09/16/2011

The last few days have been hectic.  We picked Sev up at the vet late Wednesday night.  There were no complications with his procedure, his kidney function was normal, and so they sent him home with an antibiotic and a muscle relaxer.

I took Thursday afternoon off because I couldn’t bear to leave him alone all day.  He was definitely better than he was Tuesday night, but was still having problems with incontinence, which is common after having a catheter in. 

Today he’s been doing much better, only peeing outside of his litter box twice.  He’s eating everything he can get his paws on, purring, and moving around a lot more.  He had a follow up appointment at his regular vet today, and she said everything looks good.  He has a final checkup in a week.  He’s stuck wearing his cone until tomorrow night at the earliest.  He’s also on a special diet now, for the rest of his life.  It’s something we should have done the first time it happened, but we didn’t know if it was going to be a recurring thing.  Now we know.

If it wasn’t for my awareness and attention, it’s entirely possible that Sev would be dead now.  Urethral blockage is a medical emergency and can cause death in 24 hours.  I am feeling now, more than ever, that being a vet is something I am meant to do.  I am “in tune” with animals.  I’m observant and attentive of their behavior.  Sister’s BF was saying that Sev was “fine” and “seemed better” on Tuesday.  I knew that was not the case pretty much the second I saw him.  Intuition or observation—either way, I’m good with animals, and I probably saved my cat’s life.  I can feel pretty good about that, I think.

As for how I’ve been…mostly sleep deprived.  I’m coming down with a cold on account of not sleeping or eating and being generally run down.  I don’t deal with stress well in general, and pet-related stress is pretty much the absolute worst for me.  But Sev’s doing better and so I can relax a bit and try to get some sleep.

I think I’m going to get started on that…now.