Yes, it is a swollen lymph node. He draws blood and does a blood work up. She is fine other than the swollen lymph. There are no markers for cats and dogs to check for cancer via blood test. The Vet does a snap test for Feline Leukemia and it has a slight hit of a postive for FL (Feline Leukemia)!! The alarm is being replaced by a grip of panic, (picture a hamster on the exercise wheel of stress running to no where in circles, that is me). She also had a canine tooth that needed to come out. The other two, Vinnie and Tude are good.
Armed with the knowledge that one of the cats may have Feline Leukemia sets off all the alarms, fears, sadness and you name it I am feeling it (starting to run a little faster on the wheel of stress to no where). I bring the rest of the cats in for testing and shots. This took one full week to complete. Every one was fine. Grumpy and Munchkin, also came with Pebbles, needed dental work. Scheduled the dental work and biopsy for Sneezie, Grumpy and Munchkin.
Now the lump turned out to be negative for any cancer or fungi. She was tested again for FL, except this time they spun her blood and drew the sample from her serum. The serum is the best way to test for FL. It is the most accurate. Sneezie was negative for FL!!!
In the middle of this a stray that was once someone's pet showed up. Being the soft touches that we are, we took her in. She too tested positive!! But tested her serum a week later and she was negative too. We found her a really nice home, three weeks later.
On top of this the feral that was hanging around, we took to the Vet and got him fixed up. He now lives with us. We call him Buddy. All of this took a month, knocking off for Christmas, to complete. We did this during the Christmas season and managed to get our shopping and shipping done. Can you see the wheel of stress going a little faster?
In the process of testing and getting FL vaccines, then returning one month later for the booster shot. Oreo became a subject of conversation with the Vet. My mind was locked on Oreo at his youth weight. When they weighed him, he weighed in at 23lbs! WHAT!? Seriously? It was true. He is a BIG boy. The Vet wants him to lose weight. In fact, he needs to be down to 16lbs. The Vet suggested we take the dry and wet food up in the morning after everyone ate and then again at night before retiring. This would be a slow way but a bit easier.
We begin this process right away. My goodness the line up of demanding cats in the morning for food was unbelievable. You see, we always left food out, 24/7, for them to graze. Some like to eat in the morning and be done, others take all day to eat. Leaving the food out was the easiest solution.
Oreo is 12 years old. He is our very sensitive boy. He is bigger in size and weight than all the cats but acts like he is a little kitten. He is easily bullied. He is the most loving cat, next to Vinnie, that lives with us. Food has been available to him since bringing him home. This was a shock to his system and apparently psyche.
We began getting these 4:00AM wake up calls from the cats. Mostly they were standing on the bed, in our faces, chanting : "FEED ME, FEED ME NOW!" (remember the movie Little Shop of Horrors and the man eating plant..that is what we thought of when food was demanded). Oreo would come up on the bed and stand with his face in my face. Yes, I would wake up, but I tried so hard not to laugh or look at him. If I did I got his paw, with a tiny claw, tapping my face, as if to say: are you a wake? Good, feed me. Feed me now!
I explained this to the Vet and he suggested giving them just a little food to get them through until morning. So at 4:00AM, when we heard, "FEED ME, FEED ME NOW!" we would put out a small scoop of dry food. One morning after putting out their wet food and dry food, I watched Oreo and he first hit the wet food, then went over and ate the dry food, then back to the wet and finishing off with the dry food! Oh my, that boy does eat! This feeding arrangement seemed to be working.......... WRONG-O! You saw this coming didn't you.
Two things happened at once. Vinnie crashed hard. Vinnie has hyper thyroid. We have been trying to find the right dose to keep his thyroid balanced since July. He is very sensitive to the medicine. He crashed hard the first week of January. He had a fever, vomiting and of course, diarrhea. I call the Vet and rush him over there. Now Vinnie is 14 years old. They run his blood work and all is good. This means they can give him something to bring down the fever. They gave him three shots, to settle his stomach, something for diarrhea and his fever. Brought him home and nursed him along that night. Oreo was not his usual self, but being overly stressed about Vinnie I did not pick up on it ( the wheel of stress seemed to be moving at a steady speed).
Next morning Vinnie is doing a bit better, we changed his thyroid dose again as he was now super hyper thyroid. This means his thyroid level was 8.0 and normal is 0.8-2.3. He lost more weight from it. We were giving him probiotics and special canned food to settle out his tummy. He appeared to be better.
