Seishi turned up limping violently on a left hind foot, as if his whole leg was affected, and I feared he’d had a hip dislocation. .. He and Shu leap and dive like gymnasts and Seishi’s spent his whole life in the confines of a cattery, much of it probably in a cage. And to make matters weird, he’ll limp a bit, then not.
Well, we could get in with the vet, and thank goodness, one of their people is an orthopedics specialist. He’s a doll. Nope, hip not broken: what he’s got are loose kneecaps. He’s had a patella slip, and it pops back in. Doesn’t hurt, actually, but this is a condition that can worsen to the point where it needs surgical intervention—it’s fixable. OTOH, Sei’s a cage cat, and he’s getting stronger, so more leg muscle may help the problem, so he goes back to running and romping with Shu-Shu without even a shot.
Seishi’s had a day: he began it by eating a feather cat toy—and heaved up the mylar ribbon that was part of the bundle, but the feathers are still missing. We have noticed before this he WILL eat feathers. We have bought a number of these: we think that we are going to put them away.
Then the kneecap thing. We hope he may outgrow that.
He was soooooooooo glad to get home from the vet’s without even getting a shot.
And I’m so glad they can go back to playing!
Poor kitty! hope he gets better soon.
Ribbons = bad
The feathers he can probably digest, as they are organic. Not so the ribbons, so it’s good he heaved them back up. Ribbon play should always be with supervision and the ribbons put away when they’re done playing, and you probably know all this already but I get paranoid about stuff like this.
Hope his leg muscles get nice and big so his little knees will be ok!
That happened once with our Py – her larger brother used to throw his weight around. It only happened once, though, probably 10 years ago – no recurrences since then.
I wuz so scared—I wuz afraid Shu had broked mah cat….
Poor kitteh and poor you. It’s entirely possible that the patella problem is something he’ll grow out of – knees are a strong argument against intelligent design, so I’d wait with the operation unless it happens frequently or it won’t slip back.
We are very lucky to have a good vet office literally within walking distance: very easy to get to—and to have three good cat vets and a bone-and-joint guy as the 4-person staff. He showed us on a model what’s going on, and gave us an explanatory handout, and didn’t run up the cost on us with x-rays in an area where, pardon me, radiation is not a great idea: just the basic office visit, and when we told him what had happened, how it had progressed and such, he did a rearward stretch-out that demonstrated it wasn’t at all the hip, then showed me how to feel the give in the patella, and showed us in the model that it may self-correct, and if it doesn’t self-correct, it may wear enough to require surgery in a number of years. But it’s fairly minor surgery, just a smoothing of the bone at the dual groove in which the joint operates–he showed us that …so we feel that we have a good diagnosis, and a vet we can trust.
My son’s beloved Lab mix was born with major deficits among hip tendons, and has managed very well for nine years or so by building up muscles instead, with a lot of exercise, hiking and swimming and running. He loves it. Exercise may help Seishi, too, and Little Brother will be delighted to keep him motivated and moving!
I’m glad Seishi is all right, and that you have such good vets! (I’m impressed, reading about the demo.)
Eep! Pauvre menou. He’s getting good food and lots of exercise (lol) so that should help strengthen his muscles, bones, and kuh-neez-iz. Hoping so. Re the feathers, I’d expect there’s a natural prey/food reaction going on, about the feathers, but yup, the ribbon (and strings and plastic bits and rubber bands and power/data cords)…so much stuff for a kitty to run afoul of. (Yes, I’ve sworn off trying to guard against prepositions at the ends of sentences.)
Glad yer kitteh izzen brohk’nd. (Can’t quite make myself type “ur” for your. I’z ol’-fashund.)
Just an update: he’s walking perfectly straight and is running about like a lunatic with Shu. Imagine lots of caterwauling—rolling and biting and batting—and if we break it up with a water pistol, they run for opposite ends of the house, and then it’s haroo! haroo! from either end as they start looking for each other: they rush happily together at full tilt, and then it’s yerrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrow! Waaaaaaaaaaaaoh! until we finally get enough and squirt them again.
Sounds like lots of laugh out loud moments, and very little peace and quiet time to write. Can you get anything done that requires concentration, other than during baby’s naptime? Shu might be annoyed to be called a baby, if he’s feeling a long-legged cat teen, but living with him sounds rather like having a baby in the house…
I’m so glad he’s doing well! That had to be scary.
Look what I found last night:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/zettepics/sets/72157627272624903/with/6026808889/
(Pounds head against wall for awhile.)
And now you have another kitteh! And such a sweet baby. He looks Siamese-y; could someone have lost him?
No, this is a stray. I get them all the time. All three of my older cats were wild born, so to speak. And the neighbor (who mows my lawn) said there was a litter of kittens. I asked him to find a farm if he could. I did not go looking for them (which is a very dangerous thing for me to do . . . see statement about older cats). If I had looked, I could at least tell who the mother might be. But no matter. Another friend brought kitten replacement milk today and the baby (Who may be Buffy rather than Illya) is doing very well.
http://www.youtube.com/user/ZetteG#p/a/u/0/IMIWnAFb_Ok
Smokey is now only months shy from 2 years old, and still running and playing like a half-kitten, half-teenager-kitty. In other words…y’all may be in for another year or more of Eushu-chan running around like a lunatic. But on the plus side, I think he and Goober *mostly* enjoy each other. Goober will be five at the end of October, and young Smokey doth try his patience. But Goober has never (afaik) given Smokey “The Paw of Stopping” as Seishi did Eushu to good effect. Great to hear the two are gonzo playmates.
He seems very happy with his new cat-slave!
A fast update on my Katie-girl: she continues to improve, especially since I finally decided to overcome my reluctance and put her on anti-anxiety meds. This was after trying Xanax for a class and realizing she was happier on the drugs in class than she was off the drugs at home. So I am keeping her on them while continuing to shower her with goodies in scary situations to try and get her confidence built up. She’s got her own YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/philospher77?feature=mhee if anyone wants to see how she is doing. I will admit, it’s mostly her doing “normal dog stuff” because I am so impressed when she acts normal! She’s come a long way from the dog who wouldn’t leave her safe place in the bedroom.
It takes a special owner to handle a critter with a problem. Good for you and her!