Kidney issues in 1 yr old cat

My cat Joey will be 1 in about 2 weeks, he is a neutered male.
On late Tuesday/early Wednesday I noticed a cat had been throwing up recently eaten food. I watched the cats and realized it was Joey. He still ate both wet and dry food but was throwing eveyrthing up.
Thursday morning he refused wet food, which was a first. He ate a little dry food and threw it up. Twice in his life he has gone for a couple days throwing up...but is always better by late the 2nd/early 3rd day. Thursday evening we bought plain chicken babyfood and syringe fed him. He loved it and ate some on his own as well.
Friday morning he refused food again. I syringe fed him 3 syringes which he held down. Around noon I fed him 2 syringes which he threw up. (all of chicken baby food) He grew increasingly lethargic and would cry when picked up. I called the vet and got a walk in appt for this evening. He started getting even worse, so my husband left work early and took him. They did an exam, and had to do bloodwork. While they did that, hubby came home and got me. I had my daycare parents come early to pick their kids up so I could go to the vet with Joey.
The bloodwork was bad news. I cried and cried and cried. Apparently the BUN, creatine, potassium and calcium (i may be missing something or a little wrong about something, i was basically crying the entire time so it was hard to keep up) were all high. The vet was not sure if it was acute renal failure, or some sort of blockage/obstruction in his kidney. The vet was amazing and so nice. He said he didn't think it was anything chronic, could possibly be something he ate...but they gave him medicine for nausea, fluids, cleaned his ears, treated his ear mites, and did a fecal exam and the bloodwork. The vet ended up only charging us for the bloodwork and one medication...he took about 200 off the bill because he knew that the IVfluid treatment was expensive and we were concerned about affording it.
We took Joey to a animal hospital where he will stay for 24 hours getting IV fluids, his blood rechecked tomorrow, and xrays. The xrays will tell us the size of his kidneys which will help to let us know if it is an obstruction/blockage(large kidneys) or some sort of other issue (normal size/small kidneys)
We are about $1000 into it...just with these two visits. We are kinda nervous to hear how he reacts to the fluids. I saw some posts on here about cats needing multiple days of IV fluids. I don't know how we can afford more then one day. We are in contract for a home, and our savings account was all for the down payment and furnishing the home...we just spent a good portion of the furnishing money and can't break into the downpayment money really. I am looking into a second job just to pay back what we took from savings. The vets mentioned somehting called Care something....but until our loan is approved for the house, we cannot try to get any additional lines of credit which means we can't even apply for it for another week. So basically....idk what to do. I can't have to choose between my cat and our house. I am hoping the one day of IV fluids helps a lot. If our loan is approved (we find out this week), we have to close on the house by the end of March which would not give us much time to recoup the loss of money in the savings account but we will do whatever we have to if it comes to that...

Anyway, sorry for the long post but has anyone experienced anything like this and have any advice for me? any good news about cats going through something similar and being okay?? or anything about what i should expect based on the diagnosis? thanks for any advice, vibes, good thoughts, prayers....anything. Joey is my soulmate kitty. I got him at 6 weeks old...he follows me around, sleeps with me, cuddles with me, has always been very attached to me and I am very attached to him as well. This is killing me.

The vet suggested doing 48 hours of fluids, and we asked that they re-assess at 24 hours after more bloodwork so we can come up with a plan. I will make sure to ask the vet about administering fluids at home tomorrow.
Yeah it was CareCredit...I have had a rough day with a lot of emotion so I am in a forgetful mode. And I keep staring at my phone waiting to hear about his xrays. I wish this happened (well i wish it never happened) but also that it could have happened a week later after our mortgage loan was approved...either way we are going to try to get carecredit for anything in the future that may happen....once we are in the new house and all.
Hubby has been great...he loves Joey too, just not as much as I do. He is very stressed about the financial hit we are taking with all of this and how it may affect us being able to put a downpayment on the house...but he also knows how deep my love for Joey is so we are doing whatever we can to have the money for treatments. I am trying to stay positive and not think about what may happen if the news tomorrow is bad.

