is moving slightly, then she will kind of squint. she is not actvive at all, she kind of lies in one place for 20 minutes, then shifts to another place, ranging from the warm side of the tank to the cold side... as if she is uncomfortable. There is crickets in her tank and she is paying no attention to them... i held a cricket in front of her and wiggled it around in front of her nose, but she dosn't want to eat.. she will always eat from my hand. she shed about 2 weeks ago, and she has seemed sick for the last 2 days or so. Any advice or help is appreciated.
thanks

Can you tell us your set up?

Temps, substrate?

Have you tried other insects? Butterworms, waxies, roaches, etc
In the meantime i suggest you contact a vet to get a fecal done
best of luck

like i said she has been living in the same temperature and enviroment for years no problems... i put a heat lamp over her tank and she seemed to become active for a little bit but then stopped moving around.. i picked her up for a little bit and tried to geed her again.. when i put her down she just kind of layed there for a minute... then the rolled over on her back.. so i flipped he over right side up... and after about 2 minutes she rolled over, exept she did a full roll, back onto her feet... she did this again after another 2 mins... she is still laying there (about 5 minutes after the last roll) and she seems to be taking very deep breaths, he upper torso gets a lot smaller as she exhales, then goes to normal for another while. there is about 30 seconds between these breaths...

You should answer my questions anyways, substrate build up can take years.

i have no idea what rolling means, but i would contact a vet as soon as possible, is she going to the bathroom? If so get a stool sample as well.
Good luck, hopefully someone will reply with more suggestions

yes please get your gecko to a vet. closed eyes usually means dehydration. Do you have a small eyedropper? maybe mix some water (and alittle vitamins) together, not a paste, but shoot some down his/her throat. keep your leo hydrated. if you start seem her resting in her/his water dish, then that's a really bad sign of dehydration, and it's hard to bring them back at that point. Does she have fat on her tail (a decent amount) if so, consintrate on rehydrating her between now and the vet visit. see if you can get her to drink 2-3 droplets every 4 hours. i wouldn't give her much than that.

I took a moment to look at one of my books, here's a bit of info i found

"as with all reptiles, cool temps for excessive periods of time can cause immune system supression with subsequent respritory infections.Symptoms may be subtle and include a partial opening of the mouth with a LABORED EXPIRATION. Initally, a temp change to a day tiem high of 84/86F with a drop to no lower than 80F may be adequate for mild cases. if improvement is not seen or symptoms worsen, vet should be seen."

So try turning up your temps in your cage, we are approaching cooler weather and I understand that you have had the same setting in your cage for awhile. But think of elderly people, for many years when they were younger people they were more adaptable to temperatures, now they are a bit older, it's a bit harder to regulate the body temperature. The fact that your gecko is going back and forth between warm/cool reminds me of hot/cold flashes of when someone gets sick.

does your geco have diarrehea?

for getting your geckot o eat, go to the foodstore and pick-up some turkey flavored baby food, mix some viatmins in with the food and use the dropper to feed small meals to your gecko, twice a day. don't over feed (even if it seems like they are accepting the food well) because if your gecko is having issues it's probably going to be very easy to upset their tummy. if they start vomiting it's going to make them more dehydrated

so basic just:

get your gecko hydrated (most important) and get it to the vet. turn up the temps on your cage and try baby food (turkey flavor). if that doesn't work (baby food) use mealworm guts

i wouldn't reccomend feeding your gecko crickets or full bodied mealworms right now, might upset their tummy. just gutload your bug like normal and pinch their headoff and squeese onto gecko's lips. let them lick it up. do maybe 3-4 of these, twice a day.

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