As many of you may recall, my little girl Morgan passed away back at the end of August. We never really knew what happened and what caused the pneumonia, but toxoplasmosis was strongly suggested. Looking back, she did show signs of depression and lethargy before any other symptoms appeared, but she was always a little bit strange, so the signs weren't so obvious.
My 2 year old male BoBo is another story entirely. He's always been chipper and playful, always wanting to play with me and quivering his tail whenever I talk to him. Never has he shown any sign of depression at all, and he's usually a bundle of energy. This past week BoBo has been a different cat. At first I thought it was depression because the kittens are demanding of my time. I doubled our one-on-one play time, but it didn't make much difference. Now he's sleeping a lot and when he does play, he tires out within a couple of minutes. He doesn't even come out anymore when I come home, and he used to be the first one by the door, tail high in the air. Something is very wrong with him. No major gastrointestinal or physical manifestations at this point, but very extreme behavioral changes.
Testing for symptomatic toxo is nearly impossible, from what I understand and what we've experienced. I don't, however, want to wait until it's too late with him. My question is this: Is it dangerous to proceed with treating him with clindamycin without knowing for certain he has toxo? I didn't think that was a problem so much, but I've also read that combining clindamycin with pyremethamine is more effective than clindamycin alone. But that is a sometimes dangerous drug. Do you think the clindamycin by itself would be enough?
I planned to bring him in to the vet's office, but if there's nothing really to test for, I don't know if it's going to make much difference. I have however emailed my usual vet, and if I don't hear back I'll call him Monday morning and see what he says. I just wanted to hear your thoughts.
Thank you so much for taking the time to read this! For a while I was a little freaked out, just waiting for one of the other cats to get sick. Now that I'm back to normal, I can tell something is wrong. Any advice you could give would be fantastic.
My 2 year old male BoBo is another story entirely. He's always been chipper and playful, always wanting to play with me and quivering his tail whenever I talk to him. Never has he shown any sign of depression at all, and he's usually a bundle of energy. This past week BoBo has been a different cat. At first I thought it was depression because the kittens are demanding of my time. I doubled our one-on-one play time, but it didn't make much difference. Now he's sleeping a lot and when he does play, he tires out within a couple of minutes. He doesn't even come out anymore when I come home, and he used to be the first one by the door, tail high in the air. Something is very wrong with him. No major gastrointestinal or physical manifestations at this point, but very extreme behavioral changes.
Testing for symptomatic toxo is nearly impossible, from what I understand and what we've experienced. I don't, however, want to wait until it's too late with him. My question is this: Is it dangerous to proceed with treating him with clindamycin without knowing for certain he has toxo? I didn't think that was a problem so much, but I've also read that combining clindamycin with pyremethamine is more effective than clindamycin alone. But that is a sometimes dangerous drug. Do you think the clindamycin by itself would be enough?
I planned to bring him in to the vet's office, but if there's nothing really to test for, I don't know if it's going to make much difference. I have however emailed my usual vet, and if I don't hear back I'll call him Monday morning and see what he says. I just wanted to hear your thoughts.
Thank you so much for taking the time to read this! For a while I was a little freaked out, just waiting for one of the other cats to get sick. Now that I'm back to normal, I can tell something is wrong. Any advice you could give would be fantastic.
