Roma AKA Romabear AKA Romeo our pur machine cat

I've waited to write this because even right now I feel like everything could change.

A few months ago Meg and I went out for dinner not suspecting anything was wrong. It was a good dinner and a normal drive home. When we opened the door to come in everything changed. We could hear one of our cats meowing loudly and in obvious distress and pain. We thought at first it was Tipperary because she sometimes has a deeper meow. But she quickly appeared running to us by the door, and then walked further into the house, then looked at us, and then walked further into the house. She was clearly trying to lead us to whoever was crying.

We turned the corner into the hall to see Roma lying on his side against a wall meowing. His brother, Napoli, was circling and sniffing him. Now we have always had cats and we have always had cats who love each other. In the past we had another pair of brothers as well. I have never seen cats show the fear and concern Tip and Napoli were showing and I think that made us even more nervous. It was late at night so we scooped him up and called the emergency vet where we had taken Schultzy (our German Shepherd who passed away Best Bad Dog Ever.) Once we got there and took him out of his carrier we noticed he was also spasming, neither of us noticed him spasming when we were at home but we got him up and in the carrier really fast.

 

 Looking at the way he was crying and spasming the vet thought he had suffered some kind of back injury and prescribed us medication for him. We took him home that night and got him his own little set up of food, water, and litter box in the laundry room so we could limit his movement and keep a better eye on how he was doing. We realized that because we have three cats and we free feed we had no idea if he was eating or drinking. The next morning when it came to try and give him medicine we couldn't get him to take the pill with anything. We tried cat food, treats, tuna, and chicken. Now of course I could have tried to put it in his mouth and make him swallow it but with a possible back injury I didn't want him to twist and fight. So we took him to our vet the next day for a check up and to help with the medicine. They had us crush the pills and mix them in water so that we could give him it with a syringe. We all thought that the pain was causing him not to eat and once he got some more medicine he would be feeling better after all the spasming had stopped so he seemed to be doing better. But he was still acting very lethargic. They told us to watch for signs of jaundice and we took him home.

However the next day he ate maybe one piece of food and the following day was just as dismal in the eating department. A dog can go a few days without eating but cats can slip into organ failure very quickly and so we were concerned. We knew he hadn't eaten since we found him and we had no way of knowing if he had eaten at all that day. I looked at him carefully for any sign of jaundice but here is the thing.... he is an orange cat. So I am looking for signs of yellowing on an orange cat.

I didn't know. Maybe he was yellow maybe he wasn't. We decided to be cautious and return him to the emergency vet, it was a holiday and our vet was closed. We got there and the vet tech knowing this was our third vet visit in four days offered to take a look at him and see if he was jaundice and send us on our way if he wasn't there jaundice we would avoid a vet bill. Out of an abundance of caution we decided it would be worth the $90 standard visit fee and waited in a room for the vet.

When the vet came in there was no sign of jaundice but they did decide to run some blood tests. And this is where the mystery begins.

Our pretty Roma-Bear had an elevated white blood cell count of over 4,300. His platelets were next to nothing. For further testing they had us take him to a specialty animal hospital in Franklin, TN Blue Pearl.

We drove over there with him unsure of what this was going to mean. They began more tests and hospitalized him. The first goal was to get him eating again and then figure out what exactly was going on. He had two numbers that were just so very off but then his other blood work showed normal liver, kidney, and pancreatic functions.

They would run tests to try and narrow down the cause and we went from one to the other methodically. First thought was a tick disease however he is an indoor cat. Other than a 72 hour adventure almost three years ago he never left the house unless it was in a carrier going to the vet. It was possible that a tick had gotten into the house and bit him but we never saw one, he didn't have one on him then, and he was wearing a flea and tick collar that was suppsoed to last three months and he had been wearing it for a month already.

Next we thought it might be feline infectious peritonitis because the symptoms matched however again it was very unlikely because he is almost eleven years old and that generally effects young cats and kittens. Of course it wasn't out of the realm of possibilities and they tried to do some tests to rule it out. But it is very hard to get confirmation on it especially since generally the cat has passed away before tests are analyzed.

While the vets were doing their tests for our part we were visiting Roma every day after work and bringing him anything we could to try and get him to eat: cat treats, tuna, chicken, and moist cat food. He didn't want anything. We got him to eat maybe two treats and then he would lose interest.

Every possibility was bad. We were basically waiting for confirmation that he had days, weeks, or months. One test showed liquid in two cavities and they began to suspect cancer - and I was sitting at home thinking, "it would be good news if he had cancer because that meant months." Test after test was inconclusive he had some numbers that were so off the chart bad but then again his organ functioning was normal. And he still wasn't eating.

I am lucky to have a friend who is a vet and she was an amazing resource to talk and text with throughout this time as well. I really think she kept me sane and she was a great second opinion on everything that was going on with Roma. I really owe her for being so patient and helping to make sure I understood test results and guiding me with questions to ask the vets and answering ones that I thought of at all hours.

The staff at Blue Pearl were so wonderful. I mean we really got the sense that they loved and cared for him. The overnight staff would be sure to check on him and give him some pets and attention. And one morning the vet told me they came in to a large note on the board:

"Roma ate!"

