Hello everyone. I signed up for this website in the hopes of finding some sort of comfort and potential explanation as to how I lost my cat that did not even make it to his 2nd birthday. I greatly appreciate anyone who takes the time to read and reply, I'll begin the story of want transgressed the past week and the horrendous experience I had with the Vets.
I am a young man (24), who honestly never had the biggest soft spot for cats, I used to be a dog person. My girlfriend loves cats, so I started opening up to them. About a year and a half ago we took in a tiger cat named Jäger from a friend who had to get rid of him due to roommates being allergic. We took him in making our home have 3 cats total. The cats have always been drawn to my girlfriend rather than me, but jäger is the one cat that naturally was drawn to me, he became my best buddy. He would hang out with me all night and day and sleep next to me. He was very social and loved to play.. And eat!
Everything went downhill a week ago or so.. Jäger started acting strange one day and was withdrawn from the other cats, not acting playful and sitting in corners seeming lethargic. I thought at first it could be a hairball or something minor. This all happened around Christmas and the weekend so it was awful timing as far as finding vet care. We were going to bring him in Monday morning to the humane society , but Sunday it got worse. He stopped eating and drinking water, besides eating a little wet food. We got really worried when he started breathing strange, in short breaths. We decided to bring him to the emergency vet Sunday night.
The emergency vet was a terrible experience. It was $100 just to talk through the door. We talked to the vet a total of a few minutes. He squeezed the cat in a few spots, and listed what seemed like a google list of 10 things it could be from hairball to leukemia. He then said he was going to give X-rays and blood tests, and I stopped to get the price before he did them.. It ended up being almost $800. As a recent college grad we are not able to spend this kind of money on just the X-ray and blood test. We had to pay our $100 and head out, learning absolutely nothing. There was no sympathy from anyone there, very awkward experience.
The very next morning we brought him in to the humane society, having to wait 4 hours as a walk-in. We ended up paying a few hundred for the appointment and X-ray/blood test, and they said they would call us in a couple hours. We ended up getting a call saying he was OK, just had an infection and needed antibiotics. We were very happy to hear this and thought everything would be fine. What transgressed at the humane society was a terrible experience.
We got there and walked to the back, where our kitty was on an operating table with a oxygen tube in his nose.. He looked terrible. The vet took us in a room with X-rays. This vet sounded like she had NO idea what she was talking about. She barely spoke English and had a very thick Spanish accent. This is literally a quote of how she explained the X-rays.. "Uhm ya so he has like this shadowy thing in his stomach area I don't know what that is but ya that's not good ya know? He also has like a bigger kidney here ya know? And also theres this thing around his heart which idk what it is but it will probably require surgery ya know?" All the while I'm thinking.. NO I DONT KNOW THATS WHY IM HERE. I was told on the phone he'd be fine, and she was telling me the opposite..
She gave me prescriptions for antibiotics and a nebulizer and I asked how he would be if we filled these and took him home. Now she says,"oh no he needs emergency care at a bigger facility! He needs to be put in an oxygen chamber overnight ( which costs $100s per hour". So, she literally made no sense and kept saying different things. I finally talked to a vet tech who spoke English THANK GOD and told me that he was in a lot of pain. She said even if I spent the thousands for everything he'd only have a 10% chance of survival. My parents and the vet tech recommended putting him down.. I had to make the terrible gut wrenching decision. It was $90 to put him down then they tell me it's an extra $100 JUST TO STAND WITH HIM AS HE DIES. For a humane society, this price gouging is pretty inhumane. We are all crying (I never cry) as we go to pay for the euthanization. Then they tell me instead of 90, it is $140. I ask why, they tell me it's 50 more for the antibiotics they gave him while we were on the way. Real nice to charge someone for antibiotics on a cat about to be put down.
I walked out in a daze, utterly confused and angry as how my young cat could be fine one day and dead a few days later. No one cares about us or the animal, just the money. I have been trying to find explanation and one possibility I was thinking was he had asthma and got an infection that is much more fatal for asthmatic cats. I know it's hard to guess from just this story, but if anyone has ANY possibilities of what the heck happened I'd really appreciate hearing them. I am not religious and have trouble believing in the rainbow road, though I wish it was true. I am conflicted if I made the right decision, or if I should have spent all the money I have for the possibility he'd live. I am just hoping for some sort of closure with everything. I walk around and am reminded of him in so many ways. I have never been affected by the death of an animal this way before, and the other cats we have just don't have this bond with me. I feel he was stolen way too early from us and I don't know why. I can deal with an animal who lives a full good life, but when it happens so young it really is a whole different story because I need an explanation, something the vet couldn't give me. One thing she said was he could of even gotten an infection from the smell of candles and cleaning supplies? I am a novice cat owner so I really don't know all these things. Anyway, if you made it to the end of the story i really appreciate it
I am a young man (24), who honestly never had the biggest soft spot for cats, I used to be a dog person. My girlfriend loves cats, so I started opening up to them. About a year and a half ago we took in a tiger cat named Jäger from a friend who had to get rid of him due to roommates being allergic. We took him in making our home have 3 cats total. The cats have always been drawn to my girlfriend rather than me, but jäger is the one cat that naturally was drawn to me, he became my best buddy. He would hang out with me all night and day and sleep next to me. He was very social and loved to play.. And eat!
