Hand holding welcomed!

[BuilderMammy]

Our gorgeous old Mittens hurt her leg two weeks ago. Yesterday the vet gave her a general anaesthetic to x-ray it and put it in a cast, because she seems to have torn her achilles tendon.

She came home last night panting really fast; we rang the vet who was concerned but said that she was probably hallucinating due to the drugs; she'd given her a slightly unusual mix due to her age (she's 10).

She cried a lot during the night, and this morning was still immobile. Her legs were all completely stiff, we couldn't flex them at all and she couldn't seem to move them, or her tail.

We took her back to the vet this morning and she said the anaesthetic seems to have made her have a small stroke, and the resulting oxygen deprivation seems to have caused brain damage.

She says she might recover, but there's nothing she can do to help other than keep her hydrated. So she's down there now on a drip, and we've to wait and see how things go over the next couple of days.

She's the darling of everyone who knows her, she's an absolute sweetheart and even loves the kids. She comes over to snuggle with them if they cry, and puts up with all sorts of manhandling from DS. In the evenings you never see DH without her, either draped across his shoulders or curled up on his knee, and when I'm on the couch she likes to hunch up against the back of my neck and purr (and dribble!) in my ear. When she jumps down off things she honks like a clown car and we're fairly certain she actually thinks she's a dog. We'd be lost without her.

And of course it's a huge reminder of when DS was born, when we had the whole oxygen deprivation-brain damage-wait and see scenario too. Thankfully he seems unaffected so far but this is bringing back some very unwelcome memories.

I'm feeling to much at the moment to make sense of.

Glad to hear that Mittens is home but sorry that she's still not at all well.

In terms of quality of life - I have had this chat a few times over the last year or so with my vet. His view is that if a cat is pottering around independently (even if slowly), coming over to enjoy a stroke or a fuss being made of it and is able to eat, drink, groom & use a litter tray - then there is probably at least an ok quality of life

Last year we had 3 year old and 5 year old children, a 17 year old blind cat, an 18 year old cat dying of kidney failure and an unexpected arrival of a tiny stray kitten, which we kept. It was a nightmare trying to juggle the different needs of all of the cats & children, and stop the children from tripping up the blind cat/smothering the kitten with love etc. I have to say, with much guilt, that it was almost a relief when my old girl cat did die because I had been spending so much time & energy nursing her along & worrying about her.

My blind cat is, at the moment, still able to do all of the things on my vet's "quality of life" list so we are plodding on with him

Things can change very quickly after a stroke so keeping an eye on Mittens for a few days sounds like a good plan - at least, whatever you decide, you will know she's been given every chance.

Just to say as well, I have never had to cope with a cat after a stroke but the blindness on its own need not necessarily be a huge problem - the vet was quite positive about my cat coping with it actually (althoguh with my cat he probably lost his sight gradually so was able to adapt a bit). We just take care not to have any major moving around of furniture etc and we talk to the cat a lot more, also tap the floor or the arm of the sofa so that he knows where we are & where to put his paws. The children are pretty good with him and do take care give him extra space. The biggest potential snag is that we don't leave him on his own at home overnight now, so we don't all go away together as a family. We couldn't put him into a cattery because he wouldn't cope with the complete change of environment.

Thanks for that, timtam. We're actually settling into the whole thing a bit better now; she's not as stressed by the kids any more and is very relaxed, and the kids have been great at leaving her alone so far. Obviously we never leave them alone with her, and won't, but it's going okay so far. So DH and I are less panicked and more able to see it as a viable longterm situation.

She ate food from a spoon last night instead of the syringe, and ate about half a slice of ham from DH's hand (not ideal, I know, but she loves the stuff and it's getting her eating!). And she actually had a little wander around the garden (going up and down a step and everything!), under very close supervision obviously.

On the other hand, she's still walking headfirst into furniture a lot. And her legs aren't right; every so often she'll miss a step or one of them will just go from under her and she'll fall over. And she can't reach most of herself to groom, because she can't control her body properly. She can really only reach her chest and her front paws; the rest of her is way out of reach of her tongue at the moment. Oh, and she'll be licking her chest and move her head a bit and end up licking the blanket she's lying on; she doesn't seem to know the difference.

She does seem reasonably content though, and not stressed, as far as we can tell.

Well I think she's still making excellent progress - eating by herself? It may not have been much but it's a good advance from you having to syringe feed her everything.

Remember, if she had brain damage, some new part of her brain is trying to take over from the damaged part and is having to re-learn some basic tasks. Once something is discovered/conquered there's a bit of consolidation and then it can be lodged and 'On to the next one.' Like human stroke victims, really.

It's still early days - and total success may not be guaranteed - but it sounds fairly positive to me.

