Flutd

Two months ago, my Siamese became very sick and Urinary Tract disease was too blame. We spent $900 on the iv's, catheters, blood work, urine work, special foods, etc. and had no promise he would live even after that money. But, I kept him on the vet's special (expensive) diet, monitored his daily water intake and urine that passed as I was told and he recovered. Now 7 weeks later, we came home last night and he is just as sick as he was the first time. I can't afford another $900, so we are faced with putting him to sleep.

This disease sneaks in and just hits so hard. He was fine yesterday morning - while I was doing the morning cleaning of the kitty litter he came into it and urinated, so I know he was fine in the morning... he also came into our bed that morning and snuggled under the covers as usual, purring away happily.

We spent the day with relatives who have come up to Vermont for the long weekend, got home 8 hours later and he was throwing up, straining to urinate and passing nothing, won't eat, growls if you touch him... I am amazed at how quickly this hits.

Per my vet - male, neutered cats are more susceptible to this disease. Feeding a diet of dry food is not the best - canned foods with low ash and magnesium are better and if you can get cranberry juice or extract down your cat - that is even better. Make sure fresh water is always available - one of those $30 water dishes that circulate the water every 15-30 minutes can be a Godsend as some cats prefer circulating water over plain water that has been sitting there for a few hours. Monitor your cat's intake of water and food. FLUTD hits rapidly and can turn deadly in less than a days time, monitoring your cat's urine is another key. If he/she starts to strain, it can already be too late because as the bladder fills and is not emptied, toxins start building up in the kidneys.

We have to find a vet who is willing to put him to sleep this morning and around here that is a chore in itself. We don't have emergency vet hospitals, I have to find a vet who is willing to come in and open his/her office for this one job - expensive and quite a chore!!

Many years ago I lost a young female cat to this same disease. My cat had exactly the same symptoms your cat is showing now and she died immediately following emergency surgery to unblock her bladder which had become completely obstructed.

Making the decision to put a pet who is loved to sleep is horrible and you have my sympathy. I hope this copy of the Rainbow Bridge poem will help give you some comfort at this sad time.


Rainbow Bridge

Just this side of Heaven is a place called Rainbow Bridge.
When an aniumal dies that has been especially close to someone here, that pet goes to Rainbow Bridge. There are meadows and hills for all of our special friends so that they can run and play together. There is plenty of food, water and sunshine, and our friends are warm and comfortable.

All the animals who had been ill and old are restored to health and vigor. Those who were hurt or maimed are made well and strong again, just as we remember them in our dreams of days and times gone by. The animals are happy and content except for one small thing: they each miss someone very special to them who had to be left behind.

They all run and play together, but the day comes when one suddenly stops and looks into the distance. His bright eyes intent. His eager body quivers. Suddenly he begins to run from the group,flying over the green grass, his legs carring him faster and faster.

You have been spotted and when you and your special friend finally meet, you cling together in joyous reunion, never to be parted again. The happy kisses rain upon your face: your hands again caress the beloved head, and you look on again into the trusting eyes of your pet, so long gone from your life, but never absent from your heart.

Then, you cross the Rainbow Bridge together..........

Author Unknown..........

Thanks, Lorie.

Actually, at this point I am not even sad ... yet. He is suffering miserably and his quality of life has just not been the same since the first infection a couple months ago.

At this point though, it is frustrating. My husband and I have been calling for the past hour - we are on our 25th vet in the area and the only one who is willing to put him down today said they charge $90 just to walk in their doors during the weekend and then it is another $60 to put him to sleep. Our vet is out of town because of the holiday and if he was there he would charge us $20 for the euthanasia. So $150 seems criminal - more for the vet's pocket book than the monetary concerns of the people.

Autumn

I too have been hit with this disease in the past, and you are right, the incredible way it suddenly raises its head is almost beyond belief. One healthy cat was struck down in what seemed like a a manner of hours. He was so ill, we had the vet come to us to and put him down on our property. I am sorry you have had to deal with this, you and your cat.

Thanks!

We ended up paying the high cost - I really didn't want him suffering. I am now more angry than sad in all honesty. The emergency animal hospital felt his bladder and asked how come our vet didn't notice his bladder is malformed. He apparently had a birth defect - his bladder didn't shape correctly. So it had a large pocket where bacteria was collecting and forming pools of mucus and pus.

So now I am very upset that after spending $900 on x-rays - blood tests, etc. Especially the X-RAYS, they should have caught it then!!

I still feel some guilt - he was only 3 years old and no cat should have to be put to sleep that early. But the only option left was to have his bladder completely reshaped which would have cost $5,000 or more...

Hi Autumngirl,


As you may have read in another post we had to put down our little man who was 8 months old last week. We too had problems with the vet. We had given permission to give him blood tests (which they did) and then they took x-rays and also an ultrasound. The poor little thing was going through so much and they still did not know what the problem was exactly. They said it was a possible shunt after more tests and him having seizures and getting put on morphine to calm him down they said to take him to a specialist. This was $1000 later. We wanted to save the little mans life so money at the time was not a real problem. We took him to the specialist and they said they wanted to do more tests, another $500 or more as they still did not know what was wrong. They then told us that his kidneys were abnormal and the larger one had lumps on it. They told us that the operation for a shunt was $2000 or more but they could not tell us anymore at the time. We had to put him down in the end as he was really bad, and money started to get a little tight knowing that it could have costs maybe another $3000 to $4000 to make him better. The main reason we ended up putting him down though was because they could not figure out what was wrong with him, but in the end he had had enough himself. It's not fair how they charge the earth the save your pet or to ease your pets pain..

That is so sad. 8 months is hardly an age. And vets - I still want to find one (and if anyone is from Northwestern Vermont and knows of one) Vet who is concerned more for the animal than for their own wallets. This is my 2nd vet - the first I had was in Milton and we dropped her 6 years ago after she had done a lumpectomy on our dog, we paid the bill $424 that had the surgery on it, stitches, stitches removal, the victorian collar and then varying meds. A month later got a letter - "I forgot to charge you for the antibiotic I sent you home with for Ginger. Therefore you must come in and make a payment of $30 for that medication." So I called the practices billing woman saying that we thought the line that said "Meds" included those pills. She said that they were for the ones given through the IV during the surgery and that they neglected to charge for the others. At that point, it was a month after the fact, so I said most companies would have eaten the $30 since it was their mistake. She hung up saying we still owed the money.

A week later we got a letter from a collection agency saying we had 10 days to pay or they would come after us. I did pay and pulled my animals from her it wasn't worth it.

Now our newer vet has been really good. He was done a few years ago for threatening his ex-wife's new boyfriend with a gun, but we stuck with him through that figuring that had nothing to do with his Veterinary practice. But now that he did x-rays and completely missed the malformed bladder, I can't let something like that go. That was an error that shouldn't have been made by a licensed vet. Not in my eyes anyway. So I am going to search, once again, for another vet.

I am so very sorry for your loss and also so very sorry that you had to go thru so much to put your sweet angel to rest.
You are in my thoughts.