Teeth
Recently I decided to take my older male cat, Louie (aka Papa/ The Birthday Boy) to get his teeth cleaned. Uglycat had died from complications of gum disease and cancer, and Rich had never had her teeth cleaned in all the 18 years he had her, so we figured if we wanted our cats to live a good long healthy life, we'd start them on the road to good dental hygine. (I know, it took 18 years for Ugly's complications to set in, but who knows whether or not she was in pain?).
So.
Louie goes to the vet down the street that we've never been to (his regular vet being about 20minute (miserable) car drive away). We had made calls to 3 vets in our area and this particular one seemed the most agreeable. Long story short, when all is said and done, they ended up extracting a lot of his teeth, and we paid them a grand total of $747. Seven. Hundred. Forty. Seven. Dollars. DOOOOOLLLLAAARRSSS. ...hold on...my head's imploding from thinking about it...ok, it's done.
So ok, yeah, it was unexpected, but we had the money, and it's not like we weren't going to pay them for services rendered; we also figured, Papa is 12 years old, his teeth had prolly been bad for a while, so no biggie, the kittens, being only 3-4 years old should be much less.
The Monkey went in for his appointment today, which we missed last week somehow...
Rich called me mid morning to say that the vet called and said Monkey had serious periodontal disease and that his teeth were coming out on their own; they said they had already started the extractions and that it was going to cost about $975. Nine HUNDRED seventy five DOLLARS!! WTF?! How have I now dropped almost $2k on my cats teeth?!
Well, they weren't kidding when they said they were doing some extractions...they pulled out ALL OF HIS TEETH! He has 4 major teeth - the canines and whatever the bottom ones are called and all the teeth in between them, but ALL the teeth on the side of his mouth, top and bottom, are GONE! Gone! His face is all swollen up and he's hoarse and loopy...this cat ate his good Blue Mountain Spa hard kibble everyday for a couple of years and I never once saw a tooth fall out and all of a sudden his teeth have to come out?!
When I went to pick him up I listened to what they had to say, and honestly their theory about why his teeth were so bad made some sense to me, but I told them I felt they had taken advantage of me and my husband and that they didn't represent themselves clearly enough; we had just asked to have our cats teeth cleaned. I told them I'd bring Monkey back for his FREE follow up in 2 weeks but that we would be taking our business elsewhere.
What really upsets me is that Chester, my last cat, is the only one who actually has physical signs of needing teeth-work, and now I'm really gun shy about bringing him in. I was not anticipating spending $3k on teeth cleaning. I expected at about $400 per cat a total of about $1200. This is crazy. Obviously I don't want to NOT do what's right for my babies, but geez....
So.
Louie goes to the vet down the street that we've never been to (his regular vet being about 20minute (miserable) car drive away). We had made calls to 3 vets in our area and this particular one seemed the most agreeable. Long story short, when all is said and done, they ended up extracting a lot of his teeth, and we paid them a grand total of $747. Seven. Hundred. Forty. Seven. Dollars. DOOOOOLLLLAAARRSSS. ...hold on...my head's imploding from thinking about it...ok, it's done.
So ok, yeah, it was unexpected, but we had the money, and it's not like we weren't going to pay them for services rendered; we also figured, Papa is 12 years old, his teeth had prolly been bad for a while, so no biggie, the kittens, being only 3-4 years old should be much less.
The Monkey went in for his appointment today, which we missed last week somehow...
Rich called me mid morning to say that the vet called and said Monkey had serious periodontal disease and that his teeth were coming out on their own; they said they had already started the extractions and that it was going to cost about $975. Nine HUNDRED seventy five DOLLARS!! WTF?! How have I now dropped almost $2k on my cats teeth?!
Well, they weren't kidding when they said they were doing some extractions...they pulled out ALL OF HIS TEETH! He has 4 major teeth - the canines and whatever the bottom ones are called and all the teeth in between them, but ALL the teeth on the side of his mouth, top and bottom, are GONE! Gone! His face is all swollen up and he's hoarse and loopy...this cat ate his good Blue Mountain Spa hard kibble everyday for a couple of years and I never once saw a tooth fall out and all of a sudden his teeth have to come out?!
When I went to pick him up I listened to what they had to say, and honestly their theory about why his teeth were so bad made some sense to me, but I told them I felt they had taken advantage of me and my husband and that they didn't represent themselves clearly enough; we had just asked to have our cats teeth cleaned. I told them I'd bring Monkey back for his FREE follow up in 2 weeks but that we would be taking our business elsewhere.
What really upsets me is that Chester, my last cat, is the only one who actually has physical signs of needing teeth-work, and now I'm really gun shy about bringing him in. I was not anticipating spending $3k on teeth cleaning. I expected at about $400 per cat a total of about $1200. This is crazy. Obviously I don't want to NOT do what's right for my babies, but geez....