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Our baby boy is home!
Man, what a rough weekend. Poor Wally has been through the ringer this past week. And despite all of that, he is still his sweet little self.
Friday was extremely difficult. The hospital was keeping Wally overnight to administer medicine and fluids, and monitor his progress. I didn’t like the thought of him staying overnight in a strange place without us. And I just felt worse when we went to visit him that night. They took us back to where he was, and as soon as we saw him, we both lost it.
Poor baby. It broke my heart to see him like this, in a small kennel hooked up to IV’s. When he saw us he had just been sleeping, and he got up and started to rub up against the cage and our fingers. He gave David a head rub through the cage, and he never does that. Once he started to wake up and hear all of the noises around him he started to get scared. He could smell the cats below him, and would hiss at them through the cage. Then he hissed at us, which he never does. He lay down in his litter-box and tried to go to sleep, but the poor thing was shaking. What a stressful situation for him. David and I hated seeing him like that, and we both bawled in the parking lot for a few minutes before we drove home. We just wanted our sweet little boy back.
I didn’t sleep well that night, and the next day I had drill. I received a text from David saying that his fever went down a bit after they gave him antibiotics, and that they fed him without any vomiting. They said that if he still looked good by noon we could bring him home. I was crossing my fingers and hoping for the best.
We hadn’t heard anything by 1pm, so David called the hospital to get an update. They said he had a fever again of 103, and that the doctor’s wanted to run more tests, but with cats and fevers the results can be inconclusive. He also had some nasal discharge. And the cost for the tests was going to be pretty high.
So when I got home, we went to the hospital to visit with Wally and talk to the vet. This visit was a lot less stressful. They unhooked him from his IV’s and gave us a room to interact with him. It was so great to have our little guy purring on our laps again and watch him roam around the room like the curious little kitty he is. He seemed in good spirits. And at this point, he was staying in a room by himself because of his upper respiratory, as to not pass it along to the other cats. That was probably a little less stressful on him.
The doctor explained that he was eating fine and that the vomiting had stopped thus far, but his fever had not gone down. We could either stay with the same course we were taking and have him stay another night hoping that he would respond well to the antibiotics, or we could also go through with the tests. She said that the tests they would conduct would test for infections, fungus, his thyroid, viruses and FeLV/FIV. With the tests being done, we could rule out some things and be able to tell if maybe there was something that was causing his sickness that we should know about, but they could also come back normal, and we would still have no answers…which is frustrating. As his parents, we would like to know what it is that was causing him to become sick, so we could treat it and avoid it.
We decided to go through with the tests, because we’d rather be safe than sorry, and if there is some chance that we could know what was going on with him, we’d like to know.
Wally responded well to the treatment, and Sunday morning David was able to bring him home. Ludo and Daisy were a little weary of him at first and hissed at him, but he is almost back to normal. He is still his little curious, affectionate self. We have to administer medications to him twice a day, and he does not like that at all. There are four different medications that he has to take, and they are all in liquid form. Holding him down and administering all of his meds with a syringe into his mouth can be difficult. Luckily there are quite a few YouTube videos that tell you how to do it properly. But he is quick to forgive us and still curls up in our laps. He has his appetite still, and has not thrown up. The vet would like to take his temperature again today to check up on him, and we are waiting for them to call us with results from the tests. He has to be on a diet of easily digestible food, so the vet recommended that we mix 2 parts rice with 1 part boiled chicken breasts. I boiled the chicken and put it in a food processor to mix it down. I combined it with the brown rice, but he wasn’t having it. I tried feeding him just the chicken, but I guess it is too dry for his liking. Daisy and Ludo will eat it, but Wally wants something a bit more moist. We had some of the Digestive Care canned food that the vet gave us left, and luckily he seemed to like that, so at least he is eating. I think it’s possible that Wally reacted with vomiting to a houseplant that we had in the house previously (which is now gone), or it was something viral.
We are leaving for Florida at the end of the week, and will have to either find a sitter that can administer his meds to him, or board him with the clinic so that they can give him his meds. He couldn’t have gotten sick at a more inconvenient time. I hate the thought of having to board him somewhere since he has had enough of traveling and being in strange places, but at least he would be getting his medicine and it would only be for a few days.
Daisy May was also taken to the vet on Saturday and given an antibiotic for her eye infection. She is not a fan of getting the stuff put in her eye, but I think she understands now, and her eye is looking so much better. She is almost back to normal now.
I am just so happy to have all of our cats home and on the road to being healthy again. Paws crossed that Wallowitz keeps improving!
