My Cat From Hell: Part 2

My last blog post talked about my crazy cat Chase and how he chewed his tail off. Read part I for more details. This one picks up with him having his second surgery.

After telling Brendan to go ahead and have him get the surgery, we started talking about the weekend ahead. He would need 24 hour supervision as he was going to be on new medications that would most likely make him very drowsy and possibly sick. The problem was that we had planned an engagement party weeks prior to go out of town with a bunch of friends. We also knew that no hotel would ever accept cats, but we were supposed to check in in less than 24 hours. Brendan said that he called the hotel to ask about pets and they said that pets are allowed with a fee and they are a pet friendly hotel. We then called everyone to let them know about the situation, as one person is allergic to cats and some others might be annoyed if we didn't let them know ahead of time. Everyone was fine with it, or at least they seemed like they were. I didn't care in a way because we had already cancelled an in town engagement party due to lack of interest, and this one was in danger of that too. We should have cancelled, it was one of the worst trips. Most of my friends ignored me for the duration of the trip and one of my friends almost died. But that's a story for another day...


Brendan was off that day, so he went back to get Chase after surgery. He put his carrier in the back seat, and took off down the highway, all the while Chase is mewing for help. He then started to rock his carrier forward, I'm not sure what he was trying to accomplish because I wasn't there, and finally his carrier fell down in the space behind the drivers seat, tail side down of course. Meanwhile Brendan is driving down the highway going 60 so he has no choice but to wait until he gets off the highway to help him. He finally got Chase home after his second amputation surgery, and he was so high on drugs he couldn't even walk. He tried to run away and fell on his side. Then he tried to walk and he limped along until he faceplanted into a wall and fell over. So we locked him in his crate until his medicine wore off a little bit, all the while he is in the crate yowling and hitting his head against the ceiling of the crate. 

When we arrived at the hotel the lady at the desk went through everything, all the rules and such, and we noticed that our room was the last one at the end of the hall by a back door. Hallelujah! It also said that only two people were checking in. I didn't say anything about that, but brought up that we have a pet. At no time I said cat, mainly because I have a feeling she would have turned us away like Joseph and Mary, no room for this little unholy feline at the Inn. At no time did she say dog or cat, so we figured we could use that if we got caught.

He was actually pretty well behaved on the trip, I think due in part to the fact that he was so drugged up. After getting back in town he went for another check up, and his tail was healing a little better, but still infected. He went on another course of antibiotics and some pain meds. He also figured out that if he sat with his legs to his side, like a child, he could pin his tail underneath his butt and bite the bandage off that way, even with the cone on. So we had to carefully watch him at all times when we were home, because our other cat would bite it too, thinking it was a toy.

September - After awhile it seemed like his tail was getting better, still on antibiotics, but the skin was looking healthy. Then his fur started to get ripped off with each bandage change and he would endure bandages ripping off his skin when we would change it. One bandage changer in particular was awful, both for us and him. I noticed his bandage was getting all bloodied from his chewing on the tip of the bandage, so we pinned him on the couch on top of a cushion, like we normally do, and started to unravel the bandage. When I had to unhook the gauze from the bloodied tail, he started to make noises I have never heard a cat make, and his whole body started to shake as he tried to bite Brendan, who was trying to hold him down as best he could. I knew he was  in a lot of pain, but there was nothing we could do about it, we were out of pain meds, and he couldn't go without the bandage, so I started wrap it up. When we were done he bolted off the couch and hid under the table. That's when I noticed a big wet spot where he had been five seconds earlier. He had gotten so scared he had actually lost control of his bladder. We decided that until he got a littler better, we would have the vet do bandage changes, so we made another vet appointment to make sure the tail was still healing.

I took him to this appointment, and it was the first time I actually met our new vet. She was very nice, and explained everything to me about what was going on. She recommended more antibiotics and that he have another check up in a week. By this time our funds were running low, so we waited longer than we should have.

October - A couple weeks after his appointment, his tail started to smell rancid, which I knew meant that it was infected. He had an appointment the next day, but I could tell he was in a lot of pain and wasn't going to the bathroom again. We took him in the bathroom this time, in case there were any "accidents" and got our supplies ready. By this time we were pros at wrapping his tail. He was in a lot of pain, but didn't lose control of his bladder this time. We were even able to wash the fur on his tail that had started growing back. I applied some Aquaphor to his tail, and bandaged it up. When I took him to the vet the next day, she said that it wasn't healing like she had hoped, and that we might want to consider laser treatment, after all it's only about $300. We knew that if it ever came to this point, we wouldn't be able to do anything and would have to put him down or give him to a shelter that saves cats. She said that we should come back in three days to have it checked, and that if still wasn't healing, she would highly recommend more aggressive methods of healing.

