Anemone not well after eating bristleworm

[JJH]

Maybe a month ago, we woke up to find our rainbow bta eating a bristleworm. She had bristles in her tentacles and the worm nearly out of sight. She hasn't done well since, her tentacles have retracted and she will hold food in her mouth but spits it all back out in a short time. I thought she was near death early last week when her foot was weak and she was small about the size of a grape and would not open or attempt to eat. She has rebounded and now her foot is strong and she has moved closer to the light. I think you can see tan near the base of the tentacles in the video, which means an increase in zooanthella (sp?) I take that as a good sign. She has also regained some color. But today when I was taking a video of her it looks like maybe there is a worm inside her moving (top left). Also, does it look like her mough is damaged on the left side? Am I imaging things? What do you guys think?

Before

 

[JJH]

No one?

 

[USMC 4 LIFE]

Just stumbled on your ad. Kinda hard to tell if that bristle worm is causing harm. It looks like it lost significant color though. How long apart was the pic taken from the video? How long have you had it?

 

[JJH]

The difference was two weeks apart. The bristleworm she tangled with was much larger than the worm you can see inside her in the video. At this point we have decided to try deworming her with Dr. G's. But Dr. G's has to be eaten and the anemone will put the food in her mouth for a few minutes open and closes several times before spitting it out. We are giving her very small bits of food but she won't eat at all no matter what we offer. Yesterday I tried again and she spit it out but it stuck to her tentacles for a good 45 minutes. She continually opened and closed slowly during that time. The cleaner shrimp eventually stole the food and she closed for a few hours. But then she opened fully and looked better than she has since this started. So I assume she absorbed some of the dewormer and it either killed the worm or harmed it some. We are deworming every other day for two weeks per the directions. I'm not sure what else to try. We also contacted Hikari thinking maybe Prazipro in the water might work, since she has trouble eating. After speaking with them it probably won't, but they requested a copy of the video for their lab and are supposed to contact me sometime today if they have any suggestions.

 

[JJH]

We purchased the anemone right after Christmas in December. She looked great until the bristleworm.

 

[JJH]

Just an update, the anemone is not doing well. She had been looking much better taking very small pieces (grain of rice size) of food 2 times per day for several days until yesterday. Yesterday she moved around some in the tank and refused food. Her tentacles have retraced are nearly non existent again. She's having trouble holding on with her foot. I was hoping she would make it, but I'm sure that won't be the case the now.