The cats, dogs and horses that share our lives
Iris was spayed yesterday. I was worried about the process, moreso than for our other cats. For some reason, I have emotionally tied myself to Iris in a similar way to how I did with Whisper years ago. And Whisper ultimately broke my heart when her little body gave out after her spaying operation.
Our cat, Rommel, has had a rather checkered past when it comes to his own health. He entered our house as a basically healthy twelve week old kitten nearly twelve years ago. Within a few months he had fractured his kneecap (resulting in six weeks in a cast), and within a year he’d had several abscesses, various stitches added and removed, and numerous x-rays. In more recent years he’s developed a growth in his mouth called a stomatitis, for which he has had several surgeries, regular steroidal treatments, special hypoallergenic food, and periodic doses of anti-biotics.
I have a couple of kitten pictures of Iris and Bilbo that show how a fourteen year old and (at the time) a 14 week old kitten can co-exist.
Our kittens are growing up…Nimbus goes tomorrow to have his “bits” removed.
It’s a comparatively minor operation for the male cats, with very little risk. It’s also essential if you consider yourself an even remotely responsible pet owner.
On Thursday Iris woke up with a limp. She was favouring her right front paw, and was acting somewhat depressed. We took her to our friendly vet, Doctor Michelle, who couldn’t find an obvious problem, but suspected a puncture wound hidden somewhere. Dosed with an anti-inflamatory and a prescription of antibiotics, we took the little one home. She perked up, had a big dinner and seemed much happier. I gave her the first dose of antibiotic. Part of the “prescription” was to keep her calm…yeah, right- Iris is a million mile an hour kitten, so slowing her down was about the best we could do.
Nimbus has been with us for over a month now, and has been doing a great job doing what kittens do. It seemed like a good time about four or five days ago to take a batch of photos of him, and I’ve just finished putting them into the gallery.
We weren’t going to adopt another cat.
You know we are in trouble when my post starts off “We weren’t going to adopt another…”. And once again, it’s Irene who wedged the chisel into the cracks in my steely resolve. There were feral (semi-wild) kittens, you see, at the rescue shelter where she volunteers. And one of them was very scared, and curled up and buried his head in her sweater and purred when she was there. And it was very sad, and very cute, and couldn’t she please bring her home?
I mentioned a couple of posts ago how our cat Susu had fought back from a serious illness. A few days ago, she took a turn for the worse and stopped eating again. Susu didn’t have the strength to fight back this time. We took her to the vet just a few hours ago, and released her from her pain. Irene and I were there with her at the last breath.
Our dog Sadie has been suffering increasingly from debilitating pain in her right front shoulder during the past few months. We’ve had her on several increasingly strong arthritis medications with no obvious beneficial effect.
Susu, one of our cats, has been very ill the last few weeks. It started with sneezing and runny eyes, and progressed to her curled in a corner and refusing to eat and drink. This is an emergency situation for cats, and so the vet was called in. A bit over two weeks ago the vet diagnosed Susu as having a severe upper respiratory infection (sinuses and a touch of pneumonia) and gave us antibiotics and subcutaneous fluids to give her. I was taught how to wield a needle to insert the IV, and we spent a few days nursing her at home.