Hi Friends,
It's been a while again since I've been online. You can't believe the computer issues I've had. Got another virus again. Not sure why I even have virus protection. Anyhow...

My 12 yr. old Calico, Puddy, is in hospital tonight. Shortly after my Peeka's passing, Puddy began exhibiting the same symptoms of kidney failure and, of course, I rushed her to my vet. Long story short, misdiagnosis. He was looking for kidney disease and/or failure. But her symptoms changed and she was obviously in a lot of pain. Puddy has never been a vocal cat and she is NOT warm and fuzzy. Puddy keeps to herself; she's a cool cat; she loves to hang w/the humans. But don't touch or she'll remind you who's boss. But she started crying and at first we thought it was because she had to be left there for testing, etc. and when she heard my voice in the waiting room, she really carried on. But then the crying persisted, then escalated to near screaming. I just wasn't getting answers from my vet, so I called the vet who took such good care of Yoda w/all that transpired w/the ear polyp. Well, he took one look at her x-rays and said "She has an enlarged colon. Did you know that?" I said "No, I certainly did not." So Puddy being Puddy, she will not allow herself to be handled in any way, so she had to be sedated again just so he could do some preliminary testing. He called me later and said "You have a few min. to decide. I need to do a biopsy and needle biopsies just aren't reliable w/the colon. I'd have to do an exploratory and biopsy. Do you want to do it now or bring her back?" I gave permission to do it right then.

He did biopsies of her colon, liver, kidneys and pancreas. He said that when he did her colon, that liquid feces ran out. He said "No wonder she was in so much pain." And her pancreas was inflamed. After that her temp. dropped alarmingly low so they "heated her up" and her temp. rose from 91 to 98.3 and is still rising. If she remains groggy enough, the IV will stay in and I'll prob. be able to take her home tomorrow. He suspects a tumor on her pancreas and/or hypoglycemia.

My question: how can a team of 4 doctors look at the x-rays and miss an enlarged bowel? This vet suspected it before he even looked at the x-ray! The man is gifted; I think he's an empath. Bottom line is that my Puddy suffered needlessly. The drive to the vet's office this morning is over an hour long and by this time, she couldn't walk and she was screaming, almost like a woman. I was frantic!

I guess I just need to vent but I feel so bad that I wasted time w/the other vet/s when Dr. Lee could have saved Puddy so much suffering, not to mention that he could've saved me $400. Tomorrow is going to cost me that much just for the prelims, plus the surgery. Puddy is worth it, for sure, but that $400 could've gone to Dr. Lee. And Puddy would've had some rest and been relieved of pain and suffering.

Please pray for my Puddy girl, that she'll let the staff handle her and that I can bring her home. My house just isn't the same w/out my little Calico brat cat.

Thanx and blessings,
Mary