treatment

Un voyage de mille kilomètres commence par un seul pas

~ iamthesunking ~ 4 Comments

img_8495We still feel very positive and optimistic after the feedback from the Royal Veterinary College. However, the words “We need to treat this quite aggressively” – which is what we were told on Friday – are still ringing in my ears, as are the words of one of the other vets at the practice, who told Cat Daddy on the phone that treating this condition would be “a hard slog”.

Feline hyperesthesia is a very rare and complex thing indeed. Our good friend Google will give you plenty of information about it but, to save you some tapping and scrolling, here it is in a nutshell:

– Prevention: not known
– Causes: not known
– Main symptoms*: irritated skin; eyeing tail warily as if it were an alien being; over-grooming or scratching of tail & lower body; hissing or yowling at tail; attacking tail; appearing glassy-eyed and in a trance; touch-sensitive flesh that quivers on contact, which gives it its nickname of “rolling skin syndrome” (although, interestingly, Louis Catorze has never displayed this symptom, which was why we initially didn’t think he had the condition)
– Testing: none
– Cure: none
– Treatment: usually bombardment by anti-anxiety and/or neurological drugs and/or, in extreme cases, amputation of the tail

(*Obviously, if your cat is displaying these, or other, symptoms, please don’t make any assumptions based on my word: SEE SOMEONE WHO IS QUALIFIED. I am neither a vet nor an animal behaviourist, and I can only give anecdotal advice.)

The next step for Louis Catorze is to continue on the Gabapentin, varying the dose until we hit upon the magical level that completely stops him from attacking his tail. Then, after a few months on that level, we will gradually try to wean him off.

This means that, for the foreseeable future, at least, extended holidays away won’t be possible, as we will need to be home to monitor him and make sure his routine isn’t too disrupted. But, given that my favourite place to be is Le Château, and my favourite people with whom to spend time are Cat Daddy and Le Roi, this shouldn’t be too much of a hardship.

We knew from the start that we had a special boy, and knowing that he’s one in several thousand makes me love the little sod even more.

Statement from Cat Daddy: “I think he’s milking it a bit.”

La loi de l’emmerdement maximum

~ iamthesunking ~ 4 Comments

How to make your cat sick: brag to all your friends about how well he is. Sod’s Law – or, in this case, Little Sod’s Law – decrees that all will turn to merde after that.

Tomorrow is my birthday, and my family had arranged to come over today for a 2pm birthday lunch at our favourite pub. So, naturellement, Louis Catorze picked 1:30pm to start walking with a limp, shaking his back right foot and swearing at anyone who tried to take a closer look at it.

Whilst I would have been ok with leaving it until the next day given that the little sod was moderately content and not in the worst agony, the vet isn’t open on Sundays. And I didn’t dare leave it until Monday in case it was something awful. So Cat Daddy drew the short straw and agreed to take him to the only available appointment today, which was right in the middle of our lunch.

Usually we are seen on time and are out of the vet’s within 15 minutes. Not today. When Cat Daddy got there there was a dog and a cat in the queue ahead of him, and Louis Catorze managed to rouse the cat into some sort of angry rap battle during the long wait. When that cat was seen, he turned out to be a complicated case and wasn’t out for ages.

The good news is that Louis Catorze only has a minor cut on his foot. The bad news is that Cat Daddy had to pay £80 for the treatment and missed his main course at my birthday lunch. And the even worse news is that we have to give Catorze 2 lots of medication by syringe (an antibiotic and an anti-inflammatory) a total of 3 times a day for a week. This is quite a horrifying thought, not only because he will shred us to pieces but because we haven’t had to assault him with medication for some time now. The trust that had started to build up over the last few months will now be gone in an instant, and he will probably never come near us again.

And oh my goodness: I have just checked the medication, and one of them is a weird powder that has to be transformed into a liquid. So I’ll need to perform some sort of spooky alchemy before I can even give the darned thing to him.

Please wish me luck. I’m really going to need it.

img_7921

Rouler par terre

~ iamthesunking ~ 5 Comments

I often read about other cats and their humans’ struggle to administer the flea medication, and I am usually lucky with my boy because he’s too daft to see it coming.

However, Louis Catorze has found a breathtakingly annoying way of getting his own back: once he’s been splurged with the stinky, sticky fluid, he races upstairs and rolls it off onto our clothes and/or sheets.

If we shut all internal doors, and if it’s dry outside, he races outside and rolls it off onto our patio. The rolling not only smears our patio with ugly, oily marks, but the dirt sticks to his damp fur … and then he pitter-patters back indoors and rolls off the revolting grease-dirt combo onto our clothes and/or sheets.

This picture sums up both the horror of it all and the ambivalence of the little sod.

image

And, sadly, short of putting him in a box for 24 hours following his treatment, I see no solution to the problem. How do you deal with your furry overlords and flea treatment? Right now I’m quite envious of anyone whose cat flees to an unknown outdoor location and remains there until dusk (by which time the fur is dry).

Les puces

~ iamthesunking ~ 1 Comment

This is my 100th blog post! I’m quite astounded that an ordinary black cat who doesn’t do much has inspired me to write 100 times (and Cat Daddy says he is, too). To mark this auspicious event, what better subject matter than … flea treatment. Quel charme!

“Flea treatment?” said Cat Daddy, looking perplexed. “FLEA TREATMENT? As it’s your 100th post, shouldn’t you write about something … you know … a bit nicer?”

“Such as what?”

“Well, what has Louis done this week? Anything interesting or new?”

Silence, then tumbleweed, then crickets. So flea treatment it is.

