Virg'n Mary, that irreverent sisterhood, is well over 14 years old now, and this week we've been anticipating they may not be with us for too much longer. Virg has been tentative and timid with her food attack practices for some time, but this last week saw Mary pretty much shut up shop as well in terms of food intake. As much as they despise the outing, we bundled them into their blue transport cages and off to the vet we went.
Virg has turned from our 'lil fatty', all plump and cuddly with a tummy that hung down low and comically swayed side to side as she walked or ran, into a husk of her former self. Her spine is delineated and protruding, her haunches sunken and her once proud stomach just a vestige of its past glory. She has progressively got thinner, but it wasn't such an emergency as she has continued to eat her previously favoured dry food with great alacrity at times, even if with lesser volume.
Mary on the other hand, has always maintained both her appetite and her weight, although eating more furtively away from our prying eyes. When she decided to basically stop eating a week or so back, we were prompted into emergency action.
The vets are wonderful and also well aware of the ferocity of these little spitfires when they are being forced into something they don't want to do. They got some official weights then sedated each of the girls in turn in order to withdraw enough blood to get all the relevant tests done. It was excruciating watching the little buggers panting away in a semi-coma while their tiny veins were mined for blood. It came very slowly and at an extremely limited volume, but eventually they got what they needed. While still "out of it" they x-rayed each one in turn to check for intestinal issues which might not show up in the blood work.
As it turned out, we discovered the next day that their old issue of dis-functioning kidneys had reared its head again. As they weren't eating their medicated kidney food and we couldn't force them to drink, the alternatives presented included us administering daily sub-cutaneous liquid injections to each of them, or injecting liquid into their mouths each day! With these two? No way!
Our immediate concern was to get them to eat: we reasoned that this was the first priority, and this would hopefully lead to them drinking more as well, once their appetite was stimulated. We've religiously fed them only dried medicated food for their entire lives: it was the vet's advice and we stuck to it. They used to love their "hardies"! Anyway, we changed to "wet" food as an experiment, and so far, so good. They wolfed down the first batch with a fever not seen since the last opening of a bottle of Peck's Anchovette. They have had various installments since, and already we are imaging them slightly plumper. At least they won't starve to death it seems!
We're very realistic and realize they won't be with us forever, but we're stoked they are not going to waste away like Belsen horrors before our very eyes. Our weekend was pretty much consumed with cat ministrations of one kind or another and grading of hundreds of essays between us. I was also unlucky enough to fall victim to some kind of body-aching flu which kept me pretty much confined to the couch on Sunday and struggling at school today.
Not much in the way of photos as I didn't take any of the medical procedures! A quirky set-up on a taxi driver's dash on my way home Friday night, well-fed girls basking in the sunshine, and some of us, at least, are eating like kings!!