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shannon_aThursday morning, Callisto had done no more than lick her food for a day and a half, so we called up the vet and asked what to do next.
The vet, Dr. N., suggested we give her a feeding tube, said he'd done the same for his own dog, and hoped that this could keep her going over the next month or so, at which time we could remove it when she was hopefully eating on her own again.
This is obviously a pretty extraordinary measure, and I wouldn't take it with an older cat who'd decided to stop eating. But, Callisto is only 9. We've gotten x-rays and ultrasounds back that show no organic problems. She's just got an infection or some sort that she's been unable to kick and an ever-increasing fever as a result. So we're taking this as a means to get her over the hump. And, in all honesty, we're not sure if she'll be able to get over this hump, but as her people, we certainly want to give her the opportunity to get better if it's possible. So: feeding tube.
Dr. N. was kind enough to take his lunch break to give her the tube on Thursday. (I use the word "intubate", which is the correct verb for inserting a tube, but is much more commonly used for breathing tubes, especially in the last year and a half. No breathing tube for Callisto: "just" a feeding tube.) We picked her up in the afternoon, with the vet being more crowded than I'd ever seen it.
And for the first time ever we got to go into the inner sanctum: the vet's office.
We learned about supplying food and cleaning out the tube to avoid obstructions. Basically, we fill up a syringe, apply it to the tube and (slowly) push. I'd imagined something much grosser, but this is pretty easy.
The bad side of the visit? Callisto's temp was up to 105. That's basically the verge of dangerous territory and it showed that the temp has continued to ramp up every single time. That made me feel helpless.
I asked the doctor, who'd been somewhat nonchalant, what we should do about that, and he thought it over then went back to his references to see if a different antibiotic might help more. So, we got a new one (and are still waiting on the urine cultures, which will tell us *precisely* what is needed).
Pretty easy feeding? Well that was the theory. But after we got her home I gamed and we ate dinner and then it was about 9 when we were ready to try feeding Callisto on our own. (She'd gotten a bit of food in a demo at the vet, so we hadn't wanted to feed her again immediately.)
WE COULDN'T GET THE CAP OFF THE FEEDING TUBE. We fought and fought, constantly afraid we were going to pull the whole tube out. We called the on-call doctor, who was our own Dr. I., and she helped verify that was really a cap we were trying to get off, and suggested tweezers, but all we did was rip the cap up.
Finally we had to admit defeat and agree to bring Callisto into the vet in the morning.
So, no food for Callisto that night and we had to apply the antibiotic by hand (or rather by mouth), which was less effective than using the feeding tube, and got her some of it at least, but not all.
In the morning we took her in about 7.30, for I think our third vet visit for the week, and the vet techs tried to get the cap out, agreed it was stuck, and laughingly said that they'd thought it was just going to be in there normal and we were afraid to apply the force to take it out. They had a better tool than we did and were finally able to get it out. Whew.
We're supposed to feed Callisto four times a day and managed three on Friday because of the newest disaster (more on that in a sec).
It's relatively easy, with the prep of preparing the food (heating it if it came from the fridge, mixing it with hot water, and putting it into the tube) being the most time consuming.
We also haven't quite figured out how to deal with the creation of vacuums in the syringe. When the vet techs were demonstrating, they accidentally squirted a bit of the food. We've repeated that every time we've given the food, most spectacularly covering the ceiling with food last night.
Callisto is pretty compliant with taking the food and liquid. She squirmed a whole bunch and foamed at the mouth a bit at our midday feeding yesterday, and we figured out that was because the food we'd given her was too cold (it was the syringe from the previous night, with her meds in it, which we'd stored away so as not to waste them; we had tried to warm it under the faucet, but it apparently wasn't enough). No harm done. The other feedings have all been fine.
And are we doing her good? I sure hope so. At times she seems relatively perky, at times she begs for love, and she even ate more than a few bites of food on her own last night after we got home. But she also lays around a lot and often looks uncomfortable, but at least she's laying around on the couch now instead of in her cat carrier.
So we'll keep feeding her by tube, we'll keep giving her meds, and we'll hope that he fever comes down (which it never has) and that her infection actually gets resolved (which doesn't seem to be the case through several antibiotics).
And we'll hope hope hope that we get our happy, perky cat back and she can continue to live a great life.
So we got home from the Y last night, because another stressor has been getting Kimberly to her physical therapy and out to the Y as often as possible, so that she can walk in the pool and put weight on her foot. (While there, I've been enjoying trying to increase my swimming strength at the pool, because since we've moved here, I've been aware that I'm not as strong of a swimmer as my dad any more, and I'd like to get that back.)
Anyway, we got back last night, and I pulled the swim stuff out of the back of our car, Julie the Benz, and when I closed the hatch ... IT POPPED OPEN AGAIN.
Another dozen tries, same result.
@)(#*$@)_(#.
I called my dad to see if he had any ideas, and he offered to come over to look at it, even though it was almost his bed time.
