Leicester bulletin

Thank you for all the comments and support--it really helps.

He's not eating yet but did have some of the cat milk I took in for him--always his favourite.  He's completely charmed the nurses at Hollyoak with his purring and rolling his front end over for tummy scritches.  I'm going in to visit him later today  It's good to know he's comfortable and well cared for. Hoping the surgery specialist vet today finds some grounds for optimism.  Watch this space...

hard decisions

I've just got back from seeing Leicester.  He was bright and purry and so, so happy to see me.  He's started eating.  But we have to make some really hard decisions.  I'm not looking for help with that: we have to work this out ourselves.  But I'm going to try to put it down in writing to get it clear for myself and to have something to come back to when the family is discussing it.

The break in his pelvis is really bad.  It needs surgical repair and even then he'll develop arthritis relatively young. If he has the surgery, his pelvis will heal well enough for him to get around, maybe limping and probably with early onset arthritis, but still a good quality of life for a young, active cat.  The op itself is complicated.  Hollyoak vet can do it, but will need to order supplies, which means leaving it until next week.  A specialist referral would get it done more quickly and probably also get the bones aligned better.  Either is expensive   The specialist will be very very expensive, but we're waiting for figures for both.

However, what the op can't do is repair damaged nerves. If the nerves to the bladder are damaged, he'll never be able to wee normally.  He's an amenable cat and it's possible we could get by if we help him express urine, but this would have to be done twice or three times a day for the rest of his life.  IF he has nerve damage.  There is no way to tell except waiting to see if he starts to wee.  So far, he hasn't.

Now here's the killer.  While we wait for him to start weeing, the bones are beginning to knit in the wrong position.  So we have to decide very soon whether he has the op or not.  Ideally we should decide today.  At the latest on Monday.  

If he can wee, then clearly the op is worth doing. I'm totally happy to nurse him as much as he needs and put him ahead of everything else for weeks, months, a year or two, if that's what it takes to get him back to good health.   But if he can't, I'm really not sure I can provide him with a lifetime of 2-3 times daily bladder expression, or even that this is a life he would want.  If the break could mend without surgery, we could wait weeks for his bladder to heal, but to put him through the pain and us through the expense just to find that we can't look after him properly afterwards...  But can we bear to have him put down when he might still have a chance?

Of course, if he can just manage a wee, then all we have to do is find a way to organise and pay for his surgery.  So I'm about to go back to the vet with some of his favourite cat litter and some earth from the garden to see if either of those will encourage him to let it all out.  His bladder is apparently very full, so he either has to wee today or have it expressed, which then means he's unlikely to wee naturally for 24 hours at least, given how long he tends to hand on when he's stuck indoors.  A wee today would be so, so wonderful.

We're also looking at whether we can have him at home over the weekend while we wait for the wee.  He's probably more likely to let it go here and anyway we all want to have some time with him.  But it depends how easy he is to express.  If he's still very sore, then it may be too difficult for beginners to learn to do it for him.  There's also a possibility we could have him at home but take him to the vet twice a day to be expressed there; they're checking whether the weekend staff would be Ok with that.

Please think wet and trickly thoughts in the direction of Hollyoak Vet in Impington.

good and bad

For those following the Leicester drama.

Bad: still no wee.

Good; Leicester is at home!  Just until Monday and he has to go back to the vet morning and evening to have his bladder squeezed, but at least he's here while we await the wee.

We don't yet have a clear deadline because it depends on the vet's judgement of how late we can leave the decision to operate.  He certainly has until Monday, maybe longer.  As soon as he wees, we'll find the money somehow and book him in for surgery.  If he doesn't, well, we're trying not think about that until we have to.  In the meantime, the vet nurse will empty his bladder for him if it gets dangerously full.  I can only hope that being at home will encourage him to relax and let go if he's aware of it getting full.  We want this to be a test of whether he has any feeling in those nerves, not of his ability to hold urine by willpower alone, which we already know is rather good.

It's nice to have him around again, even confined to a box and unable to stand.  Only time will  tell if this is the start of his recovery or our chance to say goodbye, but either is better than nothing.  As long as he stays lying down on his right side, he is comfy, purry and happy.  He's eating well and taking an interest in things.  He had a go at climbing out of the box, but luckily decided against that as soon as he tried to put weight on his leg.

Huge thanks to musique_monkeyfor heading out to Royston on a Friday night to borrow a dog crate, and to his colleague for lending it.  And to la_marquise_de_ for cat services beyond the call of duty.  Not content with driving across Cambridge at school run time to loan us a top-loading cat carrier (front loading is not good for the pelvis), she also shopped for kitty supplies and added a hefty portion of assorted chocolate flavours, pop and crisps to comfort monkeys of all ages.

rejoice!

Leicester has peeed! 

If that doesn't sound like great news, then you need to catch up on earlier posts here.

When we went to move him from the cat-carrier to the crate, the towel that was under him in the carrier was soaking wet.  Definitely a whole bladder full there.  So surgery and 6 weeks cage rest it is, and a good chance of a fully functional Leicester at the end of the proces.

Yay!