Everything went downhill a week ago or so.. Jäger started acting strange one day and was withdrawn from the other cats, not acting playful and sitting in corners seeming lethargic. I thought at first it could be a hairball or something minor. This all happened around Christmas and the weekend so it was awful timing as far as finding vet care. We were going to bring him in Monday morning to the humane society , but Sunday it got worse. He stopped eating and drinking water, besides eating a little wet food. We got really worried when he started breathing strange, in short breaths. We decided to bring him to the emergency vet Sunday night.
The emergency vet was a terrible experience. It was $100 just to talk through the door. We talked to the vet a total of a few minutes. He squeezed the cat in a few spots, and listed what seemed like a google list of 10 things it could be from hairball to leukemia. He then said he was going to give X-rays and blood tests, and I stopped to get the price before he did them.. It ended up being almost $800. As a recent college grad we are not able to spend this kind of money on just the X-ray and blood test. We had to pay our $100 and head out, learning absolutely nothing. There was no sympathy from anyone there, very awkward experience.
The very next morning we brought him in to the humane society, having to wait 4 hours as a walk-in. We ended up paying a few hundred for the appointment and X-ray/blood test, and they said they would call us in a couple hours. We ended up getting a call saying he was OK, just had an infection and needed antibiotics. We were very happy to hear this and thought everything would be fine. What transgressed at the humane society was a terrible experience.
We got there and walked to the back, where our kitty was on an operating table with a oxygen tube in his nose.. He looked terrible. The vet took us in a room with X-rays. This vet sounded like she had NO idea what she was talking about. She barely spoke English and had a very thick Spanish accent. This is literally a quote of how she explained the X-rays.. "Uhm ya so he has like this shadowy thing in his stomach area I don't know what that is but ya that's not good ya know? He also has like a bigger kidney here ya know? And also theres this thing around his heart which idk what it is but it will probably require surgery ya know?" All the while I'm thinking.. NO I DONT KNOW THATS WHY IM HERE. I was told on the phone he'd be fine, and she was telling me the opposite..
She gave me prescriptions for antibiotics and a nebulizer and I asked how he would be if we filled these and took him home. Now she says,"oh no he needs emergency care at a bigger facility! He needs to be put in an oxygen chamber overnight ( which costs $100s per hour". So, she literally made no sense and kept saying different things. I finally talked to a vet tech who spoke English THANK GOD and told me that he was in a lot of pain. She said even if I spent the thousands for everything he'd only have a 10% chance of survival. My parents and the vet tech recommended putting him down.. I had to make the terrible gut wrenching decision. It was $90 to put him down then they tell me it's an extra $100 JUST TO STAND WITH HIM AS HE DIES. For a humane society, this price gouging is pretty inhumane. We are all crying (I never cry) as we go to pay for the euthanization. Then they tell me instead of 90, it is $140. I ask why, they tell me it's 50 more for the antibiotics they gave him while we were on the way. Real nice to charge someone for antibiotics on a cat about to be put down.
I walked out in a daze, utterly confused and angry as how my young cat could be fine one day and dead a few days later. No one cares about us or the animal, just the money. I have been trying to find explanation and one possibility I was thinking was he had asthma and got an infection that is much more fatal for asthmatic cats. I know it's hard to guess from just this story, but if anyone has ANY possibilities of what the heck happened I'd really appreciate hearing them. I am not religious and have trouble believing in the rainbow road, though I wish it was true. I am conflicted if I made the right decision, or if I should have spent all the money I have for the possibility he'd live. I am just hoping for some sort of closure with everything. I walk around and am reminded of him in so many ways. I have never been affected by the death of an animal this way before, and the other cats we have just don't have this bond with me. I feel he was stolen way too early from us and I don't know why. I can deal with an animal who lives a full good life, but when it happens so young it really is a whole different story because I need an explanation, something the vet couldn't give me. One thing she said was he could of even gotten an infection from the smell of candles and cleaning supplies? I am a novice cat owner so I really don't know all these things. Anyway, if you made it to the end of the story i really appreciate it
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