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lydamorehouseIt's been a rough couple of days for Ms. Ball, though she seems to be having a good morning, so far.
The anti-nausea and appetite stimulant both have diarrhea as side-effects--and, oh boy, did Ms. Ball experience that. She was not feeling well enough to head to the basement and even though we set up a temporary litter box for her in upstairs bathroom, she picked our front hall as her favorite spot to do her nasty business. Being a naturally fastidious cat, every accident--which seemed awfully intentionally placed--still caused her deep anxiety and she would go hide. Also, holy heck, did this nearly liquid sh*t STINK. But she was so clearly distressed, it wasn't as if any of us could actually blame her or be all that upset about it. Suffice to say now that Christmas is over and shops are open, we're going to need more paper towels. (I also bought puppy pee pads, because those are disposable and an easier clean up.)
We actually made the decision to stop dosing her with the anti-nausea and appetite stimulant. The doc had said "as needed" and we decided the side-effects were worse than the cure. It seems to have been the right call, at any rate. Her appetite has not decreased in any way and, knock on wood, there haven't been any accidents since about 2 am.
Also, having read up about natural cures for kitty diarrhea, I actually made her a puree of chicken and rice. We were having chicken fried rice (homemade) for dinner, anyway, so it was easy enough to set aside components before I spiced ours. I'd like to think that helped at least somewhat, though it may just be the other irritants (the meds) leaving her body.
We also found something online akin to Ensure for Cats that we're going to try today. On my initial run to PetCo, I picked up some other milk-like supplements, but they're specifically formulated for kittens. The CatSure is formulated for the nutritional needs of adults. I'll take a trip back to return those and another stop to get the actual CatSue. Luckily, Mason is feeling stir crazy and will go with me. Even so, the nice folks at PetCo also offered a high-calorie gel that she might eat if she's not up for stomaching the solids.
Though so far today she's eaten like a trouper.
More hopefully, she slept on Mason's bed--which involves a trip up the stairs and ran down to get fed in the kitchen along with the other cats. In that way, she seemed much more like her normal self.
It's impossible to know how much to hope, however. The doc suggested that, even with cancer, Ball might show improvement on the prednisone. The true test will be if she continues to improve--or if she has another sudden crash. With luck, we will also get the last test results in which might give us a better sense of what the diagnosis _is_... and whether we can look at a severe case of irritable bowl syndrome, or what.
I hate to say it, because I would love her illness to be something fixable, but I'm not the hopeful one in this family at the moment. I keep coming back to the presence of the transitional cells in her urine. I'm not a vet, obviously, but you don't see those mentioned in any of the things I've found about cat IBS on-line.
Still, the goddess should feel FREE to prove my pessimism wrong!
Okay, so somewhat brighter news.... Of course, my whole family and I spent much of Christmas day worrying about our cat, but we still did our usual round of Christmas eve/day presents.
Shawn's family has a tradition of the big meal on Christmas Eve followed by present opening. We have morphed this tradition over the years and now open presents as soon as consensus is reached. This year, with Ball's initial appointment and extremely bad news, we ended up delaying opening presents until 1:00 pm.
Mason got more D&D books, plus a fantasy series he wanted, the Grishaverse trilogy by Leigh Bardugo. We got him "Luigi's Manson" for the 3-DS and several gaming related gift cards, which he promptly spent on games for the Switch. He had also been covetous of an electric blanket that his girlfriends' family owns, so we bought him one of his own. And, of course, socks. Everyone should get a nice pair of socks for the holidays, IMHO.
Shawn turned out to be a trauma this year. I had ordered the presents I wanted to get her ahead of time--two different earrings from a catalogue that specializes in Native American art. Unfortunately, because each piece is handcrafted, they almost didn't arrive in time and this causes me to turn into one of those deadbeat spouses who wandered around all the nearby stores that were still open wondering if she would like an air-freshener in the shape of a tree or a tin of sardines, you know? Luckily, I was actually able to find a meaningful gift card (when Mason has robots we often have mini-dates at the Caribou near his school) and a gag present of some cookie cutters in fun shapes (a unicorn! A dragon! Stegosaurs!) And, then, ON CHRISTMAS EVE AFTERNOON the earrings arrived so I was able to quick add one under the tree--after we'd opened, but, hey, the day wasn't over, AND surprise her with the second one in her stocking (she'd only known that I might be buying one of her two choices.) SAVED FROM DEADBEAT SPOUSE-ING.