I read Homers Odyssey soon after we adopted Billy, our blind cat. I forgot about the part you mentioned though. Our Billy is such a little fighter too. When we got home without Joey he gave a confused cry...he and Joey are pretty much BFF's (lol at using the term BFF) but they love each other and Billy misses Joey....so I hope for good news for both us and the other cats that miss their friend.

I just spoke to the vet. I will probably call every 2 hours to check on my baby. The xrays showed that his kidneys are still in normal size range. They are in the big end of normal though...almost out of normal size range....but still considered normal. His liver is a little big but because his blood test showed no issues with liver, they are not concerned. One loop of his intestine was big but again they are not concerned because that could not have caused the issues he has. I forgot to mention early, they took a pee sample supposedly at the animal hospital (they must have done it fast bc he was in with us most the time, aside form about 5 minutes) and said the urine was diluted. IDK if that means anything. He peed twice today at home in the box like normal and has not had any accidents anywhere...thats part of why I didn't think it would be anything to do with his kidneys.
Anyway, he is still at the vet obviously. I took his favorite fleecey blanket for them to let him lay on while hooked up. Its the blanket he shares with me every night while we sleep.
If he is able to go through the night without vomiting and is receiving the fluids well, they will be offering food in the morning to see if he will eat anything. I am in tears, again. I was so hoping it was a blockage and fluids/meds would dissolve it and he would be fine. Well, idk how much sleep I will or won't get tonight and I will update with any additional info as I get it.

I called the vet at 2am and they said he was the biggest purrer they have seen and he is so lovey. Which he is...he is the loviest cat ever and he loves being petted and literally purrs all the time. They said for me to try and get some sleep (i did warn them I would be calling every couple hours LOL...) and that he was doing okay so far, his bladder was starting to fill so they hoped he would urinate soon, and he would be offered food in the morning based on whether or not he threw up overnight.
I called again at 7am, he had urinated overnight which was good, and was still resting comfortably. I asked if his urine was still diluted and they said yes but it would be because of all the fluids given to him. They were planning to offer food soon. They were keeping him hooked to IVs til about 7pm and would check his kidney function at that time and I could call to receive those results.
I called again at 10am and they said they had offered him food, and he had no interest in it. They did say that he was moving around a lot more then last night, everytime someone came into the room he was getting up and meowing until they petted him, he was walking around a little and seemed to have a lot more energy. They asked if he had any food preference, and his favorite is wet food, so I told them that, and his favorite flavor is anything to do with beef. When we first got Joey actually, we fed primarily dry food with an occasional wet food "treat" to the cats...but Joey didn't eat the first two days we had him unless it was wet food, so we started giving wet food twice a day and now that is his favorite. Joey knows the schedule of when he gets his wet food and if its a weekend and I sleep in he will walk all over me in bed meowing until I get up. Anyway, my husband and I decided that instead of calling for blood work results tonight at 730 we will go in and see Joey and get the results. Also because I am concerned with him not eating, we are getting ready to go take a can of his favorite food to the animal hospital to see if they will let us offer it to him, just in case it helps him eat. IDK if it will work, or if its even allowed but its worth a shot.
Thanks for the vibes, please keep them coming. Last night I applied to a few pt weekend jobs..with my schedule running the daycare in my home, I can't really work a second job weeknights. I am also talking to my daycare parents to see if they have any friends who need occasional sitters so I can make some extra money...and as soon as we get back from seeing Joey this morning we are going through the house for anything we can sell. Please please think good, cheap thoughts for us. We have a little bit left that we can use for his treatment so I am hoping the cost doesnt go above that. IDK what I would do. I am just numb right now. I have barely slept, cried so much...this just sucks.

