Cat Tales

When it rains, it pours.

It never fails that as soon as I get something paid off, a large expense occurs. I recently paid off my car, and then my washing machine broke down. I paid off my credit card, and not one, but two of my cats got sick, maxing it out again.

I love my cats, but I am beyond stressed, and they aren’t helping the situation.

I noticed that Salem, my four-year-old house panther (black cat), was losing weight. I kept finding vomit and adjusted the camera to figure out who it was. There were two different kinds of vomit—not counting hairballs, which are normal—one with food and one that was straight bile. The latter was more concerning. After discovering that it was Salem, I locked him in my room with the camera to see if he was eating or drinking. He was doing neither.

At this point, he had been close to a week without food. We went to the vet and got fluids, anti-nausea medication, and antibiotic shots. The next day, there was no improvement, so we returned to the vet for more medications, blood work, and X-rays. Nothing concerning was found. Two days later, he went in for a barium test to check for a blockage, but that was ruled out. We kept trying different things, focused on keeping him hydrated and medicated for about two more weeks, and we added appetite stimulants. There would occasionally be a glimmer of hope—he’d take a lick of pâté or five bites of kibble and drink a few licks of water, but that was it. We sent the scans off to a radiologist for another perspective. Recently, we started him on steroids, and he spent the entire weekend eating and drinking as he normally would.

The problem is, we don’t know what’s going on. We’re considering diseases like kitty Crohn’s or the radiologist thinks it could be FIP. The symptoms vary and don’t exactly line up with anything specific. He has also been released from the quarantine of my room in hopes that some normalcy would help.

During the past week, I noticed that Pumpkin, my eight-year-old orange cat, looked like she was losing weight and may have had an infection, judging by the eye gunk and drooling. This tiny cat can eat all day and not gain an ounce. She has always had terrible teeth and has been my lifelong dental patient. Throughout her life, she has undergone dental work, extractions, and treatments for infections, so I was leaning toward a dental issue. She had also been spending more time by the water bowl, which is unusual for her. And she was puking up food. Some blood work revealed that she is in kidney failure. I was not expecting that; she’s still relatively young.

Her treatment for now includes hydration therapy, which she does not like. Essentially, I have to give her injections of fluids multiple times a day. I can’t blame her for not enjoying being a pincushion. Thankfully, she loves the special kidney diet food, which helps. I hope this will bring her numbers back into a normal range.

This has been extremely stressful and expensive, but I have no regrets because I’m doing everything I can to help them heal.