Anyone have hamsters? Weird health issue...

[Pareeeee]

Came home from work yesterday to find my husband's hamster nearly dead. This was very sudden since the evening before he was super active. I picked him up and he was very cold, limp, and breathing labouriously. We were wondering if he somehow ran out of food...but my hubby feeds him every evening, plus his cheek pouches were full.

He was refusing food, dehydrated and weak. Only thing I could think of was to mix up some CGD and try to get him to swallow it. He did, and his energy slowly started to come back.

I decided to see what was going on with his cheek pouches. I carefully pushed the contents out...and they were impacted with rotten...POOP. Why!?? Anyway, I had to go to bed so I gave him a final bit of liquid food, and put a heat lamp over his cage.

This morning I expected him to be dead. No, he is a bit better and eating on his own!

If anyone here has ever owned a hamster that stored poop, how Did you stop it? Are there any explanations as to why he would do that?