Is this a false pregnancy?

pepper tee

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I have a 6 month old kitten that think is experiencing a false pregnancy, she has not gotten out at all… we have been very diligent about keeping her in.

She started to go into her first heat a month ago. At that time my momâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]s male cat was staying here too. He is neutered but they were still going through the mating rituals till he got really annoyed with her coming around all the time. He started to get aggressive with her so we sent her to my moms for 2 weeks. She was still in heat while she was there, but her nipples were pinking and swelling up like a pregnant cat. She came back last Thursday, and is out of her heat but the swelling around the nipples have moved into 3 very large and hard “egg shaped – like balls†that are on her underbelly. They are huge, a bit larger than a chicken egg and even though false pregnancies in cats can exhibit engorged bellies, wouldnâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]t there be one engorged belly, and not three egg shaped balls? Sheâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]s not in any kind of pain, and completely normal. Two of them have moved together as if they are attaching. I have done quite a bit of internet research and the only thing that really fits is false pregnancy, but Iâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]m worried and want to make sure.

I know taking her to the vet should be the first option, but I just lost my job and I canâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]t afford to take her and have it be nothing at all. Not when i just paid a big chunck of change to get her and her sister caught up on their shots. I rescued her and have been trying to find a home for her for months, maybe I should take her to the SPCA after all, at least there sheâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]ll get the medical treatment she deserves, but we are so scared that she wonâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]t find a home and get put down. She has the cutest little face, but she is the runt of her litter and very timid and scared of unknown people so nobody wants her. Sheâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]s really growing on us and we want to keep her, but we canâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]t afford the medical costs of two cats, so I donâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]t know what to do.
 

tnr1

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Originally Posted by pepper tee

I have a 6 month old kitten that think is experiencing a false pregnancy, she has not gotten out at all… we have been very diligent about keeping her in.

She started to go into her first heat a month ago. At that time my momâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]s male cat was staying here too. He is neutered but they were still going through the mating rituals till he got really annoyed with her coming around all the time. He started to get aggressive with her so we sent her to my moms for 2 weeks. She was still in heat while she was there, but her nipples were pinking and swelling up like a pregnant cat. She came back last Thursday, and is out of her heat but the swelling around the nipples have moved into 3 very large and hard “egg shaped – like balls†that are on her underbelly. They are huge, a bit larger than a chicken egg and even though false pregnancies in cats can exhibit engorged bellies, wouldnâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]t there be one engorged belly, and not three egg shaped balls? Sheâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]s not in any kind of pain, and completely normal. Two of them have moved together as if they are attaching. I have done quite a bit of internet research and the only thing that really fits is false pregnancy, but Iâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]m worried and want to make sure.

I know taking her to the vet should be the first option, but I just lost my job and I canâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]t afford to take her and have it be nothing at all. Not when i just paid a big chunck of change to get her and her sister caught up on their shots. I rescued her and have been trying to find a home for her for months, maybe I should take her to the SPCA after all, at least there sheâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]ll get the medical treatment she deserves, but we are so scared that she wonâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]t find a home and get put down. She has the cutest little face, but she is the runt of her litter and very timid and scared of unknown people so nobody wants her. Sheâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]s really growing on us and we want to keep her, but we canâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]t afford the medical costs of two cats, so I donâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]t know what to do.
First thing that comes to mind is to ask...are you SURE the neuter was successful?? Also...how long after he was neutered did you have your female interact with the male. It can take up to a month after the neuter surgery for the male to no longer be able to get a cat pregnant.

Since you cannot afford to take her to the vet...I would take her to the SPCA so that she can get the treatment she needs. She may have worms or another medical issue...and if the neuter wasn't successful...she could be pregnant.

Katie
 
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pepper tee

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Originally Posted by TNR1

First thing that comes to mind is to ask...are you SURE the neuter was successful?? Also...how long after he was neutered did you have your female interact with the male. It can take up to a month after the neuter surgery for the male to no longer be able to get a cat pregnant.

Since you cannot afford to take her to the vet...I would take her to the SPCA so that she can get the treatment she needs. She may have worms or another medical issue...and if the neuter wasn't successful...she could be pregnant.

