Cat in surgery after swallowing ribbon

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My cat has been vomitting over the last few days, phoned the vets yesterday and got him booked in for this morning. Scooping the litter tray last night and found he's passed some ribbon and realised we'd taken ribbon off him on Wednesday that he was trying to chew. Hes had xrays done and the vet has just called, it doesnt look good. They are now going to operate straight away, leaving it any longer could be too late. I'm absolutely dreading the bill, we do have insurance but it only covers £1000 per illness. My boy is worth it though. I never really thought how badly my cat could be hurt by us getting some balloons for my sons birthday 😭.

Has anyone else had this happen and their cat made a full recovery?

It’s because you took him to the vets for no reason at all and now he’s sore 😃the mantra of all cats at the vet is “I’m fine, why are we here?”

@hartof i absolutely will be asking them to increase the amount on all 3 of the cats! I've never needed to use insurance until now luckily. They're indoor cats (we live on a busy road), they have a health check every 6 months and get the boosters yearly so we've managed to avoid any vet treatment until now. One of the vets was telling me she has increased hers to 7k per illness for her cat because of how expensive it is.

@FormerlyPathologicallyHappy that's absolutely it. He seems fine with my husband but I'm the one thats taken BatCat to the vet and left him, so obviously I'm needing punishing 🤦🏻‍♀️. He'll forgive me soon enough I'm sure 😂

Yes I have increased mine to £7k. I was paying £10 a month now it's £25 but it's worth it because when we were going through this we honestly thought if the vet bills continued we'd have to just bring him home and see what happened. Never want to be in that situation again, he's a house cat never had to make a claim before. 🤞 we don't need to again (it'll be Sod's Law that we don't after increasing the premium 😂)

@hartof also 4 grand, my eyes are watering. I'm grateful they let me bring him home last night to avoid the costs of an overnight stay. Our vet has been fantastic thankfully.

Glad he seems to be feeling himself a bit more. And that doughnut collar is very dashing!

Hope he's your friend again soon.

So glad he's ok - and he's a beauty, even with a doughnut cushion around his head 🤣

FWIW I'd recommend ManyPets insurance, although they did take AGES to pay out recently, they have always paid with no quibbles and I find the policies to be comprehensive and good.

Well, the vets managed to miss a good 2ft of ribbon that was still inside him. It came out last night, I'll be going up to the vets this morning to ask how and what we need to do next.

I wonder if it was on its way out and they knew it would be ok so didn’t cut into the bowel which would have been a big complication?

He is such a beautiful boy. I’m so glad he is ok. His donut is exceptionally cool too!

Hopefully that's the last of it, do you think there could be more?

I saw the vet and he said that because the ribbon is so thin he wasn't able to feel it in the intestine, and he didn't want to make random cuts all along to try and find something that we were not entirely certain was there, and because there was no noticeable blockages, inflammation or any places that had be cut open by it and the actual length of the intestines he could still have missed it had he made the incisions. I'm not too concerned about that now, its out and he's back to acting like an idiot as usual and eating his usual food so we just keep monitoring and ensuring he leaves his stitches alone 🤞🏻

But he was also shocked at the amount of ribbon that he'd managed to eat 🤦🏻‍♀️.

I'm amazed you've survived making him wear a doughnut collar. 🤣🤣 Glad he's doing well.

What a gorgeous cat, especially sporting that fetching doughnut collar! I'm so pleased he's n the mend, and can hardly believe he managed to munch away at so much ribbon.

He's the spitting image of my cat! Particularly wearing that doughnut - ours had to wear one for a few weeks last year. Just be careful of it though... Our cat escaped outside whilst she was wearing it, and then managed to get her front leg stuck in it trying to get it off. She had snuck under the fence to next door and I had quite a challenge getting her back whilst she was struggling with her leg - I thought she was going to break it (the leg!). I promptly cut the doughnut off her and reverted to a traditional cone!

@Toddlerteaplease luckily hes a fairly placid cat, he was fine with me putting it on but did try to get it off after a while. He'd let me put it on him again too 😂

@ReviewingTheSituation oh gosh, glad she was ok. He's only had the doughnut on for a little, he hasn't shown anymore interest in the stitches since. I will definitely be careful though, he does like to try to escape occasionally, then the traffic terrifies him 🫣

@PushkaMcgee I'm shocked at the amount he ate, I don't even know how he managed to get it without us seeing it, he's a sneaky devil. I would upload the picture, but I'm not sure a dirty ribbon is something many would like to see.

He is currently acting entirely like his normal self, and appears to have forgiven me for taking him to the vets (till tomorrow, then hell despise me again).