I had Brendan's dad take him to the next appointment, as it was during the week at a terrible time, but there is no choice when it comes to weekdays. If it wasn't for his dad, I think we would have had to put him down by now, as he has helped a lot with appointments and money. I had the vet call me later, and she gave me a good report, that his tail was improving, but they wanted bandage changes every 24-48 hours. I was nodding and saying that it shouldn't be a problem, but in my head, I'm thinking about what a pain in the butt it's going to be to either change it ourselves or bring him in, which they wanted to do. Bandage changes were only about $35, but when you add up about twenty of them, that's a lot of money to be forking out.

That's all for Part 2....stay tuned for Part 3

My Cat From Hell - Part 1

I acquired a fur baby about two years ago, and recently he has had some major issues with suicidal behavior. I will start at the beginning, warning this is a long one, but had to write it all out because I really can't believe everything that has happened....

July - I noticed the hair was missing on the tip of his tail, making it look like a worm was coming out of his tail. He also kept hiding under tables and behind toilets, something he doesn't normally do. He actually is affectionate to the point of being annoying. I showed the tail to Brendan, who thought it was weird, and Chase started cuddling on the bed with him. He noticed a little while later that he was chewing on his tail, then I heard him yell out that Chase had spit on him. I came into the bedroom later, and noticed Chase was missing the end of his tail and it was bleeding all over the bed sheet. I told Brendan that he didn't feel spit on his face...it was blood and the tip of his tail. His bone was sticking out the end of the tail! I took him into the bathroom until I could figure out what to do, which of course we had to take him to the animal ER. I went into the bathroom to get him, which by this time he had bled all over the floor and my bathroom looked like a scene from CSI. Luckily there was an animal ER ten minutes away that was open 24 hours a day, because this all happened about 12:30am. We drove over there with his tail wrapped in a hand towel so it didn't bleed all over the leather seats of Brendan's car or my sweatshirt, which it did anyway.

When we got him to the ER they said that it needed to be amputated, otherwise he would die. This is a very expensive operation, about $1,000. We had no choice, so they did emergency surgery and had us pick him up the following morning at 7:00am, so neither of us got much sleep after leaving the ER at 1:30am. I stayed home a little bit longer after we got him back, as I had a late start that day because I had a PT appointment. I never made it because, after leaving Chase in the living room for maybe two minutes, he managed to turn his head and rip his bandage off and was working on the sutures when I came back. I was frantic because I didn't have a carrier and couldn't drive and hold him all the way back to the vet, so luckily one of my friends was able to help me, and she had a carrier. While I waited for her I put him in the bathroom again, where he proceeded to spill his water, fling litter everywhere, and leave blood streaks from his tail wherever he walked. Once again felt like I was walking into a crime scene when I got home later that day. My friend watched him for the day, since he can't be trusted.

August - We had been going to VCA in Bloomington for his check ups, which I only mention their name because I firmly believe no one should ever go there, boycott this place! Since then I've talked to others that have had similar horror stories of terrible service. But I digress...every time we took him to the clinic they would bandage him up, always doing everything behind closed doors, never met any of his vets there. Once he ripped the bandage off a day after they put it on, and when we took him back they charged us the full amount of bandaging. This happened twice. Finally they said that it was time for the stitches to come out, but to not be alarmed by any puss or blood as that was a sign that it was healing. So that night he was sitting next to Brendan in his computer room, wagging his tail, just happy to have the bandage off. After hitting his tail a couple times on a nearby storage bin the skin broke loose on the tail of course, with no stitches to hold it together, and he started to bleed all over the carpet. We didn't want to do the going back to ER and get charged an arm and a leg (and tail) for another surgery right away. So I wrapped it in gauze and tape as best I could and left it for a couple days.

Fast forward a couple days, he hasn't pooped or peed in four days, stopped eating very much, and was lethargic in general, more than normally. I had Brendan take him to a different clinic that his dad had recommended. They were appalled at the service we had received at the other clinic and said that they would do whatever they could to help us. I got paged at work that day, as Brendan didn't know what to do. When I talked to him he said that the vet was recommending another surgery or lethal injection. I was in work mode, couldn't even think straight, meanwhile I have a coworker who would not stop entering the room bothering me, even after I closed the door to where I was. So I told Brendan to go ahead and have them do another surgery.

That's all for Part 1, keep tuned for Part 2...

One year later...

Wow, I just read the last post I did over a year ago, and my life has changed a lot since then. I'm going to try being in here more, seems like it's very therapeutic just to get thoughts out sometimes. Here is another list, though, of all the things that have changed in the past year:

• Owning one cat to owning two cats
• Engaged!
• New job, that i absolute love!
• Workman's comp injury at rehab center (previous job) 

It's been another crazy year, and I'm sure next year will be crazy too with the wedding, I'm already going crazy trying to do everything by myself, luckily my friends have started to step in and take over.

More posts to come!