In the meantime, somewhere between the visit to the Vet and home, my middle aged cats (6 of them) caught a virus. Of course they did, I have nothing better to do, right? I blame the Vet and he blames the pediatrician. He is a new daddy with a baby girl. She caught a cold at her check up, which she gave to daddy who brought it to work. I put Grumpy and Munchkin in isolation. They seem to be hit the hardest with it. Meanwhile..... I do not notice that Oreo has stopped eating.
A couple of nights later, Oreo looked a bit off.....He would not come to me and he would not get up...... sheer panic sets in, (the hamster, me, is running as fast as I can on the wheel of stress to no where), it is 11:00PM. Okay, I pick him up and set him down on the floor. Okay, he is standing, good. Oreo walks off to use the box, this is good, I hope. I wait outside then when he leaves, I check the box. Okay all is normal. But upon closer inspection of him, I notice he has something dried around his mouth. Washing it off I find it is dried blood!!! (the wheel is spinning faster, can you see smoke). Oh great, what do I do. Okay, I will call the Vet in the morning. Meanwhile Oreo sleeps at the foot of our bed, so every 2 hours I get up and check on him.
Next morning I put the food out, but Oreo just sniffs the food and walks off! WHAT? I try to offer him food. He begins acting like he will throw up, (not good, not good, must run faster on this wheel!). Off to the Vet. Check his blood work, all is normal. where is the blood coming from? Oh, by the way, he lost 1 pound. This normally would be fine except for the fact that the boy was not eating! The Vet tried feeding him, same response. Not eating. They X-ray his abdomen for an obstruction of some kind. We discuss his ingesting string or some other foreign object. Nothing shows in the X-ray but air/gas. He is full of it. They suggest he might be passing a hair ball and gives us kitty grease to help it along. This was a Friday. I take him home and try all weekend to get the boy to eat food. I even left the food out as before. Still Oreo would not eat......Not good (faster, faster the wheel spins!). Never good when an animal stops eating. If he did not start eating over the weekend, I was to bring him back to the Vet and they would put in a feed tube. He did not eat but vomited all weekend. Text the Vet. Told me to give him the medicine I was giving the others for vomiting. Meanwhile Grumpy and Munchkin are still sick in isolation. Do you see the little wheel spinning so fast it is wobbling?
Monday comes and back to the Vet. We discuss the situation. Still has dried blood around his mouth. Where is this coming from? They cannot find anything outwardly wrong. Take more X-rays, nothing. The only alternative is exploratory surgery. If something is in the stomach blocking they can get it out. I hate to do it, but I would always regret it if something happened and we did nothing. Oreo stays at the Vet for surgery. He still is not eating. His weight is now 21lbs. Still not the way to lose weight.
The problem with fat cats, like Oreo, is when they stop eating after a week the fat in their body rushes to the liver which overwhelms the liver, which cause liver disease, then death. It is important that he eat!
He has surgery that Wednesday. Nothing found. All organs healthy looking. The Vet being cautious takes a biopsy of his stomach and intestines. This was good as he has irritable bowel problems. They also put in a feeding tube. That night he gets a little fever. The Vet comes back later that evening to check on him and decides to leave him some dry food.
Next morning, the dry food is gone except for 3 morsels! He is eating! I get to take him home. I will tube feed him during the day and early evening and leave dry food out for him to munch on during the night.
They teach me how to feed him through a tube and how to clean it and off for home we go. The tech was having a bit of trouble with feeding him through the tube as she instructed me, but neither of us gave it a second thought. You know where this is going, don't you.
Happy day! I bring home our poodle cat. He has poor veins and blew out all the IV's from all four legs. He is home and settles in nicely. I go to feed him for the first time that evening, but I cannot get the food to go down the feeding tube. Finally I put enough pressure that the food blows back at me and covers Oreo. I tried to flush it with water, no go. Still blowing out back at me. Frustration, exhaustion, grief, stress all begin to flood me, but I manage to keep it at bay (run even faster on that wheel).
I finally went to bed at 1:30AM, but did not sleep. I would awake at the slightest sound. I would check on Oreo, he was fine. I left a small bowl of food with him on the the love seat in front of the fire place. I built a really nice fire and put the last of the wood on just before going to bed. Oreo slept on the love seat in front of the fire. Morning came and I must admit my nerves were now frayed and raw. Oreo was still on the love seat and his bowl of food had not been touched!
