Dash to the vets

This morning I hadn't seen Drusilla, normally she appears as soon as I come down eager for her breakfast, an hour or so later I was started to get worried. I called for her, I looked around the house and then I woke up Mr Mouse asking him where Dru was and he said outside, so I made him get up to come help me look. I called, I searched, I even went out to look at the road out front fearing worst, I was still in my jammies and I didn't care.

Came back in and conducted a more through search and found her snuggled next to Mr Brocoli under the bed. Encouraged her out and and brought her down for breakfast. Nope not interested. In fact she was sick. She then proceeded to go and hide back up stairs.

So what to do. If it had been any of the other cats I would have said well they were perfectly fine yesterday I'm not gonna worry just keep them in and monitor the situation. With Dru it's a case of but she has kidney disease is that ok, could it be part of that, could it be excelerating much faster than any of us, vets included, expected. Google kidney disease and Dru is early stage 2 she shouldn't be vomiting yet. Despite growing up with cats and a multitude of pets all my life and having experienced a lot of pet drama and nursing very sick animals this is my first time dealing with kidney disease. Worry and debate some more. Think could it be the E. coli infection still hasn't cleared up. Take to Facebook for advice.

Obviously for us money is an issue and a consideration but our pets welfare always comes first so my consideration to potentially not go was not money orientation but rather is it really required would someone else benefit more from the valuable time I will be taking up at the vets when they are only available for such a short time on a Saturday before emergency vets take over. We have excellent out of hours cover and with cats I have no worries (bunnies on the other hand add a whole other level of complexity, despite being a very popular pet most vets just don't know how to treat them). Anyway my gut was saying take her.

Of course I am well known at the vets, they know that if I ring with an emergency that it's genuine. Not that everyone has unfounded fears and waste time, obviously if you are ever worried seek advice, but over the last few years and with our first ever visit to them was follow up after one of our cats had an argument with a car when we'd just moved in, they have gotten to know me and us and know that I am competent at dealing with the minor stuff so when I call it's because I am really worried. And well the last few months has been a lot of trips between Dru and Jeeves.

We were seen very quickly and it was evident that Dru was in pain and more so than in previous exams. Bloods were taken and processed immediately, we are very lucky that our vets have a lot of diagnostic tools on site and we got her blood results straight away.

The good news is that actually they are better so the kidney disease hasn't progressed but it was still showing raised white blood cells so that E. coli infection just doesn't want to let up, but the the results are heading in the right direction.

So another antibiotic shot and this time some oral antibiotic to come home with, a painkiller and a vitamins shot. We came home with the above syringes of painkillers for her. Now because of her kidney disease she can go down hill fast and so I very definitely did the right thing. I had the option to leave her and put her on a drip or bring her home. The vet thought that given the history, as in she went down hill before (just not this much) and then perked up after antibiotic that home would be the best place. But it was with the understanding that if she got worse we would immediately go to emergency, which of course we would. So home and operation get food into Dru.

We let her rest, she didn't immediately go and hide away so we took that as a very positive sign. A little while later we tried her with a little bit of food and she had a mouthful and I boiled her up a bit of chicken again a couple of mouthfuls.

The best thing happened later, an hour or so after her second painkiller, she came into the kitchen looking for food. She hasn't eaten as much as she normally would, but she has now had a nice long drink and she just looks so much happier.

I can sleep tonight.