Unfortunately he didn't keep that up. There was no point in diagnosing if we couldn't get food in him. We had talked about a feeding tube but were trying to avoid it but then the day came when the decision had to be made. Roma was given a feeding tube but we also got to take him home.

Now we had a new challenge of feeding a cat through a tube. It actually wasn't that bad. We had a blue towel that we wrapped him in and sit on the couch with him petting him and feeding him. He would start purring, which he always did. Even when he was sick at the hospital he would start purring at us. Actually he had us laughing one day. One night when we were visiting him he was purring as we pet him. Then the vet tec opened the door to check on us and he immediately stopped purring. As soon as they closed the door he started purring again. It was so obvious we couldn't help but laugh at him. But feeding time became a nice cuddle time with him.

The food we were giving him was a high calorie moist food that we mixed further with water to make it easier to feed with the tube. I have to say it actually made giving him medicine much easier too. And slowly he started to begin exploring the house, well the part we allowed him in, and showing that he was feeling stronger. We kept using the feeding tube and taking him for repeat blood tests to see if his numbers were improving. And they were. The steroid antibiotic was doing it's job and fighting whatever it was that had sent him into this crisis. But he still wasn't eating.

Then one day I tried his food again as he sat on the couch.

And he ate it piece by piece as I put it in front of him he would eat it. He ate several pieces. This was the first step we had been waiting for.

Then a couple days later he went to his food bowl on his own.

Finally real progress! Roma was eating and he never looked back. We started feeding him less and less with the tube, though we still had a daily cuddle time as we flushed the tube. He also began grooming himself again. These were signs that Roma had re-found his "will to live." Something that  had been being doubted as the days of not eating went past.

Even looking at these photos I can see how much better he looks. As he started feeling better he became more active. He began meowing and talking back to us when we spoke to him, we have learned orange cats are very chatty. We also started getting what we call "happy tail wags" which is when a cat vibrates the tail very quickly, which indicates he is very happy or excited. We switched to giving him his medicine in cat treats which he enjoyed. He also built a habit of jumping on my chair every time I got up to try and get treats.

And then after a check in with the vet we got great news. They were confident enough to take the feeding tube out. He had developed a slight fever that they suspected could be due to the tube, even though the site looked good and clean. He was getting more and more active and was starting to try and pull at the cuff. While he needed anesthesia to get the tube put in taking it out was a simple five minute procedure because it basically stitched itself up.

Now we had a new challenge. Roma had been separated from our other two cats for over a month. We had kept them separate to better monitor his eating and drinking. Then we kept them separate while he had the feeding tube so that no one pulled it or bothered it. The first interaction did not go well. Tip hissed and swiped at him and Napoli ran away. Poor Roma watched them go looking so confused. I began researching this online and learned that cats recognize each other by scent. So Roma being at the vet multiple times including a week long stay and being separate from the others so long probably was throwing them off. The question was how long would that last?

The answer it turns out was just over two weeks. We let them alone to try and get them to come around on their own. Then we began luring them together with treats to get them closer to each other. And then it happened. It was a warm day so we opened the front door to allow a breeze into the house. Now they love the front door and apparently it was just what we needed. Roma went to the door to look outside and then a little while later Tip came over to enjoy the fresh air. The two of them hung out together for a little bit before Tip lost interest and came inside.

Roma stayed at the door and a little while later Napoli came to check out the door and give his brother a little sniff.

This was a first step and there were a few more hisses and swipes but it was a good beginning. We wondered how long it would take for the three of them to get back to their normal close relationship. I mean the three of them are usually together curled up or playing. They were really very close. As you can see in these photos taken awhile ago.

When we brought Roma and Napoli home over eleven years ago they were such tiny little kittens we were worried that Tip would not adjust to no longer being an only cat. We showed her the two little orange furballs and she hissed and ran away. We tried to lure her back to them and told her they were her babies, which she rightfully gave us a sideways look for but we stuck with it. And eventually she accepted them as her own.

A few days later we came in to find Tip and Roma on the couch together, opposite ends but at least together. Slowly but surely Napoli began walking normally past Roma, instead of running past him like a threat. And then:

All three curled up and sleeping without a care in the world. Roma our big kitty back at his normal sixteen pounds lying with his head right at Tip tightly curled in a ball and his paw reaching out to Napoli.

We still don't know what caused the attack that sent him into crisis. We slowly weaned him off the steroids and haven't seen any sign of problems. But then we also had no warning before we came home to find him crying. There is still a chance it could have been some kind of auto immune disease and that he could return into crisis. However with each passing day I am thinking it may have been something else. Roma had been wearing a flea collar. He has worn them before, all three of them have before and were that day. The one he had been wearing was a three month collar that he had been wearing for over a month. If it were an allergic reaction I would expect him to have had them before or right when we put the collar on him. I can't be sure but reports that I have read online of other people seems to describe exactly what he went through. So I'm not sure but I think I will no longer use flea collars on any of them because it isn't worth the risk.