My bunnys eye is irritated, need advice!

[ArwensMaRabbit]

Hi, I would like to start with a thank you for reading, I really appreciate the help! Last night my bunny Arwen was perfect, and I remember her eyes were both totally normal. However this morning when I woke up, I noticed she was holding one eye shut. I gently opened this eye to see it was totally irritated, it wasn’t VERY bad but obviously something was wrong. My mother and I used a warm/damp paper towel and started removing the gunk in and around her eye. Once we “flushed” her eye out gently, a piece of hay revealed itself poking just outside her eyelid. I carefully removed this piece of hay, and it was quite long, and it was completely trapped under her eyelid. After I removed that piece of hay, which I believe 100% to be the cause of irritation, her eye instantly got better. It’s been 8 hours now, and her eye is wide open, doesn’t seem to be bothering her(although it didn’t seem to bother her before either besides her just keeping it shut) the irritation has definitely dialed down quite a bit and it seems to be healing itself very fast. I did not give her rabbit eye drops, I’m planning on buying them tomorrow, but we only used water. What other steps should I take to ensure her eye does not somehow worsen, I don’t believe it will but I would like more opinions than my own. Do you guys think since the source of irritation has been removed, she will get better? Or does she require the eyedrops, medication, vet visit, ect? (I would prefer to spare her a vet visit because it’s expensive for me, and I’d rather be able to bring her to the vet when she REALLY needs it, compared to this little incident)

PHOTO 1 - eye is completely shut (this is before washing)
PHOTO 2 - eye has opened up (this is after removed gunk and the piece of hay)
PHOTO 3 - 2 hours after cleaning (eye is wide open, looks almost normal, a little watery, and just a little irritated)
THANK YOU

PS - my camera mirrored the image of the first 2 pictures, the 3rd picture is NOT mirrored, all 3 pictures are of the same eye, although it looks like the last pictures is of her right eye, which it isn’t, each picture is of the same eye!

 

[zuppa]

Hi, I don't know the correct answer but very glad that your Arwen is better now you're very brave and did great job I think if you see the eye itself was damaged somehow or there's any sign of infected wound inside eyelid I would get drops or visit a vet bt if there's no wound or something serious I would just keep 'flushing her eye a few times a day from my experience I use strong black tea making compress for like 5-10 mins just warm tea not hot. Fred's eye was irritated a few weeks ago I think it was from too much dust in his hay it looked bad tbh it was all red around and watering, just two times evening and morning and looks like nothing happened. Of course if there something more serious I'd use eye drops but honestly I wouldn't know which ones and where to buy them, if you know the name I'd be curious to google them.
Myself I am going to doctors only when it is absolutely necessary one of my grandmas was a surgery nurse and from my other side my great grandma was very into herbal medicine she passed away when I was 23 we were huge friends and she left me her books and diaries, so I prefer using natural remedies where possible. For tea compresses my grandma used them on my own eyes and for my father who had very sensitive eyes and I know it would make no harm and also tea compresses reduce inflammation I always use them before I need to buy official medicine.

 

[ArwensMaRabbit]

I’ll give the tea press a go before I do the eyedrops, I think Arwen would probably prefer that. Thank you for the advice
And I’m not even sure where I’d get rabbit eye drops, I figured I’d cross that bridge tomorrow

 

[ArwensMaRabbit]

All better!

 

[Popsicles]

Great news and well done for flushing the eye out so quickly, sounds like you prevented any worse damage!
For future reference, I wouldn’t use eye drops without a vet checking them over first, as if they have damage to the cornea or an ulcer certain drops can be very dangerous to use.