(I wouldn't worry too much about the ham. Sure, it's not ideal but if it acts as a temporary learning aid, eh? And it's a good treat for an older girl who's been through a lot: Seniorboy's diet has gone all to heck since he's been unwell - ham, bits of roast chicken and 'squirty cream'. (Luckily, he's not lactose intolerant.))

(I refuse to answer questions about how I happened to have squirty cream in the household!)

I understand the medicinal properties of squirty cream - my uncle had an old german shepherd years ago who would only eat her dinner if it had squirty cream on top. And he was a chef, trained in the Ritz in Paris!

She's not really feeding herself, you have to hold the spoon up to her mouth and show her that it's there, and the same with the ham - it pretty much needs to touch her lips.

Gosh - did someone mention squirty cream? Seniorboy must have been posting while my back was turned - again!

I think that's OK for now. (The holding stuff to lips.) Not only is it a big improvement on only syringe feeding but you just clean don't know where the wiring has been screwed up - sight, smell, even hunger itself. (Also there might be some Metacam effect there for a bit - you'd have to check with a vet on that one.)

I would probably be betting that her sight is a bit dodgy at the moment - but HeyHo. You're all doing very well there - and if she's happy enough (and it sounds as if she is)........

PS - when Seniorboy had his minor stroke a year or two back, he became temporarily terrified of, among other things, books. (As an example of screwed up wiring.)

So pleased to read that Mittens is back home with you and recovering.

You are obviously lovely, caring owners.

Mippy is now eating normal food, and from a bowl : ) We still have to hold it to her nose to show her that it's there, and she's not eating her normal quantity, but it's a huge step forward.

And she's walking a lot more strongly - she actually looks a bit like herself again. We're delighted.

We rang the vet yesterday and she said not to bring her last night, that it sounds like she's nice and content where she is and it wouldn't be great to disturb her by bringing her down there again. So we're going to give her a few more days before her next checkup and see how things go.

Excellent! Try not to get too excited and confident because it's real early days still - but I would be hoping for consolidation on this and some more progress.

Sounding very positive.

WOW! That info in your last post sounds like huge progress. Here's to it continuing.

She's a very lucky cat to have humans who love her so much.

No change at all since Friday. I know that's only two days but I'm starting to wonder if this is as good as it's going to get?

She's still staggering a lot and collapsing occasionally. She can find her bowl and eat from it but she's just as likely to walk through it (or her water bowl) as she's wandering.

She seems to spend a lot of her moving around time wandering blindly in circles because she keeps crashing and can't work out where to go to get out of the loop.

She mostly stays on her cushion dozing. She was quite sedentary anyway but is more so now; I get the impression she just doesn't feel comfortable moving around. She never knows where there'll be a child or a toy - there's no consistency, and won't be for a number of years yet. The kids are just too small.

She can use the litter box fairly well but it's a huge effort to get into it. We tried a shallower one but she just kicked the litter all over the floor. And I'm not sure if she's always getting to it; she felt quite damp this morning on the side she was lying on, and it couldn't have been from grooming because she wouldn't have been able to reach that bit. There are relatively few areas that she's actually able to groom. And I'm reluctant to bath her, I think she's gone through quite enough lately! So brushing is as much as she's getting.

She can't jump up into the places she used to like being; the highest she can get is a cushion on the floor, and sometimes she only manages to get her front half up onto that before she gives up and lies down. She can't manage the stairs.

I'm not feeling particularly encouraged this morning.

Ach. That's the complication of having little ones around - in an adult house, you can more easily ensure that she would be in an ordered environment. So - not so good this morning.

Is there any possibility of trying her in a slightly more restricted environment for a short bit ? (A spare room, for example, where you could let her become used to her surroundings and from which you could restrict the DCs?)

Is she still on her metacam?

PS - but yes. If the damage was severe, it may be that this is as good as it's going to get. I know you said that you were going to give her until the beginning of the week at least to see how things went but you may have to be starting to think about how good her quality of life now is.

(I'm a little uneasy about the possibility of incontinence actually starting because that would make her feel rotten about herself, cats being so clean.)

We don't have anywhere we could put her, really. It's a small house. Thankfully the kids are being super about not crowding her though; it's just the toys.

I'm thinking hard about quality of life, believe me.

We're going to give her till the end of this week. At that stage we'll bring her back to the vet, who wants to see her again anyway, and have a chat. I think if there's still no change by then, we can assume she's improved as much as she's going to.

We want to give her as much of a chance as we can but even DH (who's besotted to a fairly extreme degree) doesn't think she can be happy the way she is.

Hard and sad times for you. I'll think positive thoughts though.

Keep us up to date - there's usually someone around here.