I was too frazzled to make a yeast bread with our ham dinner, but I whipped together some popovers last minute. The ham was good, we had mashed potatoes, wild rice hash, and roasted root veggies for sides.
Christmas morning is when my family used to open presents, so we always reserve one or two for Mason 'from Santa' (yeah, he's fifteen, but he likes the tradition, so we keep it up.) And, then some time in the middle of the night I fill up stockings with candies and small things--normally this is when everyone gets socks, for instance.
Of course, this was the one time Ball's illness worked to our advantage. I was up checking on her at 2 am, anyway, so I took care of the stockings then. I got up again at quarter to six, because that's when we've scheduled her prednisone dose (6 am + 6 pm).
Christmas day, as noted under the cut above was a hard day for Ball, so I can't say it was our best ever Christmas. Normally, I look forward to having so many days off with my family. We all get along really well (minus hormonal surges.) And, with nowhere to go and nothing to do, there are usually lots of board games and eggnog. Shawn is off yet today, so perhaps we can have a day-after Christmas Christmas celebration.
I set up our altar to Bast and we've been keeping a candle going for Ms. Ball. I hope whatever happens, Bast keeps Ms. Ball safe in Her arms.
The anti-nausea and appetite stimulant both have diarrhea as side-effects--and, oh boy, did Ms. Ball experience that. She was not feeling well enough to head to the basement and even though we set up a temporary litter box for her in upstairs bathroom, she picked our front hall as her favorite spot to do her nasty business. Being a naturally fastidious cat, every accident--which seemed awfully intentionally placed--still caused her deep anxiety and she would go hide. Also, holy heck, did this nearly liquid sh*t STINK. But she was so clearly distressed, it wasn't as if any of us could actually blame her or be all that upset about it. Suffice to say now that Christmas is over and shops are open, we're going to need more paper towels. (I also bought puppy pee pads, because those are disposable and an easier clean up.)
We actually made the decision to stop dosing her with the anti-nausea and appetite stimulant. The doc had said "as needed" and we decided the side-effects were worse than the cure. It seems to have been the right call, at any rate. Her appetite has not decreased in any way and, knock on wood, there haven't been any accidents since about 2 am.
Also, having read up about natural cures for kitty diarrhea, I actually made her a puree of chicken and rice. We were having chicken fried rice (homemade) for dinner, anyway, so it was easy enough to set aside components before I spiced ours. I'd like to think that helped at least somewhat, though it may just be the other irritants (the meds) leaving her body.
We also found something online akin to Ensure for Cats that we're going to try today. On my initial run to PetCo, I picked up some other milk-like supplements, but they're specifically formulated for kittens. The CatSure is formulated for the nutritional needs of adults. I'll take a trip back to return those and another stop to get the actual CatSue. Luckily, Mason is feeling stir crazy and will go with me. Even so, the nice folks at PetCo also offered a high-calorie gel that she might eat if she's not up for stomaching the solids.
Though so far today she's eaten like a trouper.
More hopefully, she slept on Mason's bed--which involves a trip up the stairs and ran down to get fed in the kitchen along with the other cats. In that way, she seemed much more like her normal self.
It's impossible to know how much to hope, however. The doc suggested that, even with cancer, Ball might show improvement on the prednisone. The true test will be if she continues to improve--or if she has another sudden crash. With luck, we will also get the last test results in which might give us a better sense of what the diagnosis _is_... and whether we can look at a severe case of irritable bowl syndrome, or what.
I hate to say it, because I would love her illness to be something fixable, but I'm not the hopeful one in this family at the moment. I keep coming back to the presence of the transitional cells in her urine. I'm not a vet, obviously, but you don't see those mentioned in any of the things I've found about cat IBS on-line.
Still, the goddess should feel FREE to prove my pessimism wrong!
