UPDATE HERMES HAS *HERPIES*! My Little Man Hermes Eye Issue

[Anikaca77]

Hi All,

As you all know my little man (Hermes) is a very sensitive boy, he is over 1 yr old and he's been having this drainage from his one eye.

He doesn't have any other cold symptoms or anything just this one eye. It's sorta a black gooey crust that keeps building up. Also, the pink around his one eye looks sorta puffy but I don't want to put any type of eye cream on his eye because I don't want to cause any sort of infection or cause a different reaction.

Has anyone else had this happen? or any suggestions how to try to clear it up?


Thanks,
Melissa

[Catlady711]

If the eye looks red or puffy you probably need to see the vet as that could be an eye infection starting and needs medication.

Eye goobers are fairly common (most of my cats get them a couple times a week) but their eye lids are not red or puffy. For mine I just wipe their eyes with a cotton ball to get those nasty looking goobers out.

[Lizzie]

I don't think you have any choice but a trip to the vet. I can see the pink even on your photo so it is obvious. Better to treat an infection right away, as you know. I've sometimes used my own stash of Terramycin for mild eye infections in my foster kittens, but even that can cause a reaction of more inflammation.

[catmandu]

We Hope That You Can Get Hermes To The Vet Asap As This Must Not Be Comfortable For Your Companion At All. And We Pray That Its Something That Your Vet Can Heal With A Little Ointment!!!

[Anikaca77]

Yeah I have my own stash of eye treatments for my one girl cat Claudia who seems to always get the running eye at least once a year but with Hermes I didn't want to take the chance in case it was something that would cause a reaction.

I don't think you have any choice but a trip to the vet. I can see the pink even on your photo so it is obvious. Better to treat an infection right away, as you know. I've sometimes used my own stash of Terramycin for mild eye infections in my foster kittens, but even that can cause a reaction of more inflammation.

[momcat]

This most definitely sounds like a question best put to your vet. Prayers going out for your sweet Hermes that the problem is nothing serious and with proper treatment will clear up quickly.

[Anikaca77]

Well my little man went to the vets on Friday.

My husband and I took him and we have a little adventure. My husband couldn't stand that he was crying in the cat carrier and offered to hold him instead so I said fine and sure enough Hermes wiggled out of his arms and jumped under my seat causing us to pull into a parking lot to get him out from underneath the seat and my husband cut his hand under my seat and finally got Hermes out and when he got back in the front seat he goes Hermes bleeding and I said no it's you and so he held Hermes the whole way to the vets and we were both covered in white cat fur.

You wouldn't believe how much hair came off this little guy.

Well anyway, the vet did a dye test with a black light to see if he had any scratches or anything on his eye and he had a few specs so she gave us some eye meds and his eye still didn't look any better by Sunday so I figured I'd better give the vet a call on Monday.

So I called them and they wanted to see him today at 9 a.m. so we went he joined me a work for a little while this morning and took him to the vets and she looked at his eye again and she did the dye test and he no longer has the spots on his eyes. I also mentioned to her while I was there about his gums and him not chewing his food. She said that he does have really bad gingivitis and she's thinking with all of his symptoms and even when I first got him he had an URI that she's pretty sure he has Herpes.

Well she said it's treated and she could do a test to figure out if he does have Herpes but the vet said that test is pretty pricey. So for now we are going to give him meds for 5 days (and this med smells so bad and the vet said it taste bad too I'll just take her word for it) and then in another 3 months I'll do the same thing again.

So that's the update on Hermes for now.

[Anikaca77]

Actually Hermes is much better now.

He still has Herpes but over all he's in great health. We give him Elysine (spelling?) and that seems to help with his out breaks.

Thanks,
Melissa

[pomtzu]

Years ago my son had a cat with Herpes - his chin would swell when he had an outbreak. The vet never had him on any regular meds, and he lived a fairly long and otherwide healthy life (he went to RB at about 13).

[Catlady711]

Actually Hermes is much better now.

He still has Herpes but over all he's in great health. We give him Elysine (spelling?) and that seems to help with his out breaks.

