Post surgery recovery vest

[Pineapple5678]

My kitten was spayed 10 days ago, jas not paid attention to the wound what so ever and then yesterday we wake up to find she has pulled all her stitches out and has a gaping hole.
Took her to the out of hours vet who has had to put her back under general in order to re stitch her. She now has a vest she has to wear for 2 weeks and she hates it! She has literally turned into a slug and refuses to walk at all. She stands up then flops down sideways. Defo not an issue medically as if you take it off she runs around merrily however I literally cannot afford for her to rip them out again so it has to stay on. Has anyone experienced similar, have any advice?

[Frdd]

Ahah bless her.

[BrightSunshineDay]

Generally the vests are tolerated better than the collars and if its stopping her moving around that's not a bad thing. Cats jumping about tend to have delayed healing to wounds due to the constant disruption to wound healing. She'll probably get used to it in a couple of days.

[TheHighestSardine]

She'll get over it. You could try her in a cone of shame instead, I suppose.

[Toddlerteaplease]

Is she a snow shoe? She looks like she's going to kill you.

[Bargebill19]

Yep. Day three and I took them off. Less hassle and no problems.

[Bargebill19]

We are in day 8 post surgery. All three are happily doing what Arfer is doing - in their side napping in the sun.

[Fluffycloudland77]

She looks fit to murder you all.

[Elieza]

She’s adorable as a slug OP!

At least she’s taking it easy and that will heal her stitches, wee sausage.
😻

[Fluffycloudland77]

Is she any better now?. It must have hurt to do that to herself, you’d think the pain would stop them.

[eurochick]

The vet gave us the wrong ones without any "exit" holes so as soon as she needed a wee we had to get it off and go back for collars.

[Gin4thewin]

Mine HATED hers. Second i got her home she was getting her teeth behind the glue trying to rip it off. I kept it on for a month in the end until completely healed as she would not leave it alone!

She walked like a hunchback, refused to use her litter tray and was such a pain for a few weeks.

She eventually licked and groomed a hole in it and proceed to rip said hole bigger so i took that as it was time to go

[Bargebill19]

@eurochick yep our vet did that with two of ours - cue quick surgery to ensure poo exited cleanly. Kittens not impressed. Third kitten had all the relevant holes - decided not to poo...

[Ursula4007]

I bought the most expensive well-reviewed one of these when my girl was spayed because she HATED the cone. Vet said it was inescapable. Took her about 3 minutes to Houdini herself out of it then she was straight back in the cone.

[Pineapple5678]

She kept taking the cone off, she is rolling around a little better now. Still a little concerned that I haven't seen her use the tray all day defo no poo.

Cats are very good at sulking.

[Ibizafun]

Mine’s having her op next week.. just to clarify, with the vest you cut a hole so they can poo?

[Bargebill19]

One of mine had a vest with a proper bum poo hole. The other two didn’t - the only hole was tiny and the tail went through it. So we had to manhandle the kittens out of theirs, cut a hole and then get them back into the vest. Not easy! After day three of fighting to try and keep them in their vests, I had to to take them off as 1) they were very unhappy in them. 2) they were covered in poo and pee 3) I had to photograph the sutures and email the vet with them as per of their health check up.
Absolutely no way was I going to be able to catch them and redress them single handed. Dh and gone to work laughing.
Sorry but we’ve both said next time it will be collars only.

[Pineapple5678]

She is destroying her vest, and has now got escaping from. It down to a fine art.
I'm going to have to put her in a collar as well but the last one she just escaped from as well.

[Fluffycloudland77]

She’s done a number on that hasn’t she?.

[Bargebill19]

Sorry, but that has made my evening. !

[Gingerkittykat]

I ut holes round the neckline of the vest and put the collar through and it stopped the escape attempts.

I also did the same with the collar.

I also gave some time every day with the suit and collar off to let her clean herself. Obviously I was next to her the whole time and didn't let her lick her wound.

[diplodocusinermine]

Ours did exactly the same with refusing to walk and keeling over sideways - vet referred to her as 'The Diva'. And she managed to get out of the vest. We did the same as Gingerkittykat - a little while out of the suit each day under close observation. Luckily her wound healed really quickly and cleanly so I think she only wore the suit for about 5 days. She had no problems eating or using her tray.