Okay, so somewhat brighter news.... Of course, my whole family and I spent much of Christmas day worrying about our cat, but we still did our usual round of Christmas eve/day presents.
Shawn's family has a tradition of the big meal on Christmas Eve followed by present opening. We have morphed this tradition over the years and now open presents as soon as consensus is reached. This year, with Ball's initial appointment and extremely bad news, we ended up delaying opening presents until 1:00 pm.
Mason got more D&D books, plus a fantasy series he wanted, the Grishaverse trilogy by Leigh Bardugo. We got him "Luigi's Manson" for the 3-DS and several gaming related gift cards, which he promptly spent on games for the Switch. He had also been covetous of an electric blanket that his girlfriends' family owns, so we bought him one of his own. And, of course, socks. Everyone should get a nice pair of socks for the holidays, IMHO.
Shawn turned out to be a trauma this year. I had ordered the presents I wanted to get her ahead of time--two different earrings from a catalogue that specializes in Native American art. Unfortunately, because each piece is handcrafted, they almost didn't arrive in time and this causes me to turn into one of those deadbeat spouses who wandered around all the nearby stores that were still open wondering if she would like an air-freshener in the shape of a tree or a tin of sardines, you know? Luckily, I was actually able to find a meaningful gift card (when Mason has robots we often have mini-dates at the Caribou near his school) and a gag present of some cookie cutters in fun shapes (a unicorn! A dragon! Stegosaurs!) And, then, ON CHRISTMAS EVE AFTERNOON the earrings arrived so I was able to quick add one under the tree--after we'd opened, but, hey, the day wasn't over, AND surprise her with the second one in her stocking (she'd only known that I might be buying one of her two choices.) SAVED FROM DEADBEAT SPOUSE-ING.
I was too frazzled to make a yeast bread with our ham dinner, but I whipped together some popovers last minute. The ham was good, we had mashed potatoes, wild rice hash, and roasted root veggies for sides.
Christmas morning is when my family used to open presents, so we always reserve one or two for Mason 'from Santa' (yeah, he's fifteen, but he likes the tradition, so we keep it up.) And, then some time in the middle of the night I fill up stockings with candies and small things--normally this is when everyone gets socks, for instance.
Of course, this was the one time Ball's illness worked to our advantage. I was up checking on her at 2 am, anyway, so I took care of the stockings then. I got up again at quarter to six, because that's when we've scheduled her prednisone dose (6 am + 6 pm).
Christmas day, as noted under the cut above was a hard day for Ball, so I can't say it was our best ever Christmas. Normally, I look forward to having so many days off with my family. We all get along really well (minus hormonal surges.) And, with nowhere to go and nothing to do, there are usually lots of board games and eggnog. Shawn is off yet today, so perhaps we can have a day-after Christmas Christmas celebration.
I set up our altar to Bast and we've been keeping a candle going for Ms. Ball. I hope whatever happens, Bast keeps Ms. Ball safe in Her arms.
no subject
Date: 2018-12-26 07:46 pm (UTC)Hooray for late Christmas Eve post delivery!
no subject
Date: 2018-12-26 09:09 pm (UTC)And, yeah... poor Ms. Ball had another violent expulsion just a few minute ago (good news: I got the pee pad under her in time, bad news: we needed it at all). It was looking really hopeful earlier as she managed the litter box and had slightly more solid poo. Maybe it's time for more rice and chicken? It's so hard to know.
no subject
Date: 2018-12-27 12:17 am (UTC)That high-calorie gel sounds familiar. IIRC it's tempting to all living cats.
Yay for presents that arrived on time. In a friend's family, the ultimate sad last-minute gift is a bunch of flowers from the grocery store. So save that tip for next time?
no subject
Date: 2018-12-27 01:15 am (UTC)And, yeah, the flip side is that I think we'll have this stuff around for all the cats. We have an elderly cat who is LOVING all this high calorie stuff around (and she needs the calories, as she is otherwise an old skinny cat.... though I had just finished fattening her up when Ms. Ball got sick.)
no subject
Date: 2018-12-27 01:37 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-12-27 04:36 pm (UTC)