What is wrong with my kitten?  

his name is Moose. he is white and black and so fluffy.
he is a long haired male about 4 months old.
he weighs 4.6 lbs

I asked on yahoo answers but i wanted to ask here because i thought i would get better answers...??...

here are his symptoms: for about 2 weeks or less.
-distended belly (especially this week) it doesn't seem to hurt him if i press on it
-his face looks skinnier
-his poop is mushy and light brown
-he used to eat A LOT, now he eats but not as much as before
-seems to be drinking fine
-went from being overly active and hyper to laying around all day.. not lethargic but lazy and bored
-he makes whiny meows for no reason.. or maybe pain?
-sometimes his belly does this weird twitchy/spasm thing
-this one started a few days ago.. pee legs. he's started peeing himself and the fur on the inner part of his legs are all yellow
-he seems to ALWAYS have a piece of poo stuck to his bottom...
-he used to groom himself A LOT... excessively.. i cant remember the last time i saw him groom...
-he used to suck his foot until he fell asleep (so cute) but now he doesn't... sometimes i see him about to but he stops or gives up.. maybe he's too fat and cant reach? or it hurts his tummy? idk.
-we found a white rice looking hard thing attached to the fur on his bottom when we were rinsing the pee off his legs.. actually found another when i was brushing him but it might have just been poo shaped like it (ew i know)... so we were thinking tapeworm...??


I took him to a vet yesterday. she said she was concerned about FIP so we are waiting for those results. but shouldn't she have checked or at least considered other possibilities and ruled them out too while we were there?? I told her ALL those symptoms and she didn't mention anything but leukemia and FEV (i think) and then FIP. she didn't test for anything but FIP. she drained his stomach and she said that FIP has a distinct look. its usually chunky and his was not.. it wasn't cloudy either. it was a clear yellowish color.... so it doesn't seem like FIP... Shouldn't she have mentioned worms or constipation or UTI's or something? Or is it absolutely FIP? we paid like $600... we had a kitten before and we paid over $1000 in vet bills just to find out we had to put him to sleep and it seems like we're about to be in the same situation. but i just think there are other symptoms that don't match FIP that i think she should have checked for other things. would a better vet have checked for more?


Additional Details
it was $551 and it was for: medical exam, abdominal tap, Felv/FIV/heartworm test, fluid therapy, total health profile, and fluid analysis. idk. does that sound right?
i dont want to have false hope but she examined his stomach fluid and it wasn't chunky... so shouldn't that indicate that it isn't FIP?? is it really necessary to get a test that isn't accurate anyways? there are no accurate tests for FIP as far as i understand... but the stomach fluid thing seems like it would give a better answer... and he isn't lethargic like a lot of FIP symptoms say... he purrs when i pet him and comes when there is food or if i open the door to the porch. he likes sitting on the porch.

haven't changed his diet... he eats dry food and some wet cat food 1 or 2 times a day.

help

Hi everyone, thank you so much for replying. i appreciate all the advice and kind words.

also wanted to say, we found the tapeworm looky thing the day after going to the vet so that's probably why she didn't think to do a fecal thing.. but from what I've read, I just really think she should have anyways, just from his symptoms. we get the results back today (who knows when, i didn't think to ask - I'm dumb) but they haven't called yet. we called them but a vet wasn't available. uhg.

i hope its tapeworm too... he walks around a lot.. too much i think for FIP.

another symptom to add also... i did the pulling up his skin on his shoulders thing and it didn't snap back.. kinda sunk into place. so that means he is dehydrated right? i saw him drinking a lot yesterday though.

i hate waiting. and i hate not knowing what to do for him.

so she finally called us last night at like 9. she said she doesn't think its FIP. and now she thinks its liver or heart disease. idk what to do. we aren't made of money. obviously its not smart to have pets if you can't afford to care for them and plan for things like this. but vet bills are ridiculous and what if we spend all sorts of money again and still don't know what the problem is?

his stomach looks very big today.

thank you everybody. I'm so overwhelmed

here is whats been going on since last post..

he hasn't pooped in at least 24 hours.. at least. i don't think he did yesterday but we have 3 cats so its really hard to determine but I'm pretty sure he didn't all last night either. and I'm really worried if its been longer than that.

I've been checking A LOT for more rice looking things, where he sleeps and on him, and I haven't found any more... maybe I was mistaken? idk.

My husband spoke to the vet again tonight and asked if it could be constipation.. she said she doesn't think so. She is convinced its FIP, liver or heart disease and wants to do ultrasounds on the abdomen and heart.

personally, i think it sounds like a possible intestinal obstruction or blockage or some kind.. maybe from a large hairball??? He used to groom himself a lot and suck on his foot a lot. could a hairball cause these symptoms?

he hasn't been eating today. but he paws at it (to save it for later). we've been trying to give him water as much as possible. and he drinks on his own sometimes. he doesn't go to the litter box. i put him in a few times. the first time he stood for a while and finally peed a tiny bit.

his tummy is SO big. he used to zip thru the kitty door to our porch (chasing our bunny, they're best friends).. now he can barely get both legs over..

we dont want money to be an issue. but we also don't want to be taken advantage of... I'm at a point where i think vets are evil and just want to induce fear to get as much as they can out of you. maybe i am wrong.

draco: we'll be calling around today

NorthernGlow: she took a sample to see if the fluid was chunky or sticky like FIP usually is. i asked if we should drain the fluid from his stomach and she said not to.

