Cat Issues - need advice please

Hi Everyone,

I am a first time cat owner (grew up with dogs) and I am trying my best to understand what is going on with my cat. I got her from the humane society back in March and she turned 6 in May. She's pretty much been a fantastic cat. She has fit in with our household perfectly. It's just myself, my son and no other animals. 

So onto what's been going on....

This past Monday I was working in my office (I work from home) and my cat (Princess) was in the enclosed sun room (it's completely enclosed) lounging as usual. All of a sudden I heard her make a low, loud, growl type howl and run past me. It was like something scared the daylights out of her. She proceeded to howl and crouch real low to the ground with her tail between her legs, eyes really big (almost all black). She kept pacing back and forth like this and would not let me near her. At one point she ended up under my bed and I noticed she was kind of chomping her jaws and drooling. She wasn't drooling for a long time but and the drooling hasn't happened since but obviously at this point I became extremely alarmed. 

I went to check in the sunroom to see if maybe I could figure out what happened. There are no chemicals or anything within reach, no cords, nothing of that nature. The only thing that I could think of was that I repotted a cactus the other day and while I was very careful to clean up maybe a spare pricker got caught in her paw and she ingested it? Or maybe a bug got in the house and she got stung in her mouth? My initial reaction was that something scared her but after seeing the drool and chomping I thought maybe she hurt her mouth. 

So I couldn't get her into her regular dr. so I took her to the ER vet. They had to sedate her to check her out because she wouldn't let anyone near her. At this point it had been almost an hour and a half since she started acting that way and she had not calmed down at all. They couldn't see anything in her mouth, no cuts or sores but based on what I told them thought that a bug bite or the cactus pricker was possibly the best scenario. She did have a fever but the dr gave her fluids and that immediately went down and he determined that the fever was from her being so worked up. 

He said since technically she is undiagnosed she should have xrays and blood work but I just couldn't afford it. I was already spending more than I could afford on the ER visit. So once she woke up from sedation she was doing alot better, when I went in to see her she let me hold her and she was purring and nuzzling me. So off we went with some pain meds and I decided that I would follow up with her reg dr if necessary.

So here we are a few days later and she is lightly eating (she won't touch her regular dry food I had to go get wet food and she will eat that) she is using the litter box but she is still having these "episodes" of howling and being scared. It's definitely not like the first day. When it happens she comes running to me for comfort. But she shakes her head and howls and meows. Normally she's not very vocal. She's more of a chirper, so something is obviously not right. 

I did talk to her dr yesterday and she said that since she does seem to be improving keep giving her the dose of pain meds to help with the pain and bring her in if she continues on like this. 

I apologize for the lengthy post but I'd love some insight from others. I'm wondering if she's maybe just gone mental or something and it has nothing to do with something biting her or ingesting a pricker. She's been checked out and while she hasn't had like extensive tests done she's been given a good grade of health so far. Whatever is going on she is not a happy cat. Last night I woke up in the middle of the night to her cuddle tight against me - she never sleeps like that, she always sleeps at the foot of the bed. 

This is all just so strange to me... 

Thanks in advance for any advice. 

Lauren 

Hi,
I would strongly advise you to take her to your regular vet for tests. And have them check her mouth- probably under anesthesia. There is something really wrong with her. Imho that was not a single episode. If it was the case, it would be over.
But the cat is under pain meds, and still having episodes.
Just so you know, cats hide pain amazingly well, so when they show it like that, it is because they are in a LOT of pain.
Please, listen to her, and take her to the vet- I really feel there is something wrong there. this is pain.