If you’ve been following Le Blog since the beginning, you will know about Louis Catorze and tablets. Yes, I know. So you can imagine my joy when some clever person invented Broadline, an anti-worm and anti-flea combo-solution in liquid form that can be dropped onto the back of the neck and that negates the need for worming pills.

Catorze is pretty good with dropper-style flea treatment, due to being so thick that he has no idea it’s happening, even mid-splurge. Occasionally he gives me the look as if to say, “Erm, excuse-moi … did you just …?” but then reverts to, “Nah, never mind.”

The first thing that struck me about the Broadline was the size of the applicator: it’s like a snooker cue. There is zéro chance of hiding it in one hand and discreetly sidling up to Catorze, as I was able to do with the teeny tiny Advocate tube; he’s thick, but he’s not blind (although we did once have to get the vet to confirm, as we were genuinely unsure).

And, whilst the quantity of liquid claimed to be just 0.9ml, it looked like rather a lot. Oh dear.

Application time came and, as expected, Louis Catorze noticed and wasn’t hugely pleased. But he didn’t run and hide: in fact, he came into the living room and snuggled us both afterwards.

Here he is, with that telltale neck smear:

image

Someone suggested recently that perhaps Louis Catorze was FINALLY coming around to the fact that we do all these things to try to help him. I really hope this is true – although I suspect that he was actually trying to rub the Broadline off onto us.

Où est mon argent?

~ iamthesunking ~ 1 Comment

image

I have a week off work, and I was so looking forward to sleeping late and drinking tea in bed with my 2 boys. Sadly, Catorze had other plans.

This morning we were woken at 8:00 by yelling (not for any real purpose, just for fun), then again 30 minutes later by the postman banging on the door to deliver a package that wouldn’t fit through the letterbox. When I went back upstairs to bed, Cat Daddy rolled over and murmured sleepily, “What was in the package? Don’t tell me it was more shit for that bloody cat?”

I did as he asked and refrained from telling him.

The “shit for that bloody cat” turned out to be anti-flea treatment and a further supply of Atopica, accompanied by an invoice for £103. We’re quite used to seeing enormous Catorze-related bills, so I wasn’t too concerned by this initially. But, when I transferred the £103 from our savings account into my current account to pay the invoice, I realised that le royal sick fund had definitely seen healthier days.

During the reign of Luther – who was once described by the vet as “a picture of health” – the fund flourished and grew to in excess of £800, because Luther never needed veterinary treatment apart from his routine booster jabs. His little brother, on the other hand, halved the fund within 18 months, and now it contains under £300. When I told Cat Daddy how much was left, he called Louis Catorze a rude, unrepeatable name and grumpily agreed that we would need to double up the monthly standing orders going from our current accounts into the sick fund.

I realise that this must sound like a request for money, but rest assured that it really isn’t. So please don’t donate to us or collect money on our behalf*, firstly because we knew what we were getting into when we took Catorze on, but also because he is one of the lucky ones whose slaves can just about manage. I have already mentioned elsewhere on this blog that cats cost money, but it’s worth repeating – and, whilst I would never discourage anyone from taking on a special needs cat, anyone considering it needs to hear the harsh truth about the cost.

The good news is that, if you take on a cat with known medical issues, the rescue centre will almost always offer discounted or free aftercare treatment; for instance, we get reduced-price Atopica if we buy it from Louis Catorze’s ex-rescue (yes, the eye-watering sum of £103 INCLUDED our discount!). If you’re struggling with a new diagnosis for a sick kitty, it’s always worth approaching rescues and animal charities and asking about cost-price medication, even if your cat came from elsewhere.

*Lilly’s Legacy, on the other hand, is a rescue group that helps stray and missing cats and is in desperate need of funding. If you would like to make a donation to cats who are genuinely in need, their PayPal account address is lillyslegacy@hotmail.com

Où est mon stuff?

~ iamthesunking ~ Leave a comment


A text reminder to give Louis Catorze his flea treatment is only really helpful if you know where the treatment is. In fact, I have no idea where the vast majority of our stuff is. “Somewhere in the floor-to-ceiling jungle of cardboard boxes” is as good a guess as I can manage.

So my second piece of advice to anyone moving a cat, after “Build the house first”, is: Put all the cat’s stuff into the removal lorry first, even if you are moving the cat last. We thought we had been very clever, packing all his things together and keeping them till last when we moved “so that nothing gets lost”. However, the problem is that it gets put on the lorry last, but unloaded at the other end first. Then it gets boxed into a corner by all the other stuff that comes after it.

Yesterday we had to drag our very hungover selves to Pets At Home painfully early in the morning when we realised we couldn’t find Louis Catorze’s food – although, when we got home, the little sod refused to eat it – and now it looks as if we’re due another visit for his Advocate. His Atopica and Piriton were packed in the same place, as were the dust mite repelling devices and the anti-allergy beeswax candles, all of which we could really do with right now. Oh dear.

Despite our manque d’organisation, Louis Catorze is settling into Le Château much more quickly than I’d anticipated, and I think the fact that he’s physically well, with very little trace of his allergy, really helps. He’s happiest, unsurprisingly, when he’s released from his attic prison and has the run of Le Château, and we’ve had many tail-up moments. The next major thing for him will be negotiating the Tunnel of Terror, i.e. the cat flap that goes through a wall. Given that it took him 5 months to go through our previous, super-simple door cat flap just once, another couple of weeks to make a habit of it and a further 2 weeks to realise that he could come in as well as go out, this could be an interesting saga …