Minor Cat-astrophe

Yesterday our huge orange cat, Simba, had a lump on his chin at breakfast that hadn’t been there the night before. I’m one of those people who believes that you shouldn’t even have pets if you can’t afford and aren’t willing to take them to the doctor when you’d want to go to the doctor. So in that spirit we even have pet insurance for the spoiled little dude. It’s cheap and saves us tons of money though in the long run, but yesterday’s all-day vet visit still managed to cost us $230, even with a big discount. Ouch. I had to cancel my appointment to get my cavities taken care of today because that was all the money I had set aside. Ouch again. With no actual answers given until Wednesday when the pathology report comes back.

We are really hoping it’s an allergic reaction to putting coconut oil in his food to try to mitigate the skin problems he’s been having. He’s a finicky beast and requires filtered water to combat his propensity to form crystals in his urine, a serious, serious problem for male cats especially, that can take a healthy animal down in a matter of 48 hours if you aren’t paying attention to the warning signs. He got so neurotic for a while that we had to buy that calming cat spray and covered our entire house and furniture in it, as well as using the wall outlet system and Bach’s Rescue Remedy for pets. Plus, he somehow gained three and a half pounds even though he’s been on a strict diet since his last teeth cleaning.

We now officially own a twenty pound beast of an orange fuzzy cat. His favorite thing is being carried around, often like a baby. He doesn’t even realize that he can jump on the counters, he’s easy on most of our furniture and usually only goes after plastic bags and cardboard boxes, and he sleeps on our bed with us every night after a round of running screaming his head off around the house.

My boyfriend found him underneath a truck in the rain outside my old apartment while we were newly dating. When I came home from work he was just leaning against my building, holding this wet, skinny kitten, totally torn as to whether or not we should feed him and bring him inside. Obviously, we brought him inside, and obviously we fed him, probably a little too much

.

The little orange fuzzball pretty much stole our hearts from the first hour we had him.

We definitely love Simba, and it was super weird having an empty house yesterday. I worried about him all day while he was at the vet because we just had to drop him off in the morning when we noticed the lump. He’s now 6 years old and getting to that age when lumps and bumps scare me a lot more. I’m pretty embarrassed about the weight gain too, because we shell out for Solid Gold cat food that costs an arm and a leg. I guess at least now I know that our no treats, 1/4 cup of food twice a day regimen isn’t working for our fat cat. His metabolism is apparently slowing down a bit. Time to add a lot more fiber into his diet. Twenty pounds!!! Geez. He’s still a handsome boy to me, though!

And so charismatic. He had all the girls in the vet office loving on him when we picked him up. He greets all of our visitors as soon as they show up, even when he’s been asleep the entire day. It’s hilarious how he hears the voice of one of our friends, any friend, and comes running, like the official welcome committee. He lets the little three year old girl downstairs pull his tail and pet his fur the wrong way and never so much as hisses (don’t worry, I rescue him from that situation if it gets un-fun for him!). He’s just extremely unique and tolerant. We couldn’t have ended up with a better, sweeter, fatter cat.

Sorry, I know this was a post about our cat and not chronic illness, but it took up my entire day yesterday and is making me all nervous still until we get the pathology report back on that damn lump.

It made me realize that I am so unprepared to have sick kids…. holy crap, I will feel so terrible for them and so helpless. I really admire parents who have kids with chronic illnesses. I can’t even imagine how hard that would be. ❤