I went over the edge. (the wheel was going so fast that it flew off the spindle!) I felt myself coming apart. I was a mess of raw nerve, sorrow, stress, exhaustion, frustration and of course my favorite, guilt. I call the Vet. We are on first name basis with everyone there. I bring him in again.
For a man, my Vet is pretty tuned in or he saw the wild look of crazy in my eyes (welcome to Mrs. Toad's wild ride of stress!). Yes, the feeding tube was blocked and they use cola to eat the dried up blockage out. My Vet sent me off to buy a cola and bring back. He needed me gone for a bit so they could check Oreo out and make me take a breath. I ran to the donut shop around the corner and brought back a dozen donuts for them along with the coke. I grabbed a Starbucks bottled latte to get my caffeine charge before I melted down at the Vet's office ( I had melted, but I was unaware of it).
The Vet asks me if I would like to border Oreo for the weekend with them. No hesitation from me, YES! My Vet told me to take the weekend and DE-STRESS. These were his instructions to me; when Oreo comes home don't worry about whether he is eating or not, just tube feed him, leave the food out and DO NOT STRESS about it. They ended up putting in another feeding tube that was a bigger diameter that would not clog so easily. I left Oreo and headed home.
On my drive home, I finally broke. The sorrow of losing Pebbles, the frustration, the exhaustion, the guilt of feeling like a bad pet parent, the stress, the scare of feline leukemia, the dental surgeries, the reactive lymph node, Vinnie's thyroid crash, taking the food away from Oreo, his surgery, putting him back in the Vet's hospital, the virus running a muck through the cats, feeling like a failure that my stress had a part in Oreo's decision to stop eating, just became too much! I cried.
My Vet told me to let them care for Oreo over the weekend and for me to get rid of some stress. I did that. I worked outside that afternoon. This helped me clear my mind and I began the de-stressing process. I actually ate dinner, ( part of the problem with care takers, they forget to care for themselves) sat down and watched a movie. Felt good to get off the pins and needles I was walking on.
What we now know; Oreo is a night time eater. Not a day eater. We messed him up badly by taking the food away from him at night. Stressed him to the point that he stress ate in the morning, but some how began to think he was not to eat at all. The dried blood around his mouth turned out to be a small ulcer at the very back of his tongue. The only way to see it is when they put him out for the surgery. More than likely stress induced.
Oreo vactioned at the Resort Vet for the weekend, eating his dry food and getting less tube feeding. The Vet emailed me each day on Oreo's progress.
In the meantime, I had to resort to antibiotics for Grumpy, Munchkin, Tude and Vinnie to kick the virus. All are back to normal. Grumpy and Munchkin lost a little weight, but hopeful they will gain it back before long.
Vinnie is doing better. His thyroid level is down to 3.9, getting closer to normal.
Since this episode with Oreo, I have discovered that I have 3 night time eaters. Therefore, food is once again out 24/7. No more 4:00AM wake up calls to feed.
Oreo came home from vacation without the feeding tube! He is eating normally and very happy to be home! The Vet figures we won't be able to get Oreo's weight off, but we will see down the road. Right now we are just happy he is eating and a happy boy. Me, I am off the stress wheel to no where.
I want to thank friends and family that prayed for me and my animals. I am very grateful for the much needed support.
Also, I want to thank Lyn, a good friend, hooked me up with some natural sleep aid, which I needed and used in my De-stressing process. If you need help sleeping, try these. They are called Sleep-tite. You can get them from Lyn at her website: www.fullmoonwellness.com. Now she will be surprised that I mentioned this, but I needed sleep and these did the trick!
My Vet, John. He is a remarkable Vet. He specializes in dogs and cats. He is very thorough. He does research to see if there is something more that can be done, beyond what he has done. He is compassionate and has helped us in more ways than we can ever thank him. If you live in North Texas and need an excellent Vet, go see John at the Animal hospital of Melissa: www.melissavet.com, number 972-837-2000. He has a good caring staff as well. They were kind to me in my craziness. I appreciate all of them!
Here are two pictures of Oreo when he was 2 years old. Perfect weight.
Here is Oreo now after coming home from the hospital. Munchkin has his back to Oreo. See the poodle like legs. Oreo looks a little rough around the edges, but you would too if you had a 4 inch cut on your tummy, a hole in your neck and poodle legs.
