Blog on the Lillypad
Tuesday, June 01, 2004
 | Jesse gets in a jam
At work, our favorite kitten is the pet of Carol, our "medical coder". She comes in with stories about orange marmalade Jesse, a sweet and precocious young tom cat that Carol and her husband adopted as a gas station stray. Jesse is still a kitten. Two days ago, while Carol was sewing, he got into her sewing basket and came out with a long length of elastic. He carried it around the room and tumbled around with it. |
Carol was not dismayed that he had chewed it in half. She didn't bother to go look for the other half of it. She coaxed him to let go of the chewed end he had carried up, and she threw it away. They settled down for a peaceful night.
Thr next morning, Carol heard poor Jesse crying so loudly that for a moment she thought it was a child. Then she realized it was he. She hurried downstairs to find him in pain. Almost abruptly, he became listless. Normally he sits on the bathroom counter as she puts on her makeup and watches her, but he didn't budge from his curled up position near the litterbox.
Carol began to realize what had happened to the other half of that elastic cord. She put him in his carrier and took him to the vet.
The vet took x-rays and saw a mass inside him but said there was no knowing what it was until they took it out of him. She told Carol to go on to work, and she would call with the results. Poor Jesse, who had been quite listless, snapped at the vet. He was afraid and uncomfortable, but there was nothing to do but send him under the knife.
A couple hours later the vet called to tell Carol that she had removed two feet of elastic cord from Jesse's stomach and intestines. He would have to stay for another 24 hours, but he was doing well. "And," she added, "he's not a good patient." Apparently in his fear, Jesse won't let anybody touch him, although normally he is the sweetest and most affable of felines. He wants his beloved Carol and Randy, and he wants to go home.
Update: Carol brought the elastic band in to work today. It is, indeed, two feet long. With shaved tummy and shaved forepaws, Jesse is delighted to be home. He doesn't have to wear a "halo"; by some new medical technique, his stitches are all "on the inside," where he can't do them any damage. Carol said he has used the litter box as though nothing has happened. And he expressed his delight to be home again by rubbing up against everything and everybody quite frequently. As cats often don't associate things they swallow with painful consequences, Carol has resolved to be extra careful to keep dangerous objects out of his reach.