Thanks,
Melissa

Did you mean Lysine? We use that one at work for kitties with herpes, mixed results with it. Some it does a great job on helping them, on others some improvement but not great. I'm glad it seems to be working for Hermes.

Did they say how expensive the test is? If it's not all that bad it might be worth doing if he hates his meds so much he makes himself sick. Dusty used to do that with anything oral and we eneded up having to give most everything by injection because she'd get so upset.

Thank you for posting an update. Give Hermes a hug for me.

[Anikaca77]

Hi there, I think it's that but I'll have to look when I go home.

It works fine for him.

I'm not sure what test you are referring to. Hermes has since stopped throwing up we found out it was cat nip from a plant that he doesn't agree with him and makes him throw up.

Hermes is all better other than the Herpes and his tale thing now but we are trying to get that under control.

Thanks,
Melissa

Did you mean Lysine? We use that one at work for kitties with herpes, mixed results with it. Some it does a great job on helping them, on others some improvement but not great. I'm glad it seems to be working for Hermes.

Did they say how expensive the test is? If it's not all that bad it might be worth doing if he hates his meds so much he makes himself sick. Dusty used to do that with anything oral and we eneded up having to give most everything by injection because she'd get so upset.

Thank you for posting an update. Give Hermes a hug for me.

[Catlady711]

Hi there, I think it's that but I'll have to look when I go home.

It works fine for him.

I'm not sure what test you are referring to. Hermes has since stopped throwing up we found out it was cat nip from a plant that he doesn't agree with him and makes him throw up.

Hermes is all better other than the Herpes and his tale thing now but we are trying to get that under control.

Thanks,
Melissa

Maybe I missed a couple posts when I was reading. I thought at one point your vet said you could do a test to be sure it's herpes so you'd know if you had to keep giving the Lysine or not. Sometimes I'm doing several things online at once so I may have confused something.

I'm glad things are improving with the vomiting. I hope things go just as well with everything else and he'll be good as new in no time.

[Anikaca77]

I think the one post you might of saw about Hermes was a test they were going to perform if he didn't stop vomiting but we found out the reason and since then he's been healthy and fine!

Thanks!
Melissa

Maybe I missed a couple posts when I was reading. I thought at one point your vet said you could do a test to be sure it's herpes so you'd know if you had to keep giving the Lysine or not. Sometimes I'm doing several things online at once so I may have confused something.

I'm glad things are improving with the vomiting. I hope things go just as well with everything else and he'll be good as new in no time.

[moosmom]

Anika,

MooShoo had a herpes virus in both his eyes. It caused scar tissue on both his corneas. He's partially blind in his left eye and is completely blind in his right. The ophthalmologist said that while they can try surgery to remove more of the scar tissue, I have to remember that herpes can be aggravated by the stress of the surgery, causing more scar tissue to form on his corneas. In other words, what I have is what I get, which is fine with me, as long as he's happy and healthy.

MooShoo's eyes do tend to get dry. The vet told me to use "Natural Tears" in his eyes to keep them moist.

[Anikaca77]

Hi Moosmom:

We can tell for sure when Hermes gets stressed and his herpes is acting up because his eyes get all red around the rims and he'll start sneezing.

So this tail issue with trying to wash it twice a week is making his herpes flair up but I think I'm going to try to trim the hair that way I don't have to stress him out too much or for too long. The last bath I gave him he was very unhappy with me because I ended up having to wash the rest of him because the stuff on his tail ended up getting on him.

We'll see...my husband doesn't want to shave his tail but I think for his sake we better just do it and that way his skin will have time to heal.

Melissa

Anika,

MooShoo had a herpes virus in both his eyes. It caused scar tissue on both his corneas. He's partially blind in his left eye and is completely blind in his right. The ophthalmologist said that while they can try surgery to remove more of the scar tissue, I have to remember that herpes can be aggravated by the stress of the surgery, causing more scar tissue to form on his corneas. In other words, what I have is what I get, which is fine with me, as long as he's happy and healthy.

MooShoo's eyes do tend to get dry. The vet told me to use "Natural Tears" in his eyes to keep them moist.