Well – Thought I’d give you an update on our cat Poop.

Earlier this week Tommie ran downstairs and said “Something’s wrong with Poop!” and then quickly ran back out of the room.  I was like “What do you mean??” as I hopped up and ran after him.  When I got upstairs, I found Poop laying in the hallway.  It looked like he had thrown up some clear liquid with a little fur in it and was laying on his side breathing really heavy with his tongue out.  I told Tommie to get the carrier and I called the vet and said “Something’s wrong with Poop!  We’re bringing him in right now!”  She asked what was going on and said “OK, bring him in.”  Within a couple of minutes we were out the door.  I was in my PJ bottoms and messy hair and we both left without our phones.  I kept glancing back at Poop in the carrier to make sure he was still moving and breathing.

When Poop has a hair ball, he doesn’t sound like a normal cat.  Most cats sound like they are “throwing up”.  Not Poopy.  He sounds like a person yelling or a giant squeek toy.  I’ve never heard such a loud sound that will bring you out of your seat.  He had a couple of those sounds on the way to the vets office.  Made me jump.  When we got to the vet’s office and opened the carrier Dr Webster said, “OK, Where’s the blood coming from?”  I was like “Uh – that’s new!  It must’ve happened between home and here!”  She said “OK” and pulled him out.  He had blood all down the front of him.  When I saw the blood and him struggling to breathe, I LOST it.  I lost my balance and had to catch myself and just started crying.  I could not STAND the thought of losing another cat so close to our cat, Forrest, dying.  This was just so out of the blue.  We were both just baffled as to what the heck was going on.

Honestly – what was going through my mind was, that this had to be my fault.  If I had two cats die so close together – it had to be something to do with my house and something I had let them get into or SOMETHING!  I was going through everything with the vet.  I was like “I don’t think he swallowed one of my hair ties?  We ate chicken last night – maybe he swallowed a bone, but the trash wasn’t overturned, so he didn’t get into it!”  Just trying to think of anything.  He kept trying to reassure me, it’s not anything you did.  I don’t think he’s swallowed anything.  She said it sounded like his lungs were full of blood, and he felt like he was drowning.  She gave him a shot, and he started to calm down and breathe more shallow.  She explained the medicine she gave him was going to pull the fluids out of his lungs and help him breathe.  She said she was going to keep him for the day to observe him and to check back with her later.  She kept the carrier and said she’d clean all the blood out of it and give him a bath.

That was a very long and stressful day.  My eyes were just so raw and dried out from all the crying I did.  She said with the symptom’s, it sounded like it could be a heart condition, but she couldn’t do an XRay or anything until she got the lungs more clear, because she wouldn’t be able to see anything.  Plus, over all the fluid, she was having a hard time hearing his heart.  She said this is very rare for a cat to be coughing up blood and in her 30 years of practice, it was the first time she had seen it.  She said a lot of times, when cats have heart issues, the owners are unaware until the cat suddenly falls dead.  She said if it ends up being a heart issue, he will be very fragile.  Great.

Anyway, the day seemed to go on forever and I finally gave in and called her to see how he was doing.  She told me that he had responded very well to the medicine and we needed to come pick him up right as she was closing and she was going to send him home with us for the night.  She said he’d be more comfortable there, and he needed to be observed in case he had problems.  She said to keep him somewhere quiet and calm.  Keep the other cat away from him.  She said the medicine will make him thirsty and he’ll have to pee a lot. Just make sure everything is close by for him.

So, when we got home, Tommie ended up sleeping in the living room on the couch with Poop in the living room.  I took the other litter box and food and water in the bedroom with me and kept Neko with me.  She also sent us home with pills we had to give Poop to keep pulling the fluid from his lungs.  Hate shoving pills down cats throats!  So anyway. We watched him.  He hardly moved and you could tell he was really struggling to breathe.  During the day I’d have him in the office with me and in the evenings he’d be with Tommie. He didn’t eat for a couple days and only drank a little.  I was so worried.  I was worried he was going to pass away while we were watching him!

The second day, late in the evening, he started to get up more and move around.  He also seemed to be moving around better and climbing stairs.  On the third day she had Tommie bring him back in for a check up.  He seemed to be better by that morning.  When the vet saw him, Tommie said she was very, very pleased with his progress.  She said his lungs sounded almost completely clear and she could hear his heart and it sounded normal.  Her final diagnosis, or guess on what happened was that he was trying to cough up a hairball and just was doing it so hard that he ruptured something and it caused his lungs to fill with blood.  This does sound like what it could’ve been.  He is so violent when he gags. It’s not normal.  It really scares me that something like this can happen though!  It makes me afraid to leave him alone!!  What if we weren’t there when this happened??  Would he of choked on his own blood??  But it also makes me happy that it’s not a more serious problem and that he’s acting completely normal now!!  We’re still giving him the medicine, but hopefully will be able to stop that by Monday.

Thank you, everyone, for your concern and kind words to me in my time of distress.  Poop is back to his normal self.  He’s up and moving and meowing, and eating and drinking and maybe not chasing yet, but I’m sure that will be next.  The boys like to torture each other.  I can now joke….I was telling Tommie, “I hope that Poop wasn’t put on this earth ONLY to torture Forrest, and now that she’s gone, he feels like he has lost all purpose to live!”  It was so hard with those two together.  Forrest was a victim cat, always slinking around like she was afraid of everything and Poop would stalk her and pounce and fights would occur….he’d get locked up.  Vicious cycle.  But, thankfully that wasn’t the case, and now he’s gotten used to the several days of pampering and is expecting more of it.  Ha ha.