$816.27

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

…or, how much it can cost you if you don’t get your cat spayed when you should have.

Last week I told you about my cat getting fixed. Well, she’s just fine now and back to her “normal” self.

We have two other cats. They’re sisters, about nine years old. Officially they are named “Patches” and “Babyface”. I refer to them, respectively, as “Regular Kitty” and “Psycho Kitty”.

Last Friday, after bringing Fred, the newest kitty, home from the vet’s, I noticed that Regular Kitty wasn’t her usual self. If she’s sitting on the arm or the back of a chair or couch, you can usually pet her. She’ll even jump in your lap to petted when she’s in the mood. If she’s on the floor, however, forget it. She’ll disappear in a heartbeat.

I noticed her sitting in the bathroom, looking rather down (well, for a cat). Not only was I able to approach and pet her, I was even able to hold her head up and inspect her eyes and open her mouth. I knew I had a sick kitty on my hands.

Numerous attempts to get her to eat were not successful. So, on Monday we (my stepdaughter and I) take her to the vet. The vet takes her temperature (in the 97 degree range, not good), does some blood work, x-rays, and so forth.

The vet suspects her uterus (the cat’s, not the vet’s). The only way to find out, of course, is to open her up. I suggested that, since she’s opened up, to spay her.

I got a call yesterday and am told the cat suffers from a closed pyometra and the uterus will have to be removed. I told to go ahead and do whatever is needed to make the cat well.

The cat gets the surgery and had to be hand fed with a large syringe. She simply will not eat the regular food. Otherwise, she’s recovering nicely. Temperature is normal and she’s active. One thing is she doesn’t like to be watched when she eats and another is she’s probably scared to death of the strange people and places.

I picked her up today and got the bill: $816.27!!!

Now that seems like a lot of money for a cat and, well, it is. However, I couldn’t let the cat die (which would have happened) and once you start paying for blood work and x-rays, you might as well go the whole nine yards, right?

So, the moral of the lesson: GET YOUR PETS SPAYED OR NEUTERED!!! Bob Barker was right!!

You may ask, why didn’t we get this done years ago? My stepdaughter refused to do it. They are her cats after all. I couldn’t very well kidnap (catnap?) the kitties and forcibly have them spayed, could I?

Well, she’s gonna have to pay us back and maybe, just maybe, she’ll learn something from this.

In the next month or so, we’ll be taking Psycho Kitty in to be snipped as well.

2

What was her rationale for not getting the cat spayed? There isn’t a good one unless it is a champion show cat.

3

As far as I can tell, SHE’S afraid of doctors.

As much as I hope she’ll learn from this adventure in cat maintenance, I have my doubts.

4

Even Champion show cats get altered when they are retired. (Looks over at the twice winner of Best International American Curl of the Year (TICA) that’s curled up next to me in his cat bed) and those who breed/show tend to alter even their breeders within the first 5 or 6 years because it’s a well documented fact that every heat a female cat goes through increases her chance of breast cancer. And boys left whole have to be kept in quarters they are allowed to spray in and usually seperated from even the other studs because intact males get territorial.