Katie
The male cat was neutered by the SPCA 2 years ago, and I really don't know how to tell if it was done correctly or not.
 

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Call the SPCA and ask about low-cost spay/neuter. They can point you in the right direction. She needs to be spayed, even more so if you think there is something abnormal going on.
 
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pepper tee

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Originally Posted by semiferal

Call the SPCA and ask about low-cost spay/neuter. They can point you in the right direction. She needs to be spayed, even more so if you think there is something abnormal going on.
I actually think it's something worse, I'm taking her to the vet in right away. I called the SPCA, they don't have a low cost neuter program anymore.

I'll see what the vet says today.
 
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pepper tee

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Originally Posted by WellingtonCats

Let us know what the vet says. Never in a pregnancy should you feel hard lumps.
Sorry for not posting sooner, I've been so preoccupied with force feeding her and still making my job interviews that I havn't had time to get to the computer. The vets were awesome, very nice, helpful and accommodating, but they still donâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]t know what is going on with her. 3 vets looked at her, and not of them have never seen this before, not to this magnitude anyway. On a good note, itâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]s not FIP, as the swellings follow the mammary chain, but they still have no idea what it is. They have pretty much diagnosed the same probabilities I did….save for the fact there could be two possible outcomes of Mastitis. I'm waiting for the vet to call me back today and explain it to me again. They still think it could be a false pregnancy, with her hormonal balance straight through the roof, but they said it also looks like Mastitis, but sheâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]s not showing signs of fever or milk secretion, so they are perplexed.

They gave her an anti flammatory shot, to see if it makes a difference in the swelling, but it didn't. I swore it made it worse, it felt harder for the rest of the day. It has softened since, but it's still very large and round and she's still not eating. We have to force feed her to get anything into her and it's really hard to see her like this. it's almost as if she has no will to live, she just lays around and stares. I don't know what to do. I called the vet today to let him kinow the outcome of our last visit like he asked, but he hsn't returned my call yet. We could try to put her on antibiotics for mastitis and see if it brings the swelling down, but he's not sure if it'll work as she's not secreting at all nor does she have a fever. The other option is to pull a fluid sample from the swellings and run some tests. I'm opting for the tests right now, thre is no point in giving her antibiotics if they aren't going to work.

In the meantime I am to try to get her to eat, watch for decrease swelling in her abdomen and wait. I don't want to wait any longer, it's breaking my heart to see her like this. If these 3 vets don't know what to do, is anybody else going to know. I don't know what to do......If I had the money I would take her to every vet in the city, but I can't......and why can't they figure this out. One of them is an instructor of veternary medicine, he should know shouldn't he? Neither of them have ever seen this before!
 
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pepper tee

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Well on a good note, she's eating on her own again.

I had my mom come over for a couple of days to help with the feedings and implement other strategies to deal with this. Since we have 2 other cats in the house right now, we couldn't tell if she was eating even a bit on her own, nor could we moniter her bowel movments, so we isolated her from the other cats the last 2 nights. I had to put up with whining cats wanting to get into the room, but it worked...she ate a wee bit on her own sat night, and lots last night. She hasn't had a bowel movement in 2 days though. This can be explained by the fact that we have been syringe her liquified food, or she could have done it during the day when she's out with the other cats and we missed it. We pretty much took two hour watches each this weekend to keep track of what she is doing. Anything to help diagnose whatâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]s going on since the vets donâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]t have a clue.

It's still not over though, the swellings have not decreased so I'm taking her to the vet to pull a fluid sample from the sacs. Hopefiully once they know what type of fluid it is, they can maybe figure out where it is coming from.
 

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I am sure this is frustrating and sad for your baby, and not what you need when you are out of work. Doctors(Vets) don't know everything, thats why it's called practicing medicine.

Does she seem to be in Pain? I would like to know how this progresses and if it eventually resolves itself.

I'll say a kitty prayer for her.
 
