u/Consistent-Tart-292

Princess Peach hated being weighed and I hated handling her knowing it stressed her out. I wanted to get a baseline weight since we’ve been together for 25 days now, the shop owner who sold her to me at an expo guesstimated she was about 3 months old at the time I bought her. She weighed in at 52.5g and is about 2.5” x 2.5”. It was also my first time checking her underside, which looked like a heathy color (didn’t get a photo unfortunately).

Does anyone have tips for handling her in the future for weigh-ins and underside checks? Or getting substrate off better so the weight is more accurate? I didn’t want to mist her right before to add more stress. It was both of our first times doing this and the most amount I’ve handled her so far (gloves on, don’t worry). I’m open to any friendly tips or tricks to making the process as smooth as possible going forward. Curious if there are opinions on ideal time of day to weigh her, how often to do these kinds of checks at home, etc.

Planning to schedule a check up and establish a vet for her in the next month. I’m a little anxious for that as well, so if there are tips on transport or anything else related I’d love to hear that too!

I’ve had my Pacman for 18 days (she’s between 3-4months old) she pooped in the container from the expo on day 1 and she pooped in her water bowl on day 9. She’s continued to grow, shed, and show a healthy, confident appetite. I haven’t had any issues feeding her. Main staple is nightcrawlers on a schedule with supplemental dustings but I try to vary her diet as well. No issues eating. Temps and humidity are stable. Tank is bioactive, substrate is a bioblend mainly reptisoil mixed with a few other things like reptibark and sphagnum moss (only used for deepest layers to keep moisture in).

I was overly anxious about when her next poop would be since I’ve read so many stories about impaction. Then I found dried pellets near her burrow and thought, omg maybe she’s been pooping all along, possibly regularly even? But she likes to use her burrow to go instead of the bowl? These also had “sparkling” specs on them, which I googled might be from her pee?

I found a few more of those today (not pictured), but when I tried to crush them, they splintered/were fibrous so… substrate.

Now that I look back at this photo from a few days ago, I’m worried they weren’t poops either but substrate. They were pretty hard and compact. Most of them stayed dark even after I let them dry up a little. I suspect the top right might’ve been bark but unsure about the others. Today I noticed springtails congregating near her burrow (not on her). I’ve seen a lot of poop photos here but they’re all in water not substrate so I don’t have a point of reference for dried substrate poops.

I feel like I’m genuinely going insane trying to figure out poop or not poop, and if not poop then do I need to remove her from her tank and soak her.

Clearly, I am an overly anxious and paranoid new owner who just wants to make sure she’s thriving. Please help, I think I’m going poop insane fr. Thanks in advance!