Thursday Evening - Queen Bernadette, a beautiful Dilute Calico, curled up on the bed with Princess Leah, a beautiful Russian Blue, and Queen Catherine, my beautiful wife. Queen Catherine was not feeling well and welcomed their company. Both of the felines were rescued through a shelter and had been with us for a while. Queen Catherine was definitely not getting out of bed. The two Royal Felines kept her company. But something was amiss with Queen Bernadette (Queenie). She was obviously not carrying her normal weight, and there was a distinct yellow coloration to her ears.

Saturday - No doubt, something was seriously amiss with Queenie. A nasty accident was revealed on the comforter. and she was very yellow. We called the vets to be referred to an emergency vet a few miles up the road. We made an appointment, tucked her into the cage and headed up. A very professional atmosphere, clean and well kept. We were quickly ushered into a small room decorated with cat items. We brought Queenie out of the cage and cuddled her, fearful of what we were about to face. The vet tech had a hard time listening to Queenie's heart, she was purring too loudly. Slight elevation in temperature. The Vet came in and talked about blood tests and scans and treatment options. They left to prepare the estimate.

A while later the estimate was presented. The listing was quite detailed, and came to a total of $800! On the other side of the folder was a glossy brochure that offered financing. The Vet Tech explained that covered through about 5 o'clock that night. If she was there overnight, it would be another $200! And if they could find out the cause, or even if they didn't know, the treatment usually required four days in the hospital, at $500 a day! A feeding tube would have to be inserted. Our shock was evident. They scurried around and offered to knock off $200 by doing an xray, not as good, instead of the MRI. We carefully put her back in the cage and went to leave.

They were shocked and began the whole guilt trip thing. But how could I justify risking my daughters' college funds to take care of a cat? It wasn't like it was easy, but it was pretty obvious that I could not risk $3,000 and not even know if the cat would live. It took a while, but they finally let us leave. The vet made it clear that she didn't like the course of treatment we elected. However, we were armed with a prescription for an antibiotic, two plastic syringe bodies and two cans of a special high calorie cat food. The directions were that if the health of the cat was to be regained, and if nothing was really terribly wrong, she had to get food and water into her system to reverse the jaundice and stop the liver from trying to digest the rest of the body.

We set up a kitty hospital in the upstairs bathroom. The one with the heated floor. A big comfy pillow and several towels, with a bowl of dry food and water and a personal litter box completed the facilities. Outside was a baking timer and the syringes. Every twenty minutes it would ring and we would squeeze a syringe full of food down her throat followed by a syringe of water. All day Saturday, all day Sunday, all day Monday the routine went. Twice a day, two eyedroppers full of antibiotic. We babied our baby, holding her every chance we got.

Tuesday I went to our vet and was able to obtain a couple more cans of the high calorie food. The yellow was fading, but it wasn't gone. But Queenie was not as light as she had been, she was using the litter box and had been caught sniffing the food and water a couple times. She was given the run of the house again, returning to the use of the litterbox in the basement under her own power. Breakthrough! Some of the syringe load fell on the towel and Queenie licked it up. It took a few more days and she started eating small amounts of normal canned food on her own. We cheered everytime we saw her drink some water. The color was returning to normal. It has been over three weeks now. Queen Bernadette amused us last night chasing her tail in the middle of the living room. Her fur is softer than ever and she is just as pleasant and catlike as you could wish!

Vet Emergency Room Charge $80
Prescription for Antibiotic $0 (Thank you Meijer!)
Five cans of High Calorie Cat food $8
Having Queenie back Priceless!