Thank you for your awesome response. I have looked into things that could have caused poisoning...he is a strictly indoor cat, we have no plants, no automotive things inside, there is a chance he got into ibuprofen but he does not typically eat anything weird...he is very very picky about the things he eats. Also when we mentioned this to the vet they seemed to believe that had he gotten into ibuprofen he would have died rather then had this happen, so idk. Either way I hate that it could have been something I did but I am trying not to beat myself up over it because it really can't be determinded why this happened.
I have checked his food for the antifreeze and didn't see that ingrediant. We are switching all our cats over to a mainly wet food diet and going to use dry food as "treats" instead of the other way around. I am considering a raw diet, I need to do some more research on it. My husband and I are both vegetarians so we don't keep meat in the house typically but for my kitties I would do it.
I have a vet appt set up for tomorrow evening so that we can work with our regular vet to set up a treatment plan once we find out more about his blood tests and kidney functions. When we just went to see him he was so so happy to see us. He is back eating on a normal schedule, the animal hospital said he is regularly eating dry food. We brought him another container of natural wet food and asked that they give him that for his next feeding instead of dry, I know he is getting a lot of fluid from the IV but I would still like him to have the wet food we took. We go back in this evening to find out blood test, and have a list of questions to ask them. We only stayed 15 minutes because I wanted him hooked back up to fluids but he was so happy to see us and slept while we petted him for a little bit. He gave me a mad face when we had to leave..he misses his mommy. The tech said he is the sweetest cat...all the techs have said it. It makes me feel good bc I know that I think he is the sweetest cat in the world so it is nice to see that others think that haha.

We have basically decided to do everything we can afford to do, even though it means cutting into our house fund. We had paid our credit cards mostly off before trying to get the mortgage so we can use a little bit on those also. We have made plans to hold off on some stuff we planned to buy for the house, we are not going to paint like we had originally planned, and some things will have to wait. I am still trying to find a pt weekend job or ways to pick up some extra money to replace what we have spent but it is worth it. I have told them we are going to apply for CareCredit this week once our mortgage is approved and they know this, but they still don't do payment plans. At least CareCredit can help with the prescriptions he will need and future vet visits. We are a little stressed about everything financially but are trying to stay positive and do what it takes to make Joey better

He has never had urinary issues. The thing I don't understand, is that he is urinating regularly and had been even while not eating. It was diluted a bit on Friday when they tested it, and still is but they said now it is normal bc of the fluids he is receiving via IV. They are not sure why he had diluted urine on Friday.
I definitely have no plans on giving up hope for Joey. Depending on the creatnine levels tonight, we will either do a 3rd day of IV fluids or bring him home tonight. Either way, we have a vet appt tomorrow with our regular vet to get a special diet prescription and the info on doing subq fluids at home. We plan to start those immediately and do it however many times a day/week the vet recommends.

Just got back from the animal hospital getting Joeys latest kidney test results...his creatinine levels are within NORMAL range!! The vet said she had to look at his printout a couple times and even asked the others around to verify it was the right one, as they did not expect his levels to fall back down to normal range. She said that typically if a cats levels do not go down in the first day, they won't drop so much in the 2nd either, so they were pretty shocked that it went from 7.6 to normal. He is still at the animal hospital, they want to wean him slowly off fluids for about 8 hours and I am picking him up in the early morning.
We still have an appt tomorrow at 6pm at our regular vet to check his
levels again after he has been off fluids for a almost a day. We are also going to discuss a special diet, and find out how often they want to check his levels so we can figure out if this is something that will need continued treatments.
I talked to the vet again tonight about the ibuprofen thing, because they said if his levels are fine, continue to be fine, then it looks more like some sort of toxin got in him...so she was telling us how it is usually lilys and antifreeze that causes this. Well we have no flowers inside, and no antifreeze inside so it couldn't be that. Joey is indoor only. I asked about the ibuprofen and she said cats typically won't eat something like that and if he did eat it the outcome would have been worse. Also she said typically in a situation where the cat had some sort of toxin ingested, the kidneys would have been in the large range and not the normal range. So we still have no ideas what caused it, but as a precaution I am still making sure the medicine is put in a different cabinet.
I will update again tomorrow after his vet appt where we check his levels again and hopefully get some more info. Joey definitely wants to come home, he was very mad that we left him and is getting restless in the cage there. The tech said everytime they walk by he reaches his paw out and snags her shirt and meows until she stops and gives him attention. They have all told us how much of a joy he is and what a wonderful cat he has been while there which is always great to hear. The vet asked that I call and update them once we go to our vet just so they know how he is doing.
Thanks everyone for the vibes and all the awesome advice!!