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- Feb 12, 2014
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Within the past year, my two beloved geriatric cats (litter mates) died. It was brutal. I had them since they were kittens, and they were so cooperative and docile. I was therefore spoiled/naive in my expectations from cats. They let me bathe them, clean their ears and teeth, check their temperature when necessary (the way none of us liked), feel around on them for signs of illness or disease, and ... load them into their carrier. Neither liked it, but they didn't fight me about it. The worst they did was cry a little and put up a half-hearted protest.
Now we have Katie, a roughly six-year-old scrappy former stray, with big beautiful blue eyes (she's a lynx point siamese) and major trust issues. Oh, and she's FIV+, so keeping her stress level low is important. She has gradually learned to trust us (long story, but we've known her and fed her for over 5 years near a family member's home a nearby town while she was a tame-ish stray cat, but we only finally adopted her in February), but gets snippy if she's manhandled and outright violent when coerced into a crate.
We live in Tornado Alley and it's the spring, when the need to take swift shelter is common. We live on a upper floor of an apartment building that is not safe if a tornado comes through. There is a storm shelter area below us where I used to be able to swiftly round up our previous cats and take them down with me. It took all of 3 minutes. Now with Katie, we have an incredible degree of difficulty that I'm not accustomed to. I've been a cat owner for nearly 20 years with very cooperative cats, but she is my first intensely noncompliant one, and while I know the ins and outs of lots of feline health issues, behavioral ones like hers are entirely new to me.
Earlier today there was a tornado spotted nearby and it was time to go down to the storm shelter, fast. For weeks now, we have left her carrier out with the door open for her to get used to it and walk in and out — which she has been. So the hope was today that, as we were headed down to the shelter, we would be able to swiftly get her inside it to take her with us.
Lowering scared/angry cats through an open door when a carrier is turned upright always looks good on blogs and YouTube videos done with already docile (?!) cats, but it doesn't work so well in practice with violently panicking ones.
As my husband adores her, and she him, we thought he'd be the best to try. As he went to lower her in, she thrashed around incredibly dramatically, hissing and yowling, somehow avoiding making contact with my husband's skin with her claws or teeth. He had to set her down in the calamity so that we could hustle down to the shelter and hope that she stayed safe in the closet.
When the coast was clear and the tornado warning ended (no touchdown near us), and we came back inside our apartment, all she wanted to do was hide under the bed, which I can understand after what she probably feels was a major betrayal of trust.
When she finally came out a minute ago though, my husband and I both noticed she seemed to be limping, but she slinked/hustled so quickly it was hard to determine which limb it might be. [EDIT: seems to be right shoulder area, now that we've witnessed it again] I'm sure she somehow hurt herself in the whole carrier attempt.
I retrospect, we're both thinking she may have actually been limping for a while now — the whole time she's been here, though very subtly and only now gelling in our minds now that we've seen it so pronounced today. Five years ago, when she was at the house she lived outside of before we took her in ourselves, she used to jump fences and even hop on rooftops. Pure acrobat. Over the past couple years, we noticed she wasn't doing that anymore and assumed that she probably had a bad tumble at one time and was left less agile — perhaps an old injury healed badly.
So... we're now both concerned that she's further damaged whatever latent injury she may have already been harboring. With my previous cats, I would be at the vet with them as soon as possible this week, but with Katie, obviously there's a new degree of difficulty. I don't even know how we would get her into the carrier in order to get her to the vet for scans. (This was so easy with our last two!)
When we adopted her and took her inside our apartment a few towns over three months ago, it took forever to lure her into the carrier with tuna and quickly slam the door shut on her. A ton of drama/thrashing then too, but injury-free. She was so wild at the vet immediately after that they had to anesthetize her to give her an initial quick checkup, triple test (faint FIV positive results), and trim her nails.
For future check-ups and ailments that could be done in our home, I had planned to bring in the mobile vet that came to our home to put our senior cat, Gus, down in March, but obviously if she needs scans, we're going to have to take her in.
I'm not even sure what my question is right now... How badly might she have hurt herself thrashing around in the carrier attempt? Could it have caused a worsening of an injury that we've been the vaguely curious for months may have been pre-existing? Should I try the Cosequin I still have left over from my late, great, arthritic Gus kitty? What do we do about a vet visit to get her bones/joints checked out if we can't even crate her easily? We already need to keep her calm and low-stress for her FIV; the trust and cautious snuggles that we have slowwwly earned from her seem like they can be easily reversed in situations like this.
I miss Gus and Liz so, so much on days like this. I know I can't compare her to them; that's not fair. I know she has emotional baggage and fears they never had because they'd been doted on and handled and hugged on since they were kittens. But I'm just so used to having cats that are basically adorable live stuffed toys, snuggly and cooperative. Katie is hard. So hard. I love her to pieces and I'm committed to giving her the indoor, pampered life she deserves, even though I'm deflated over the demands another special needs cat, even though she blows hot and cold, even though she's an emotional wild card on any given day. I'm at a loss over what to do with all this right now, next steps...
I'm just scared of what injury she might have incurred this afternoon in the carrier disaster, how we can even deal with it for next steps, and what to do with a cat I love and have bonded with, but who reminds me with each tantrum when I'm just trying to help her that she's not as easy as is in my skill-set.
