Lulu is our 13 year old long haired beautiful sweet girl. We have been treating Toby with chemotherapy since last April when he was diagnosed with large cell lymphoma.
Since Toby's diagnosis we've been feeding him many different foods at all times of day just to get him to eat, so we weren't surprised when the other cats didn't all show up at regular feeding times- seeing as how there was lots of every type of food all day.
I even thought to myself I need to stay on top of the other kitties' health as it would be just my luck if another of them got sick and I didn't notice.
Sure enough I went to pick up Lulu one day and she was light as a feather- she is small anyhow, but she seemed to weigh almost nothing. She has such long fur, she was hiding that weight loss.
Lulu had no symptoms other than eating less, which we didn't notice due to having food around at all times and not knowing when the others would decide to come get it. We took her to the vet, her blood test was normal, the vet said she had a slightly elevated white count but since her teeth weren't the greatest, she recommended we treat with clindamycin which we did via our cat sitter while we were on vacation in December.
I made her dental appt last Friday with the stipulation that they do an xray first to rule out anything else. We are experienced now after Toby's cancer. And while we were at the chicago veterinary specialty center with Toby getting his chemo, the vet called us to say Lulu had what appeared to be a large tumor int the area of her thymus gland, near her heart.
John and I discussed it and we decided to just go right to a surgeon and have it removed. It was suggested to us that we do a guided ultrasound first, but we know we just want it removed and pray that it is not cancer.
Is there anyone else who has experienced this before? Do you think there are any risks just going from xray to surgery?
Lulu's normal weight is 7 or 8 lbs and now she is down to 5 lbs. She is a normally tiny cat but now she is very underweight. If she were not a long haired cat we would have caught this. So many if's. I cannot usually hold her because she will then start a fight with the other cats to be the top cat and she will begin marking (she is a returned declawed pee cat, thank you original owners - not).
I appreciate any experience, advice, insight.
Since Toby's diagnosis we've been feeding him many different foods at all times of day just to get him to eat, so we weren't surprised when the other cats didn't all show up at regular feeding times- seeing as how there was lots of every type of food all day.
I even thought to myself I need to stay on top of the other kitties' health as it would be just my luck if another of them got sick and I didn't notice.
Sure enough I went to pick up Lulu one day and she was light as a feather- she is small anyhow, but she seemed to weigh almost nothing. She has such long fur, she was hiding that weight loss.
Lulu had no symptoms other than eating less, which we didn't notice due to having food around at all times and not knowing when the others would decide to come get it. We took her to the vet, her blood test was normal, the vet said she had a slightly elevated white count but since her teeth weren't the greatest, she recommended we treat with clindamycin which we did via our cat sitter while we were on vacation in December.
I made her dental appt last Friday with the stipulation that they do an xray first to rule out anything else. We are experienced now after Toby's cancer. And while we were at the chicago veterinary specialty center with Toby getting his chemo, the vet called us to say Lulu had what appeared to be a large tumor int the area of her thymus gland, near her heart.
John and I discussed it and we decided to just go right to a surgeon and have it removed. It was suggested to us that we do a guided ultrasound first, but we know we just want it removed and pray that it is not cancer.
Is there anyone else who has experienced this before? Do you think there are any risks just going from xray to surgery?
Lulu's normal weight is 7 or 8 lbs and now she is down to 5 lbs. She is a normally tiny cat but now she is very underweight. If she were not a long haired cat we would have caught this. So many if's. I cannot usually hold her because she will then start a fight with the other cats to be the top cat and she will begin marking (she is a returned declawed pee cat, thank you original owners - not).
I appreciate any experience, advice, insight.