Actually we think the wetness wasn't wee - she's sitting on DH's lap at the moment and she's drooling all over him, he's soaked.

Poor Mittens. I will think positive thoughts but I have to say it's not sounding too hopeful. I completely sympathise with your problems of small house, small children and ailing cat - we had this last year and are going through it again now with elderly cat #2

She might adapt better to the blindness in time but it would need a fairly calm consistent environment I think

The drooling/staggering etc I'm afraid I have no experience of/advice about but if she is unable to swallow her own saliva I'm afraid that's a worry for me

My old cat spends a lot of his time asleep, we have been glad to get him through another winter as he does enjoy lazing around in the sunshine come spring/summer. We ask the kids to keep out of our bedroom so at least he can sleep there fairly undisturbed - also the eldest is a school now so we can regulate the daily chaos to some extent

Best take things day by day and keep a close eye on what you think her quality of life is like

Sad times, very sorry

I'm sorry she hasn't improved more, OP. Thinking of you and will be interested to hear your updates.

She's getting more active. She's still walking as badly as she was but she's doing more of it. And she's interacting with the kids a lot - walking up to them or coming over to investigate when DS is being changed. It's not like her; she used to be happy enough for them to come to her but would rarely approach DD and never DS. Now she's all over them and it's awkward, because DD is unsure about her now that she's so different and DS isn't as careful as we need him to be. He was on his ride-on horse yesterday and we had to whisk her out of the way a few times; neither of them has the sense or coordination to avoid a collision.

Also, she's determined to go out to the garden. We've let her out the back a few times (closely supervised) and she's had a good wander around, and then managed to find the door and get herself back in. But it means that every time we have a door open, she tries to make a break for it, and I'm afraid that she'll slip out the front door without us noticing (yesterday there were 6 of us wandering in and out the door for various reasons at one stage and she very nearly got out). There's no way she can be allowed near the road.

I'm just not convinced we can keep her as safe and secure as she needs to be, she's far too vulnerable and our house is too chaotic these days.

My parents (who also love her to bits and are very upset about all this) keep telling me she needs to be put to sleep because it's not fair to leave her like that, falling over her own feet and walking into things, and I keep arguing with them because I feel that we'd be treating her as something disposable, getting rid of her because she's too complicated and too upsetting. We've had her since she was 12 weeks old and she's part of the family. But I sort of agree with them. DH, on the other hand, doesn't. But he keeps leaving the front door open, encouraging the kids to play with her, or leaving the stair gate open (she can't manage the stairs properly, and one day when DH brought her up, she tried to walk through the bannisters on the landing and would have fallen down into the hall if he hadn't caught her). So I don't think he has fully thought through what it will take to keep her safe.

He's almost trying unconsciously to 'force her well' by power of mind? If so, that can happen - usually means someone is deeply attached and can't bear the thought of not having the animal around in its 'normal' state. (Sorry if that wasn't expressed well - knackered here.)

She sounds as if she's reverted to a semi-kitten state? You do sometimes get personality changes with brain damage and it looks as if she had some.

Yes, DH is absolutely nuts about her, and her about him. And yes, she's a bit kittenish, I think. But there's more to it than that. She doesn't have the same understanding that she did. I'm actually fairly convinced that she actually can see a certain amount, just doesn't understand what she's seeing at all. And the learning to walk is terribly hampered by the damaged tendon, so her back legs are all over the show. She actually trips over her back paws all the time and just falls over. And when you're holding her and put her down, she can't stand - she just collapses in a heap and then has to spend a few minutes trying to work out how to get her legs under her again. She's like a kitten, but a terribly damaged one.

Ach.

Leaving aside the issue of the difficulties for your family (which are not inconsiderable but Hey) - is she enjoying her life do you think?

I agree with cozietoes, as long as her actual quality of life is good then persevering is fine. If she doesn't seem happy, not eating well, being urinary and/or faecal incontinent, frighten by things, injuring herself further etc then sometimes the hardest decision has to be made.

Having a pet pts is really not as horrendous as some people might think, it's very calm and peaceful (only mentioning it in case that is what your DH is worried about). But I completely understand that it hard to detach yourself emotionally to makes these sorts of decisions

She seems happy enough to me. She eats, she potters around, she clearly enjoys wandering around the garden because she keep asking to go out. She purrs when she's cuddled, and follows DH looking to be picked up.

As far as the difficulties go, it's not us I'm worried about so much as her. I'm terrified watching the kids around her because I'm afraid she'll get hurt somehow, because she can't get out of the way with her legs collapsing out from under her.

To be honest, I'm just confused by the different messages I'm getting. My family all insist that she can't be left like that, whereas she doesn't strike me as particularly unhappy, just a bit confused, clumsy and bockety (which could also describe me a lot of the time!).