Evakatharina: thank you he really is!


sorry for the big posts ... I appreciate all the comments and advice so much!

went to the vet again today to get some antibiotics. they think its FIP again because his stomach is so big. he hasn't eaten today and last night. i can feel his spine a lot. he drinks water. don't think he's pooped yet. he's breathing fine. he's having trouble walking.. he can but it looks like a struggle, he's kind of wobbly. he vomited up this clear mucousy stuff. he seems to be getting more lethargic than just lazy....

the vet said if he didn't respond to the antibiotics in 1-2 days its most likely FIP.

yeah.. after the last visit i am angry with my vet...

so mad...

1. we went in to pick up some antibiotics and asked if i could get an appointment. they said i would have to wait till 6 or if i didn't want to wait i could do an emergency appointment for $50 more. he looked ok and we live down the street so i told them i would wait till 6. the receptionist said ok but then said she was going to take moose to have a tech make sure it was ok to wait. then 10 minutes later she said "a vet would like to speak with you". she never said anything like "she doesn't think he should wait, she would like to do an emergency checkup now." and when i went back there she didn't do anything but talk to me about what we've already talked about. so we left with the antibiotics and had to pay $80 more for something i didn't authorize in the first place. they tricked me! grrr. if they had done SOMETHING. anything. besides talk i would be fine with considering it an emergency recheck but no.. just talk about what we had JUST discussed the night before.

i told my husband and he called to ask for our money back. i know after paying $600 already, $80 seems like nothing but it is. he's going to need an ultrasound and if it is liver disease we need to buy medicine and if its not we will eventually have to put him to sleep. so we don't want to just throw money out for stupid reasons. for health reasons and necessary things, of course.. for shady vets.. no thanks.

also, my husband asked for a vet to call us when they were available so we could figure out the next step, set up an ultrasound appointment.. something. but they never called us.


Luckily we didn't expect them to (jerks!). so we called a different place and made an appointment for tomorrow. the vet we had said an abdominal ultrasound would be $580. at this other place we would need to do an initial exam $50, but the ultrasound fee is only $245 and its by a board certified tech. way cheaper plus a second opinion.

he seems more perky since yesterday. we've been feeding him meat flavor baby food with a syringe and pedialyte about every 2 hours or more. and of course the antibiotics. yesterday was the first day that he seemed VERY lethargic. or lethargic at all. but today he seems weaker (i think because of all the weight from his tummy), but not so depressed...


I'm going to ask this other vet about draining the fluid to make him comfortable. i don't understand why they wouldn't.. we asked a few times and they gave us the same answer.. something about risk of infection and about it not being very beneficial. and blah blah blah.

/end rant

sorry for the long post again.. i ramble!
I'm going to go feed my poor boy again
thanks again for all the wonderful advice and comments

yeah i was trying to give my vet the benefit of the doubt. but we haven't been with them long and they aren't invested and you can tell. the vet we are seeing tomorrow called our old vet and asked them to fax over the paperwork

his breathing seems ok. actually that's one thing she did say when we had our "emergency checkup" she said he was breathing fine. the fluid built up in the lower part of his stomach.

i'm going back and forth on the worms... I've been checking and i haven't seen any more. maybe what i did find what i thought? Idk... cuz what else could it have been.. ? but just in case, I'll ask the vet to do a fecal test or something tomorrow while we're there.

hi..

so just wanted to say what happened at the vet today. i really liked the vet we saw. she was very personable and didn't rush anything. she seemed genuinely concerned. and even though we have bad news to report, i feel better following her advice.

she went over the records from the other vet with us and did her own exam. she did the ultrasound hopeful it would be something simple with the liver or something. but basically she said she found what was probably the worst case scenario at this point. she drained his tummy to get a better read on the ultrasound and make him more comfortable (and he feels so much lighter and perkier.. probably doesn't hurt to breath..) she said he has a possible intussesception. and she said that thats caused by irritation on the intestines or something (might be saying it wrong) which could be caused by FIP. so... he could have FIP AND intussesception on top of it. or just intussesception which really isn't any better... his stomach was so big because the intestines fold over... making the correct passage too small and the food gets caught in the folds.. so his belly gets huge. this is the best picture i could find of what she explained. she said sometimes (and i know i wont explain it right), in a very rare percent.. the folds will break off and heal at the right spots and the cat will poop it out the folded part. but they have to break at the same time or something in order for them to heal right... idk. i can't explain things.

but. i just wanted to update in case anyone else has or might have a cat with Moose's symptoms and don't know what to look for... I hope this helps someone.

and if you live in the Ventura area, i recommend Buena animal hospital .. idk about the other doctors. we saw Nicci Quinn.

we had to put him to sleep.

to stabilize him would be $3,000 and to do the surgery would be $3-5,000. even if we could wait to see a regular vet and not an emergency one, it would be around $5,000. they said there was a slim chance he would even survive surgery and they said they might not even be able to stabilize him because he was so anemic. yesterday he was fine. and even if we did stabilize him enough to do the surgery, he might still have FIP and die in a week or so anyways.. and we wouldn't know the results till Thursday. he wasn't comfortable. i know he was suffering. we had a vet come to our home and put him to sleep. don't go to ......... they are jerks.