News on my cat.
OK. Here's the story on Tweak, my kitty.
She went into surgery three Fridays ago, I think it was, and got three cancerous tumors removed and three teeth pulled. Since she has a heart murmur, they couldn't keep her BP and her heart regulated, and had to stop before they finished getting two more teeth that needed to come out. She was fine there for about a week, week and a half, when I saw that she stopped pooping-- took her to the vet, they figured that since she was so incredibly in pain due to arthritis that she didn't want to go. She had been ok to go to the bathroom before she'd been on pain meds, but then realized how bad it hurt after she was off, and stopped going.
About three days or so after, I noticed she started swallowing funny, and then she started coughing and wheezing really badly. We thought it was acid reflux, because she started vomiting along with it. We got her on anti-nausea medication and that seemed to help, but she wasn't really eating much, and after a few days, her coughing and breathing got worse. I figured, what the hell, I'm going in to see the vet to pay some down on my bill, I'll take her in anyway.
The doctor listened to her, took two Xrays, and came back to me with an extremely alarmed expression.
Tweak's left lung had filled with sputum-- right over her heart, so the doctor said that she had a very, very guarded prognosis-- it could have gone either way in the next couple of days. We put her on two different antibiotics just in case it was an infection, but it could very well be congestive heart failure... yesterday I took her in, the doctor listened to her chest and said that she's not terribly better, but there's less of the crackling in her lungs and that she seems just a TINY bit better-- and that one couldn't really tell within two days.
She gave her a shot that they use in heart patients to clear up that extra fluid-- a diuretic, I think, and now Tweak seems to SORT of be breathing easier, but she's got the snotty bubble from the nose thing going on now.
She's not eating. She just won't. She ate a tiny bit of tuna at the vet's yesterday, but refused anything else later that day and today. I force fed her some of the Science Diet a/d just to make sure her liver doesn't do that fatty-liver wasting thing and do her more damage. I managed to get probably just under a third of a can in her today. She IS drinking, however, which is good, and she was wandering around the house much more than yesterday.
She's still in dangerous territory. It could be a tumor that cropped up in record time within the two weeks between her Xrays/the surgery/now. It still could be her heart, rather than a respiratory infection. The only way they'd know if it actually was the heart would be if I took her to the vet school at State and got one of those fancy heart whatevers, the ECG, I think?
Anyway. I've lost four pounds. She's probably lost a half of one. I've not been dealing with it well. It kills me to see her like this, and it breaks my heart that she might not make it... and that if that's true, I've done it to her by sending her into surgery for her teeth and those tumors. I know she was in pain due to her teeth, so that at least takes away some of the guilt, but still. I also feel bad that if she doesn't make it, her last days will have been filled with not only her own suffering, but me sitting there shoving pills and medicinal liquids and food down her throat when she didn't want them.
That's where we are right now. I can't do art, I can't sit at home and just watch TV, I can't read, hardly, without thinking of her and obsessing over her health.
Blah.
me.
She went into surgery three Fridays ago, I think it was, and got three cancerous tumors removed and three teeth pulled. Since she has a heart murmur, they couldn't keep her BP and her heart regulated, and had to stop before they finished getting two more teeth that needed to come out. She was fine there for about a week, week and a half, when I saw that she stopped pooping-- took her to the vet, they figured that since she was so incredibly in pain due to arthritis that she didn't want to go. She had been ok to go to the bathroom before she'd been on pain meds, but then realized how bad it hurt after she was off, and stopped going.
About three days or so after, I noticed she started swallowing funny, and then she started coughing and wheezing really badly. We thought it was acid reflux, because she started vomiting along with it. We got her on anti-nausea medication and that seemed to help, but she wasn't really eating much, and after a few days, her coughing and breathing got worse. I figured, what the hell, I'm going in to see the vet to pay some down on my bill, I'll take her in anyway.
The doctor listened to her, took two Xrays, and came back to me with an extremely alarmed expression.
Tweak's left lung had filled with sputum-- right over her heart, so the doctor said that she had a very, very guarded prognosis-- it could have gone either way in the next couple of days. We put her on two different antibiotics just in case it was an infection, but it could very well be congestive heart failure... yesterday I took her in, the doctor listened to her chest and said that she's not terribly better, but there's less of the crackling in her lungs and that she seems just a TINY bit better-- and that one couldn't really tell within two days.
She gave her a shot that they use in heart patients to clear up that extra fluid-- a diuretic, I think, and now Tweak seems to SORT of be breathing easier, but she's got the snotty bubble from the nose thing going on now.
She's not eating. She just won't. She ate a tiny bit of tuna at the vet's yesterday, but refused anything else later that day and today. I force fed her some of the Science Diet a/d just to make sure her liver doesn't do that fatty-liver wasting thing and do her more damage. I managed to get probably just under a third of a can in her today. She IS drinking, however, which is good, and she was wandering around the house much more than yesterday.
She's still in dangerous territory. It could be a tumor that cropped up in record time within the two weeks between her Xrays/the surgery/now. It still could be her heart, rather than a respiratory infection. The only way they'd know if it actually was the heart would be if I took her to the vet school at State and got one of those fancy heart whatevers, the ECG, I think?
Anyway. I've lost four pounds. She's probably lost a half of one. I've not been dealing with it well. It kills me to see her like this, and it breaks my heart that she might not make it... and that if that's true, I've done it to her by sending her into surgery for her teeth and those tumors. I know she was in pain due to her teeth, so that at least takes away some of the guilt, but still. I also feel bad that if she doesn't make it, her last days will have been filled with not only her own suffering, but me sitting there shoving pills and medicinal liquids and food down her throat when she didn't want them.
That's where we are right now. I can't do art, I can't sit at home and just watch TV, I can't read, hardly, without thinking of her and obsessing over her health.
Blah.
me.