Years ago, someone accidentally threw my hamster

For context, this was years ago. This hamster has since passed away from what was assumed to be diabetes complications. Her passing was likely unrelated to this incident as the time gap between this and when she started getting sick was huge. I’m not asking for advice on care, just looking for a place to tell this story and hopefully to move on. I’m a very sensitive person, and even years after this has happened, I still feel terrible.

I’ve only ever had one hamster, and her name was Pixi. She was an adorable grey robo ham with a white underbelly. I shouldn’t have been given this hamster, as I was still a preteen and tasked with caring for her all by myself. Believe it or not, I actually managed to provide pretty good care for her.

Pixi had a good diet, a huge cage, and inches of bedding to burrow in. She had plenty of hides, toys, chews, and a huge wheel that wouldn’t hurt her back. I cared so much about that little hamster. I spent so much time researching for products and tweaking her cage. Obviously I made mistakes, but overall, I think she had a good life.

One day my friend came over. She was watching my hamster as we talked about what we would do that day. Pixi seemed calm, so I let my friend feed her a treat. I warned my friend in advance that she could not try to pick Pixi up or touch her because she would either run away and not come out or bite her. My friend reached down to pet Pixi, but she ran away, and since we were about to leave, I just said something about “I told you, she doesn’t like to be touched” and got ready to go. But my friend didn’t take no for an answer. She reached down into the cage from above to grab Pixi and pick her up. Pixi turned around and bit into her hand, hard. My friend yanked her hand away, but Pixi let go at precisely the worst time and was thrown a few feet, maybe five. She landed at the base of a piece of wooden furniture. I managed to run over to pick her up and return her to her cage.

I don’t think Pixi was hurt, at least significantly. She continued eating and behaving normally after the initial first seconds of shock. I never noticed any broken bones, tremors, or odd behavior from her. She didn’t even lose trust for me. I guess she knew by smell that I wasn’t the one who had tried to grab her. Even though I know that it’s not logically my fault, I still to this day feel awful. I shouldn’t have ever let my friend near her open cage. I’m not looking for sympathy, I just wanted to be able to share the story since I was ashamed after the fact and never told anyone.