The whole staff at the new place I went to was great. We waited our turn, and she, not a staff member, came out to get us. She took us into the exam room, and the one staff member who was waiting in the room immediately realized they needed to call in "the lion tamer".
What ensued was about 20 minutes of some seriously angry cat antics. They were great and really treated her with care even though she was not cooperating at all.
She involved me throughout the whole process, she showed me what the problem is, and we have a plan. We have a new diet. I have to figure out how to separate the girls' food. Gabs can't eat any of Gracie's food, we are on a strict diet. She has to lose 6.6 pounds. That's a 1/3 of her body weight. She is 18.6 pounds. There were a lot of contributing factors that played into the situation we have now: the first 4 months of her life where she lived at the vet until I adopted her, being treated for coccidia (? Sp - yes it's 3:24 am and I don't feel like looking it up - the snoring coming from next to me woke me up, but he's had a very difficult week and I'm not even going to nudge him to have him turn over), the ensuing year of many upper respiratory infections and dose after dose of steroids, she packed on the pounds. And - all of the poking and prodding for that first year of her life mostly in a very sensitive area makes for a very ticked off kitty when you go near the area, or even pick her up. She knows what's coming. I try to pick her up every so often and just love on her and put her down so she doesn't always associate being picked up with pain. She gave her a shot of antibiotic that lasts for 10-14 days so we wouldn't have to wrestle her every day to shove a pill down her throat.
When it was time to leave, she walked us back to the waiting room and announced to the packed room that the cat lived. The whole place erupted into laughter. Someone piped up and asked if anyone other than the cat didn't make it. I responded that no blood was shed and apologized and hoped that we didn't stress out their animals. They all kindly said no and that they knew who was stressed out.
So we went to the car and I sent Chris a novel of texts with the details while I quit shaking.
As soon as we got in the car she calmed down and when we got in the house, she was back to her sweet self and loved on me. For as bad as it was, she seems to be feeling better. She went right to her bowl and started eating. I let her enjoy the old food while I was opening her new food. Then I switched out the dry. Luckily she likes it and chowed down.
We go back in 2 weeks for a progress check. If none. There will be a reduction in her food allotment. Here's rooting for Gabs that she loses some.
So, as much as I like our old vet, I feel so much more involved and more knowledgeable about what is going on. I hate to leave them, but her needs come before any loyalty that I feel for that office. Even though this new vet is a 30 minute drive as opposed to a 5 minute drive - it's the right move for us.
66° Mist and Fog
Sent from my iPhone DayOne journal app.
