Just waiting for my cat's beautiful tail to drop off 😭

[LaChatte]

Nine days ago I got home from work to find DCat with a limp tail. Called the vet who wouldn't see him until Friday (one week to the day) as it wasn't urgent. Took him in for an x-ray (already knew it was broken). Vet gave us three choices:

1. Operate on it to fix it, would be purely esthetic and cat would suffer for no benefit to him. 1000€.
2. Amputate it next week, not really beneficial to DCat. 350€.
3. Let nature do its thing and just leave it to fall off, no pain to DCat, no extra cost to us. Vet said it was she would do.

So now I'm just waiting for it to fall off, it was such a beautiful floofy tail 😭 I am not looking forward to finding it wherever it falls off. DCat is very annoyed as he obviously has no feeling in the part after the break and now seems to think he's got something attached to his tail.

That's appalling treatment from your vet. It is an emergency. As tail injuries can also damage the spinal cord. I Personally would have it amputated if the injury is irreversible. Much fairer to the cat. And he'll bounce back quicker.

In many years in cat rescue and more years following cat groups etc online I've never heard of this. Any cat with a tail injury has always had a prompt amputation. Go to a different vet for a second opinion ASAP.

Poor cat. Amputation would have been my choice. Your vet sounds very uncaring. Leaving a week to see poor puss is awful, what if it was a disease or serious injury that has caused the issue.

I phoned the only other vet in the area and explained, got the same opinion 🤷🏼‍♀️. Other than it annoying him he's fine (we are giving him antibiotics and an anti inflammatory for a week). I am gutted about it all though

Keep us updated, OP, I'm intrigued. Cross fingers that the wait & let it happen option goes as well as vets predicted.

Limp tail is an emergency and you should have taken him to an emergency vet . I take it from the € that you are not in the UK . The vet needs reporting .

I had a cat whose tail was damaged and it was just left on. His spine was damaged as a result and he became doubly incontinent. One vet I saw about it was furious the tail had been recommended to be left on by another vet. Said the damage done was unnecessary and cruel.

In my long career as a vet nurse i have never heard of this being done , how does the vet describe what will happen , is there a tissue injury as well as bone damage ? if there is he could develop a nasty infection well before it may drop off , is the vet suggesting treatment other than amputation if this is the case ? , if no skin lesion i can't see how it will drop off and the vast majority of cat tail injuries are very painful .
Is he going to the toilet normally , there are lots of knock on problems that can occur from a tail injury.
I don't think you have been advised correctly also not sure how a 2nd vet telephone conversation would say the same thing when the usual advice from any vet would be amputation .
Please get the poor cat treated appropriately by a vet who knows what they're doing !

I'm in France, seeing as both vets said the same not sure reporting them would make much of a difference (nor who I'd report them to).
The break is about 3 cm from the tip (when I called that was the first question both vets asked so I don't know if that has any kind of impact). Its not altering his movement at all, he can still run, jump and use the litter as normal. Hasn't put him off his food either. He does occasionally flick it as if there's something stuck to the end of it though.

So he will lose 3cm? That is sad, but I had imagined his whole lovely tail being lost; maybe losing the tip is not a threat to his health otherwise (I hope this is the case).

Yes he will lose about 3 cm, I
He'll still have a fair length of tail, but it just seems so awful. No idea how it happened, assuming it got shut in a door.

How is DCat doing now?

Was it an open wound?
Or was it a tail pull injury where two vertebrae have become separated?
Or was there a fracture of a vertebrae?
Open wound needs prompt surgical attention. The open would could see part of the tail fall off, but doing this runs the risk of tracking infection.
Tail pull or fracture advice now is good quality pain relief and watching waiting brief for 4 weeks. If function has not returned at 4 weeks then carry out an amputation. With neither if these injuries would part of the tail fall off.

Well 3cm is quite different to his entire tail dropping off.

It's very different.

It's not his whole "beautiful floofy tail" dropping off

No wonder the OP got such panicked responses.

I've come across similar people, people who say they "chopped their thumb off" with a knife when cooking.

When what the mean is they nicked a tiny bit of skin off the tip.

Strange.