I thought I was a seasoned veteran with cats. Turns out, that was just with abnormally easy ones — not emotional trainwrecks.
Now we have Katie, a roughly six-year-old scrappy former stray, with big beautiful blue eyes (she's a lynx point siamese) and major trust issues. Oh, and she's FIV+, so keeping her stress level low is important. She has gradually learned to trust us (long story, but we've known her and fed her for over 5 years near a family member's home a nearby town while she was a tame-ish stray cat, but we only finally adopted her in February), but gets snippy if she's manhandled and outright violent when coerced into a crate.
We live in Tornado Alley and it's the spring, when the need to take swift shelter is common. We live on a upper floor of an apartment building that is not safe if a tornado comes through. There is a storm shelter area below us where I used to be able to swiftly round up our previous cats and take them down with me. It took all of 3 minutes. Now with Katie, we have an incredible degree of difficulty that I'm not accustomed to. I've been a cat owner for nearly 20 years with very cooperative cats, but she is my first intensely noncompliant one, and while I know the ins and outs of lots of feline health issues, behavioral ones like hers are entirely new to me.
Earlier today there was a tornado spotted nearby and it was time to go down to the storm shelter, fast. For weeks now, we have left her carrier out with the door open for her to get used to it and walk in and out — which she has been. So the hope was today that, as we were headed down to the shelter, we would be able to swiftly get her inside it to take her with us.
Lowering scared/angry cats through an open door when a carrier is turned upright always looks good on blogs and YouTube videos done with already docile (?!) cats, but it doesn't work so well in practice with violently panicking ones.
As my husband adores her, and she him, we thought he'd be the best to try. As he went to lower her in, she thrashed around incredibly dramatically, hissing and yowling, somehow avoiding making contact with my husband's skin with her claws or teeth. He had to set her down in the calamity so that we could hustle down to the shelter and hope that she stayed safe in the closet.
When the coast was clear and the tornado warning ended (no touchdown near us), and we came back inside our apartment, all she wanted to do was hide under the bed, which I can understand after what she probably feels was a major betrayal of trust.
When she finally came out a minute ago though, my husband and I both noticed she seemed to be limping, but she slinked/hustled so quickly it was hard to determine which limb it might be. [EDIT: seems to be right shoulder area, now that we've witnessed it again] I'm sure she somehow hurt herself in the whole carrier attempt.
I retrospect, we're both thinking she may have actually been limping for a while now — the whole time she's been here, though very subtly and only now gelling in our minds now that we've seen it so pronounced today. Five years ago, when she was at the house she lived outside of before we took her in ourselves, she used to jump fences and even hop on rooftops. Pure acrobat. Over the past couple years, we noticed she wasn't doing that anymore and assumed that she probably had a bad tumble at one time and was left less agile — perhaps an old injury healed badly.
So... we're now both concerned that she's further damaged whatever latent injury she may have already been harboring. With my previous cats, I would be at the vet with them as soon as possible this week, but with Katie, obviously there's a new degree of difficulty. I don't even know how we would get her into the carrier in order to get her to the vet for scans. (This was so easy with our last two!)
When we adopted her and took her inside our apartment a few towns over three months ago, it took forever to lure her into the carrier with tuna and quickly slam the door shut on her. A ton of drama/thrashing then too, but injury-free. She was so wild at the vet immediately after that they had to anesthetize her to give her an initial quick checkup, triple test (faint FIV positive results), and trim her nails.
For future check-ups and ailments that could be done in our home, I had planned to bring in the mobile vet that came to our home to put our senior cat, Gus, down in March, but obviously if she needs scans, we're going to have to take her in.
I'm not even sure what my question is right now... How badly might she have hurt herself thrashing around in the carrier attempt? Could it have caused a worsening of an injury that we've been the vaguely curious for months may have been pre-existing? Should I try the Cosequin I still have left over from my late, great, arthritic Gus kitty? What do we do about a vet visit to get her bones/joints checked out if we can't even crate her easily? We already need to keep her calm and low-stress for her FIV; the trust and cautious snuggles that we have slowwwly earned from her seem like they can be easily reversed in situations like this.
I miss Gus and Liz so, so much on days like this. I know I can't compare her to them; that's not fair. I know she has emotional baggage and fears they never had because they'd been doted on and handled and hugged on since they were kittens. But I'm just so used to having cats that are basically adorable live stuffed toys, snuggly and cooperative. Katie is hard. So hard. I love her to pieces and I'm committed to giving her the indoor, pampered life she deserves, even though I'm deflated over the demands another special needs cat, even though she blows hot and cold, even though she's an emotional wild card on any given day. I'm at a loss over what to do with all this right now, next steps...
I'm just scared of what injury she might have incurred this afternoon in the carrier disaster, how we can even deal with it for next steps, and what to do with a cat I love and have bonded with, but who reminds me with each tantrum when I'm just trying to help her that she's not as easy as is in my skill-set.
I thought I was a seasoned veteran with cats. Turns out, that was just with abnormally easy ones — not emotional trainwrecks.
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