Yesterday was not a good day - but was, in the end, a very good day!
Long story
20th February 2022
We play Bananagrams every day. The cats like the tiles and have, several times, picked them up in their mouths and we have to be quick. We have had quite a job removing them from mouths when they have not wanted to give them up. We know not to leave them unattended. Yesterday afternoon we played our usual game. Nigel hadn’t finished so I left him in the lounge finishing off his grid. He finished and then went to check something he was recording for a neighbour on the video in the same room and when he went back to put the game away (yes her ought to have done that first) his tiles were all disturbed. Two words were scattered so he did the sensible thing and checked he could put the words back together and he was missing a letter I tile. He looked all around – no joy – so he then counted the tiles and they were one short and then he counted the I’s and they were one short so we knew it was an I missing. At that point he called me. We checked everywhere in the lounge. We took the sofa’s apart, we had all the furniture moved, we had torches under the wall unit. No sign of the tile. We checked again – we moved the sofas right out. Nothing. We could only assume that the cats had taken it or swallowed it. We checked other rooms, but in fairness the cats hadn’t left the room, he was facing away from the tiles for all of a minute so they couldn’t have pushed it or carried it far so we checked a third time and we were panicking. We knew we were on a time clock and so phoned the emergency vet (of course it is always on a Sunday isn’t it!) Their advice was it was easiest to deal with whilst in the stomach and so we were to feed them a big meal and take them in and they would try and make them vomit. Nigel fed them and I checked AGAIN but there was no tile. I had all the cushions off, we pulled the Velcro back off the suite, we pulled it out againWe now had no option but to take them. Storm Franklin was causing chaos as we set off.
The vets were lovely though I broke down in tears as soon as we arrived because the last time we went there was when they put Fiki to sleep! They said it was hard because we didn’t know which cat it was likely to be – they were both equally fascinated by the tiles and capable of doing it. The vets assured us it would be more than possible for them to swallow a scrabble sized tile. They don’t chew things – we give them treats which are quite large and they don’t chew them they swallow them. They said they would start with Indy, sedate him which should make him feel sick. They wanted them to have full tummies so they would feel sicker and also a belly full of food would cushion the tile as it came up. So they sedated Indy and they said in 80% of cases the sedation and drug they use would make a cat sick. Of course, he was in the 20% so wasn’t sick. They then shaved his tummy and did an ultrasound. The ultrasound showed there were things causing shadows in his tummy and they were possibly the size of a scrabble tile, but they could equally be the three treats he had had. They x rayed him though they said the density wouldn’t show up and the x ray was inconclusive, but it was possible he had a tile in his tummy. They explained it would be too big to pass but that if it moved from the stomach it would lodge in the small intestine and that would cause a blockage. The only remedy then would be to operate and remove it and that was a risky operation as you get infections from the gastric fluid etc very easily. We discussed the options and decided they did have to do the same with Koda.
We sat in the vets, terrified, for two hours whilst they both went through these tests. Eventually, they showed us both ultrasounds which both showed ‘masses’ in the tummy which could be a biscuit, could be scrabble tiles. They said we now needed to starve them (of course neither had been sick) and then go to our own vets in the morning for an ultra sound in which case if it were food it would have gone and if it were the tile it might still be there if it hasn’t migrated into the intestine and if they could see it they might be able to use a gastroscope and pull it out. They told us all of the signs to watch out for and we left, none the wiser and terrified.
My poor little boys with their shaved tummies
Koda hadn’t really recovered well from the sedation and could barely walk. He looked awful. Both were very stressed and we settled in for an evening of watching and waiting. Now this is the bit that you either will or won’t believe. Over the past 30 years since I lost my Mom there have been many occasions when I have lost things and I have asked Mom to help me and suddenly I have known exactly which bizarre place to look and have found them. I had been praying all afternoon and evening and also begging my Mom to help.
At about 10 pm I said to Nigel, we need to put the cats out of the lounge and I want to check the runners under the sofa (they are electric sofas – hard to explain) so we did that and I lay on the floor as Nigel extended the footrests and I saw it – right there, on a ledge under the sofa on the runner and I had known that was exactly where I needed to look. There is no gap down the side of the sofa seats – it is all sealed. There is no way to reach this runner from underneath. The only way to get to it is to extend the sofa fully reclining and then you can see the part the letter was on. We have not been able to work out how it could have got there. But I know, for sure, that my Mom sorted it out and then told me where to look.
The boys were given a very late very big supper and we both sobbed with relief. And yet another lesson has been learnt.
We were worried we should not have taken them but we really did strip the lounge several times before we even rang the vet and then they told us we were on a time limit to sort it easily.
The boys now have horrible shaved tummies which will take ages to grow back and they were stressed and upset, as we were, but we are so very grateful that it wasn’t worse.
I think - without me writing it - you know what I am thankful for today x
and yes I recorded it because I record the bad as well as the good ... the text of the above post is under the leopard print strip
