Brenna Without Borders

After the string-in-the-butt incident, I really hoped the worst was behind us.  But Linus got sick again the next week. 

Same as the first time, he began frequenting the litter box, and yet, when I cleaned it, the litter box was empty. Dr. Miller believed it to be another infection and extended his antibiotic.  In addition to that, she also put him on a muscle relaxer so he wouldn’t feel like he urgently had to pee all the time and an anti-anxiety medication.  

Linus hated the anti-anxiety pill. It must have had a very bad taste or went down the wrong way the first time he took it because he never forgot and he could pick that pill out of anything I tried to mask it in.  

Let me preference this all by saying that I was only allowed to give him ¼ of a pill. So this pill was smaller than a peppercorn.  Picture a tictac then cut that into fourths. 

First I put it in his dry food, he loves to eat, so I figured he would gobble it up with the rest of his food. Not the case, he would eat all of his food, even the chewable antibiotic, and leave the ¼ of an anti-anxiety pill. 

Next, I tried wet food, I figured it would dissolve it and he would sop it right up. Also – wrong. Apparently (I found out from the vet later) if you dissolve or grind up certain pills they make the food taste bad. Linus didn’t touch this wet food if it had the meds in it. 

Next, I tried Greenies Pill poppers. These are the greatest invention, I highly suggest these for masking pills for your pets. It worked the first time, I was so excited I happy-danced around the kitchen. But Linus got smarter, the next day when I tried to give him his yummy pill treat, he chewed up the treat and spit out the pill.

My last resort was forcing it into his throat, which I hated to do. To but several youtube videos advised me on the proper way to administer a pill to a refusing cat. After a day or so, he knew when it was pill time and hid from me under the bed. As frustrated as I was, I was also really impressed.

Eventually, I gave up on the anti-anxiety medication.  But I did take other suggestions the vet gave me in regards to keeping an anxious kitty calm.  She suggested Feliway diffusers.  Similar to a Bath and Body Works plugin, but instead of releasing warm vanilla sugar, they release pheromones into the air, which are scentless and only detectable by cats. This smell calms the cat and reassures safety.  I now have one by the litter box, one in my room, and one by Linus’s cat tower. Just for good measure.  You can buy Feliway’s and the refills on Chewy.com. 

Linus seemed to be feeling better, but his bathroom habits did not seem to be improving. 

One day, at the beginning of March, I noticed that he was crying in and out of his litter box. When he wasn’t crying, he would hide in my bedroom or behind the couch. I knew something must be wrong. Now would have been a very convenient time to have a talking cat, so he could tell me exactly what was wrong and I could fix it. 

Then I noticed he was attempting to urinate on anything soft around him, blankets, rags, you name it. And while I scolded him for attempting to pee on some dirty laundry, I’m so grateful he did, because that is when I noticed the blood. 

He wasn’t able to urinate, but what came out instead were small drops of blood. I knew this must be bad. 

I called my vet, yet again.

They told me that this sounded like a full-on blockage to his urinary tract and it could be life-threatening – I needed to bring him in immediately.  

Incredibly scared, upset, and worried;  I still had to wrestle Linus into his carrying case, yet again. He knew the signs of a vet visit now, all the treats and food in the world couldn’t lure him into that carrying case. It took my mom and me, shut in my bedroom, moving my bed and be crawling under the bed and pulling him out. Crying, clawing, biting, he fought me the whole time. It took two of us to zip him in. He was in so much pain and he was so sad, but he still had some fight in him. I encouraged myself that if he still can fight against getting into his carrier then he was going to be okay. 

The vet took him right away, an emergency visit. With a quick ultrasound, Dr.Miller confirmed to me that Linus’s urinary track had been blocked. An emergency procedure was required. 

Within an hour, I received a call that the procedure had been successful and Linus was okay.  However, he would need to be monitored for 24 hours at least. To make matters worse, my vet is not open 24 hours, so they could keep Linus there, but there would be no one there to monitor him… which in my opinion defeats the purpose. They strongly advised against taking him home, because if he did reblock, then I would only have a matter of time to get him to the emergency room.  My second (and really only) option was to take him myself over to the 24 Hour emergency animal hospital. 

I signed in agreement. My vet told me they would set the whole thing up.  All I would have to do is call, they would come to get Linus, and take him to be monitored for the night. Sounds easy right? 

As I’m sure you guessed, this process was far from easy. 24 hour veterinary hospitals are very similar to human hospitals in that there is a lot of waiting and a lot of not knowing what is going on.

My dad drove me, thank goodness because I was not in the mental state to drive. My vet gave me Linus, all the sedation had worn off, he was completely alert, he had a catheter in and cone on his head and I had to transport him in hopes that nothing would go wrong on the 25-minute trip. 

When we got to the kitty emergency room there were cars everywhere.  During Covid, you aren’t allowed to go into the hospital, so you have to sit in your car and wait. At least 30 cars, waiting on sick pets. A sign propped up at the entrance said “emergency room wait time 12  hours”. That is some really bad marketing in my personal opinion. 

So I call the number, I explain the situation, they don’t have my mine or Linus’s information, they weren’t informed we were coming. Someone comes and takes Linus and then I don’t hear anything for over an hour. I call back, they tell me I’m going to have to wait. Finally, two hours later a vet calls me and is nice to me, he quotes out how much it will be to keep Linus overnight, explains the process, and then tells me someone will be calling to take my credit card information over the phone. 

A full paycheck later, I’m allowed to go home. The first night in over a year that I slept in my bed without Linus at my feet. I couldn’t stop thinking about him. I pictured him in a small metal cage, with his cone of shame, and dozens of other animals making a ruckus around him. So many new smells and experiences that I wasn’t there to comfort him through. 

The next morning I received an update. My little con-man figured out how to pull his catheter out on his own.  But to the vet’s surprise, his urine was cleared up, no more blood, and now she was just waiting to see if he was able to pee on his own and if so, he could be released. 

And so I waited for a call. And I waited. And I waited. Finally at 4 pm that evening I got the call that Linus had finally peed and he was cleared to come home. 

I received no additional details about his state, what had been done to him, or what was needed for the recovery process.

What came next was 7 days of spoon-feeding, timed medications, and constant worry. But there finally seemed to be some light at the end of the tunnel.