By the time he got there, I'd decided that the latching mechanism of the hatch was broken, and so we fiddled around with that to no great success.
But he, being the engineer, figured out how to get the hatch tied with a cable tie, so at least Julie is drivable now, as long as that doesn't break.
He then went home, found videos for how to replace the latch and a non-OEM replacement part on Amazon. I then bought an equivalent one this morning with much quicker shipping. They claim Monday, which I don't believe because nothing gets to Hawaii in two days, but whatever the case we'll hopefully have that fixed as soon as possible.
Which is great, because I was imagining a month waiting to get into a repair shop (because they seem to be having labor shortages too), and then having to deal with the annoyance of getting a ride out to drop off the car and a ride back to pick her up. Which would all have been a huge additional stressor. Waiting a few days for a part and then doing it ourself HOPEFULLY won't be.
Hopefully we can do it ourselves. I think we can.
After Thursday night ended up spent fighting with a feeding tube cap, and Friday night was spent futzing with Julie's hatch latch, I told Kimberly if felt like every evening was being eaten up by the Void of Disaster.
Dramatic much? Also, my new heavy metal band name.
What else has been going on in life?
I've actually managed to maintain my Wednesday-or-Thursday gaming with Californian friends despite the heavy scheduling at the moment.
I'm maintaining my two days of work for Blockchain Commons, albeit with a half-hour or hour out on the occasional day to visit the vet.
My personal work has been dragging since things got overly busy in August, and is *really* dragging this month, but I'll at least get my Designers & Dragons history done for the month, and I've managed an edit of 37% of the elf book for RuneQuest so far.
I haven't been out hiking or walking or biking on a Saturday for ... I dunno 3 weeks? I think the last time I went out was a very wet hike in Kokee while my dad and Mary were still in California. But, I haven't wanted to rush out in the morning when Callisto's health has been constantly uncertain, and now we have four times a day feeding which means I can't do an 8-hour outing like I often do.
And we need to start preparing for Christmas. We actually got one thing done toward that: we got an anti-UV coating put on our Living Room window, so we don't have to worry about our tree and ornaments fading (which I *did* worry about last year, and seemed to happen to a small degree). It also keeps the seats on the couch from getting quite so hot, probably protects us from skin cancer, and if anything improved our view by taking out the glare, which was my big concern.
And at this point I'm still very hopeful we can make our trip to California planned for the holidays, but having a non-eating, feverish cat with a feeding tube that's expected to stay in for a month makes that somewhat problematic.
So, good times, but as the Avenue Q monsters say: "Let life roll off your backs / Except for death and paying taxes, / Everything in life is only for now!"
The vet, Dr. N., suggested we give her a feeding tube, said he'd done the same for his own dog, and hoped that this could keep her going over the next month or so, at which time we could remove it when she was hopefully eating on her own again.
This is obviously a pretty extraordinary measure, and I wouldn't take it with an older cat who'd decided to stop eating. But, Callisto is only 9. We've gotten x-rays and ultrasounds back that show no organic problems. She's just got an infection or some sort that she's been unable to kick and an ever-increasing fever as a result. So we're taking this as a means to get her over the hump. And, in all honesty, we're not sure if she'll be able to get over this hump, but as her people, we certainly want to give her the opportunity to get better if it's possible. So: feeding tube.
Dr. N. was kind enough to take his lunch break to give her the tube on Thursday. (I use the word "intubate", which is the correct verb for inserting a tube, but is much more commonly used for breathing tubes, especially in the last year and a half. No breathing tube for Callisto: "just" a feeding tube.) We picked her up in the afternoon, with the vet being more crowded than I'd ever seen it.
And for the first time ever we got to go into the inner sanctum: the vet's office.
We learned about supplying food and cleaning out the tube to avoid obstructions. Basically, we fill up a syringe, apply it to the tube and (slowly) push. I'd imagined something much grosser, but this is pretty easy.
The bad side of the visit? Callisto's temp was up to 105. That's basically the verge of dangerous territory and it showed that the temp has continued to ramp up every single time. That made me feel helpless.
I asked the doctor, who'd been somewhat nonchalant, what we should do about that, and he thought it over then went back to his references to see if a different antibiotic might help more. So, we got a new one (and are still waiting on the urine cultures, which will tell us *precisely* what is needed).
Pretty easy feeding? Well that was the theory. But after we got her home I gamed and we ate dinner and then it was about 9 when we were ready to try feeding Callisto on our own. (She'd gotten a bit of food in a demo at the vet, so we hadn't wanted to feed her again immediately.)
WE COULDN'T GET THE CAP OFF THE FEEDING TUBE. We fought and fought, constantly afraid we were going to pull the whole tube out. We called the on-call doctor, who was our own Dr. I., and she helped verify that was really a cap we were trying to get off, and suggested tweezers, but all we did was rip the cap up.
Finally we had to admit defeat and agree to bring Callisto into the vet in the morning.
So, no food for Callisto that night and we had to apply the antibiotic by hand (or rather by mouth), which was less effective than using the feeding tube, and got her some of it at least, but not all.