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pepper tee

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Well sorry for not posting sooner but my phone and internet was cut off for a couple of weeks. I put my money towards vet bills instead of my phone and have been looking for work like a madwoman. Last time I posted, she just started to eat on her own again and after a talk with the vet decided to have a biopsy done instead. That way we knew for sure what it was as pulling a fluid sample doesn't always tell them. That and he said the swellings were tisssue and not liquid, which turned out to be wrong in the end anyway.

The day before her biopsy, I came home and the swellings had decreased by half their size. I was elated. She was eating and running around like normal and the swelling was going down so upon my call to the vet, we cancelled to see what would happen. The next day rolls around and it's gone by 75% and even though I am breathing a sigh of relief that she's getting back to normal, I'm wondering where all that "tissue" is going. I couldn't see how a mass that size can go away so fast without it affecting her somewhere, but she was so chipper and running around. The next day though, I woke up and saw her breathing very rapidly, almost as if she was hyperventalating, so I promptly took her to the vet and after a series of tests, she tested positive for anemia and she was oxygenating at 60%. I had a difficult choice to make right there and then, i could keep her on oxygen at the cat hospital and rack up a $1000 debt or take her home and see what happens. At that point it's obvious that there are a lot of problems happening to such a young kitten and even if i put that money into finding out what the problem is and trying to fix it, she could still die.

So I took her home and cried all the way there. I had to tell my daughter that she may not recover from this ailment and that we have to make a decision. We cried all night, and all the next day as we watched her breathing get worse and worse, knowing she was dying right in front of us. She wasn't in any pain, she was actually very peacful and cuddly still, but I'm sure it was uncomfortable for her and we just did whatever we could to keep her comfortable. The vet couldn't take us in till 2:30 pm in the afternoon and after testing her again, the worst of our fears were confirmed, she was dying. Her temperature had dropped to threatening levels, and she was oxygenateing at 30%. My mom was there with us and I couldn't even talk to the vet, I kept breaking up over the thought of putting her down put it seemed like the best choice. We were all crying pretty harsh as they put her down. Then something terribly disturbing happened, a lot of reddish liquid came out of her nose. My daughter freaked out and the vets jumped in shock too. They have never seen it before and the fact that it was the result of it coming out of her lungs suggested that we were dealing with something more serious then we had anticipated. Now we know where all that "tissue" went. it wasn't tissue, there was liqiud in them and when it left the swelling it was drowning out her lungs. So i think it was FIP after all. The only reason he did not suspect FIP was becasue he assumed it was tissue build up and not liquid, and with everything I have researched on FIP, it fits a lot of what happened to her. I cried for 3 days over that cat, our household was really torn up about it. It's not fair that this cats health was comprimised by my financial situation, and I feel enourmous guilt over it but at the same time, **** happens, and you do the best you can. I thank god I live in a country where my child has access to healthcare, I don't know what i would do if that happened to my child.

Anyway, I'm sorry for the sad story, it's still breaking my heart, but I wanted to let you know what happend. You are right that vets don't always know everything and maybe I just had a bad run of luck for this kitten but it sure taught me a valuable lesson about responsibility. When you take on a pet, you are responsible for it's health and well being and you ahve to be prepared for medical issues, and i wasn't. I took that for granted. I'll act a lot faster next time.



Originally Posted by pepper tee

Well on a good note, she's eating on her own again.

I had my mom come over for a couple of days to help with the feedings and implement other strategies to deal with this. Since we have 2 other cats in the house right now, we couldn't tell if she was eating even a bit on her own, nor could we moniter her bowel movments, so we isolated her from the other cats the last 2 nights. I had to put up with whining cats wanting to get into the room, but it worked...she ate a wee bit on her own sat night, and lots last night. She hasn't had a bowel movement in 2 days though. This can be explained by the fact that we have been syringe her liquified food, or she could have done it during the day when she's out with the other cats and we missed it. We pretty much took two hour watches each this weekend to keep track of what she is doing. Anything to help diagnose whatâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]s going on since the vets donâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]t have a clue.

It's still not over though, the swellings have not decreased so I'm taking her to the vet to pull a fluid sample from the sacs. Hopefiully once they know what type of fluid it is, they can maybe figure out where it is coming from.
 
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