Tale of Two Kitties

A few weeks ago we were taking our oldest cat Nomad into the vet for a routine checkup but when we arrived he wasn’t acting his normal self. He had started to hyperventilate, his gums were pale and his pupils dilated. He gets stressed out going to the vets but this was abnormal even for him. The vet put him on oxygen and gave him some lasics (can’t figure out what the spelling is, but they help remove fluid from the lungs) and let him chill for a few hours.

We took him home hoping that getting him back to his own environment would calm him down. Unfortunately, after two days his breathing was still abnormal, and any stress would make him hyperventilate. We decided to take him to the vet’s again, although this time to a different one, as we thought the other vet shouldn’t have let him go home with us two days before.

The new vet immediately saw him in his distress and performed a series of xrays. They revealed a heart about 50% larger than is normal. The vet wrote a referral to a specialist clinic and Nomad and I immediately drove off to this new hospital.

There the vet immediately put him on oxygen and ordered and ultrasound and echo. She put him on lasics and enalapril and decided to keep him for a few days for observation. The diagnosis was some sort of unspecified cardiomyopathy, heart failure, basically. Thankfully, when I went back to pick him up he was breathing regularly, and with a regular regimen of pills we hoped he could remain relatively healthy, perhaps even for years.

We went out of town (to Austin for a conference) for a few days and during this time had Nomad borded at a medical clinic where we were sure he’d get the proper care. Unfortunately as soon as I picked him up and brought him home he started hyperventilating again. This time was worse than before, you could hear fluid in his lungs and he would lay down to cough. It was horrible watching him.

We ran him back to the vet (the second vet, the specialist wasn’t available). By the time we got there he was coughing up fluids and really struggling for breath. His gums were pure white, he was definitely oxygen deprived. After consulting with the vet we decided that stabilizing him again wasn’t likely to be in his best interest. It takes several days and he’s likely in considerable pain during the process. Plus if it only lasts for a few days, it’s just not practical to spend over $2000 just to get a few relatively peaceful days for the cat. We decided to euthanize him so that he wouldn’t be in any more discomfort.

Watching him and petting him while he was injected and died was pretty sad, but it was better than watching him struggle for breath and coughing up fluids. This is my favorite picture of Nomad and how I’ll always remember him.

Nomad’s little brother (not literally, they’re not brothers and he’s quite a bit bigger) Leo was clearly distressed without his playmate. So we decided to rescue a new cat for him to play with. So yesterday we adopted Luna from the APL. It’s funny, she’s fully grown but looks like a miniature version of Leo (7 pounds versus 16) – they have nearly identical coloration and markings. They’re still hissing at each other on occasion, but it seems like they’ll get along with a bit of tme.

I’ll post some pictures of Luna when I get some good ones.

Update: I don’t think I ever mentioned, we had adopted a dog named Max back around December. Unfortunately we did end up having to give Max back to the adoption agency. Our great dog experiment ended rather in failure.