Our cat has used up most of his nine lives
May 11th, 2008 - Posted by Alan Howard
Deidre found Spike yesterday morning sitting on one of the chairs in our outdoor setting. He'd been out all night, which was a first. We found out why when we saw a huge chunk of flesh taken out of his side. After quickly rushing him to the vet, we sat down while watching them running around out the back dealing with the emergency that was our cat.
Turned out that the chunk wasn't the extent of his wound. He'd done something to himself, maybe fallen onto something that pretty much sliced him open, but didn't cut through his muscle fiber. To the vet's surprise, as they were cleaning up the wound that was only about five inches in length, he 'fell apart'. The cut ended up being more than 12 inches in length, travelling from just to the right of his spine, going down across his stomach, and back halfway up his left side.
The vet took pictures, because he'd never treated an injury on a cat to that extent before. After over 100 sutures, he now looks like some kind of Frankenstein creation. But recovering well, it seems. We're picking him up this afternoon.
I'm hoping he learns from this experience, and doesn't ever again do whatever it was he did, that resulted in whatever it was that happened. It cost $1,000 for the treatment, not something we were expecting to pay, and not something either of us want to deal with again. As of this week, pet insurance is number one priority.
Entry Filed under: Pets
5 Responses to “Our cat has used up most of his nine lives”
Posted: May 12th, 2008 at
I feel for you with the cat!, I’d be pretty shocked if anything like that happened to one of ours!
Posted: May 15th, 2008 at
Thanks Damian. It’s not a nice experience to go through, especially for the cat!
Posted: May 24th, 2008 at
Hi Alan, what a nasty experience! We’ve got a cat too, but she’s strictly indoors. We don’t even have a cat door at our place. We got as an indoor cat, and she’s remained that way so she never wants to go out. Would you consider keeping your cat indoors too? I am astounded at the number of cats that streak in front of my car on their journey home in the evenings. I wonder how many make it back alive?
Posted: Jun 7th, 2008 at
Alan,
Oh, my goodness. It’s almost hard to imagine what he encountered to sustain such an injury. About 6 years ago my cat, who used to be quite the prowler, got into it pretty good one night with another cat. I’m not sure if he got the best of the other cat or not, but it certainly got the best of him. When I came home from work one night, I found him sitting in from of the door in a way that didn’t seem quite right. That’s when I noticed one of his eyes had been poked out. What a trip to the vet that was. But my cat has long since healed from that misadventure, and has even tolerated being the butt of my jokes. I offered to get him a cat’s eye marble to replace the one he lost, but he didn’t think too much about that. He’s in an indoor cat now. Which is good since I don’t have to worry about what he might run into if I were to let him roam around outside. Besides that, when I leave for work in the morning, it’s good to know he’ll keep an eye on things for me while I’m gone.
Posted: Jun 7th, 2008 at
Oh God no, not the puns!
A friend of mine had exactly the same issue, with his cat losing its’ eye in a fight. It happened about 12 or so years ago, and it’s a lot older now, and getting a cataract on its remaining eye. It’s blind, deaf, and yet is still an outdoor cat.
I’m hoping that the rest of this cat’s life will be less troublesome…
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