More Bun Drama

It's been a lousy few weeks for Bunny. The story is so convoluted and boring--I'll try not to ramble.

Bun takes a miracle drug twice a day to keep her regular. The University of Illinois' small animal clinic gets it from India, but the supply recently ran out (for good? conflicting stories!), and all animals on the drug needed to come in so their doctors could talk about alternatives. So Jeff and I brought Bun in.

During the exam, the doctor suspected that she had a urinary infection. She gets these about once a year, and after further tests, we learned that yes, that was the case. The antibiotics she had to take: 56 Clavamox pills over the next four weeks, which seems incredible. Bun hates pills, so this would be a twice-daily power struggle. I drew 56 erasable Bun faces on our kitchen chalkboard for motivational purposes. Fine.

Yesterday morning when we opened our bedroom door, Bun was not there to greet us and boss us around. This was highly irregular, so we started calling for her. She emerged from the living room and limped up to us. She didn't want to put much pressure on her back left foot, and as a result she was moving slightly sideways.The foot in question:

Jeff once had a little dog that had a stroke who moved the same way, so he immediately thought, stroke. Maybe it was a side-effect from the pills? He scooped her up in a towel and we both started crying and holding Bun like a baby. Our poor girl!

She seemed alert in every other way, though, and was not yowling in pain, but we knew we needed to get her to her local vet as soon as possible. Jeff held it together long enough to make the necessary call, we threw on some clothes, and we rushed her up to the vet just as it was opening.

Bun's kind of a big deal up there. Her file is one of the thickest they have, so everyone knows her little face. She is incredibly docile and sweet to all humans, and she also has this way of giving her doctors and other vet people homemade cookies "just 'cause." I took one look at the always-sympathetic C., working the desk as we blew in, and got hideously weepy as Jeff explained our situation. We were hustled into an exam room.

The first available doctor looked in Bun's eyes and did the usual exam, saying she wasn't showing any stroke symptoms. She suspected that Bun had injured her leg in some way and wanted to take some X-rays.

[fast forward through stressful waiting period where they kept Bun for a couple of hours]

The X-rays showed no signs of breakage. We were able to see that she was a bit constipated. ALL of Bun's doctors had looked at her and all concluded that she had not had a stroke. Consensus was that she had a soft tissue/tendon injury. They gave us something to treat her pain and we went home. I came up later with some cookies from Bun.

What could have caused the injury?

Theory A: Bun's kinda-pal Quixote likes to engage in grab-ass (see video below, and now I feel like such a jerk for chuckling)...

 

...and occasionally those two get into some knock-down, drag-outs during the wee hours.

Theory B: As Bun has aged, her ability to jump has declined. Last week I watched in horror as she attempted to jump from our dining room table to a window sill and missed, falling to the floor. Maybe something like that happened overnight.

But Bun has been frightened of Quixote since yesterday morning and actively hides from him now. So I'm leaning toward Theory A.

Attempts to give Bun her pain medication were met with a frothy, spitty, puking girl who was having none of it. She refused food for the rest of the day and hid in Jeff's office. Her eyes were dilated and I know she must have been in pain. We ended up sleeping on the floor beside her last night.

In the morning (5 a.m.) we all woke up. Happily, I was able to coax Bun into eating some of her dry food and drinking some water. She used her litter box a little--she had to have been almost totally dried out. Standing in the box seemed uncomfortable for her and I feel that's a top reason why she's avoiding it. Jeff managed to get her various meds in her. She's spent most of today in Jeff's office, eating and drinking a bit but not much. Jeff has become worried that she's not passing the stool we saw in her X-ray yesterday and, with the advice of her U of I doctor, he has upped her laxative dosage. We don't want this to turn into a repeat of two summers ago.

SO we are hoping that between now and 2 p.m. tomorrow, Bun will have had a successful litter box trip to Town #2. If not, she has another date with her U of I doctor. I really hope it doesn't come to that.

If you would like to donate some money toward Bun's hefty medical bills, I have a PayPal button on the right. Or please consider buying a print here, stuff here, or originals here. Thanks!

EDIT! It's late Friday morning, and I am pleased to announce that Bun gave birth (basically) to a bouncing baby boom-boom, as we call them. Actually, it was more like octuplet boom-booms. Crisis averted! Even though she's still got that sideways walk that will hopefully heal over time, Bun's feeling a lot perkier today. AND she gets to nap the afternoon away in her sunny basket, narrowly avoiding a scary, expensive trip to see her U of I doctors. GO BUN.

I mean, seriously, there was cheering going on in this house. People were dragged away from desks to gape at things in litter boxes.

And I would like to sincerely thank everyone who wished our cat well and donated some money to her cause. You almost completely paid her surprise expenses this week. Thank you very much for helping us. Bun loves you and wants to give you cookies, just 'cause. I was genuinely surprised that anyone had even bothered to read to the bottom of yesterday's post. I propose a toast to you, my dear readers. You made a little cat happy.

(I made it clear that Bun pooped today, right? She did not have a litter of kittens. I was trying to make a little joke and am saying this preemptively in case people didn't get it.)

Comments

[Cheryl D.]

Healing thoughts to Bun & Co - I'm sorry you and Jeff are faced with a less-than-cooperative patient. I will keep you guys in my thoughts! *hug*

[Angie M.]

So sorry to hear about Bun and hope she gets better soon. Sent a little donation. It's not much, but I hope it helps. Please keep us updated.

[Kelly]

Thanks Cheryl!

Angie, you are fabulous and beyond generous. <3

[Lynn]

Bad kitty Quixote. Feel better soon Buuunnnnn!