In the morning we took her in about 7.30, for I think our third vet visit for the week, and the vet techs tried to get the cap out, agreed it was stuck, and laughingly said that they'd thought it was just going to be in there normal and we were afraid to apply the force to take it out. They had a better tool than we did and were finally able to get it out. Whew.
We're supposed to feed Callisto four times a day and managed three on Friday because of the newest disaster (more on that in a sec).
It's relatively easy, with the prep of preparing the food (heating it if it came from the fridge, mixing it with hot water, and putting it into the tube) being the most time consuming.
We also haven't quite figured out how to deal with the creation of vacuums in the syringe. When the vet techs were demonstrating, they accidentally squirted a bit of the food. We've repeated that every time we've given the food, most spectacularly covering the ceiling with food last night.
Callisto is pretty compliant with taking the food and liquid. She squirmed a whole bunch and foamed at the mouth a bit at our midday feeding yesterday, and we figured out that was because the food we'd given her was too cold (it was the syringe from the previous night, with her meds in it, which we'd stored away so as not to waste them; we had tried to warm it under the faucet, but it apparently wasn't enough). No harm done. The other feedings have all been fine.
And are we doing her good? I sure hope so. At times she seems relatively perky, at times she begs for love, and she even ate more than a few bites of food on her own last night after we got home. But she also lays around a lot and often looks uncomfortable, but at least she's laying around on the couch now instead of in her cat carrier.
So we'll keep feeding her by tube, we'll keep giving her meds, and we'll hope that he fever comes down (which it never has) and that her infection actually gets resolved (which doesn't seem to be the case through several antibiotics).
And we'll hope hope hope that we get our happy, perky cat back and she can continue to live a great life.
So we got home from the Y last night, because another stressor has been getting Kimberly to her physical therapy and out to the Y as often as possible, so that she can walk in the pool and put weight on her foot. (While there, I've been enjoying trying to increase my swimming strength at the pool, because since we've moved here, I've been aware that I'm not as strong of a swimmer as my dad any more, and I'd like to get that back.)
Anyway, we got back last night, and I pulled the swim stuff out of the back of our car, Julie the Benz, and when I closed the hatch ... IT POPPED OPEN AGAIN.
Another dozen tries, same result.
@)(#*$@)_(#.
I called my dad to see if he had any ideas, and he offered to come over to look at it, even though it was almost his bed time.
By the time he got there, I'd decided that the latching mechanism of the hatch was broken, and so we fiddled around with that to no great success.
But he, being the engineer, figured out how to get the hatch tied with a cable tie, so at least Julie is drivable now, as long as that doesn't break.
He then went home, found videos for how to replace the latch and a non-OEM replacement part on Amazon. I then bought an equivalent one this morning with much quicker shipping. They claim Monday, which I don't believe because nothing gets to Hawaii in two days, but whatever the case we'll hopefully have that fixed as soon as possible.
Which is great, because I was imagining a month waiting to get into a repair shop (because they seem to be having labor shortages too), and then having to deal with the annoyance of getting a ride out to drop off the car and a ride back to pick her up. Which would all have been a huge additional stressor. Waiting a few days for a part and then doing it ourself HOPEFULLY won't be.
Hopefully we can do it ourselves. I think we can.
After Thursday night ended up spent fighting with a feeding tube cap, and Friday night was spent futzing with Julie's hatch latch, I told Kimberly if felt like every evening was being eaten up by the Void of Disaster.
Dramatic much? Also, my new heavy metal band name.
What else has been going on in life?
I've actually managed to maintain my Wednesday-or-Thursday gaming with Californian friends despite the heavy scheduling at the moment.
I'm maintaining my two days of work for Blockchain Commons, albeit with a half-hour or hour out on the occasional day to visit the vet.
My personal work has been dragging since things got overly busy in August, and is *really* dragging this month, but I'll at least get my Designers & Dragons history done for the month, and I've managed an edit of 37% of the elf book for RuneQuest so far.
I haven't been out hiking or walking or biking on a Saturday for ... I dunno 3 weeks? I think the last time I went out was a very wet hike in Kokee while my dad and Mary were still in California. But, I haven't wanted to rush out in the morning when Callisto's health has been constantly uncertain, and now we have four times a day feeding which means I can't do an 8-hour outing like I often do.
And we need to start preparing for Christmas. We actually got one thing done toward that: we got an anti-UV coating put on our Living Room window, so we don't have to worry about our tree and ornaments fading (which I *did* worry about last year, and seemed to happen to a small degree). It also keeps the seats on the couch from getting quite so hot, probably protects us from skin cancer, and if anything improved our view by taking out the glare, which was my big concern.
And at this point I'm still very hopeful we can make our trip to California planned for the holidays, but having a non-eating, feverish cat with a feeding tube that's expected to stay in for a month makes that somewhat problematic.
So, good times, but as the Avenue Q monsters say: "Let life roll off your backs / Except for death and paying taxes, / Everything in life is only for now!"