My poor cat...

My poor, sweet Dixie has had a trying day. I've been meaning to take her in for her annual checkup for about 2 months... Kept forgetting to make an appointment. Finally figured, I'd go at the end of this week after all my exams were over with. So I took her this afternoon after my final was over. And it's a damn good thing I did!

She has an infection in her mouth, which probably just developed in the past few days, because she has a rotting tooth in the very back of her mouth (as cats her age often do). She's lost more weight (as she has been for the past year, as the Vets well know) in the last few weeks. Now, she's down to 4 lbs. 13 oz. This is probably due to the tooth making eating painful so she's probably been eating just enough less than usual to loose weight, though not enough to make me notice. (She's now happily eating soft food, as she has been for the past two days.)

Still, the vet took blood to check for problems with her liver, kidneys and thyroid, just in case. The doctor said that her kidneys seemed a bit small (but I'm not overly concerned there since she is a very petite cat). But there were no irregularities other than that and no odd lumps, lesions or things of that nature, which is good.

She was dehydrated, which is cause for concern. They aren't sure why since I have seen her drinking regularly, as usual. It may have just developed today (so doubly good that I took her in!). So they gave her subcutaneous fluids to get her electrolytes back to normal and make her feel a bit better. Oh, she was not a happy kitty! Screamed for the whole hospital to hear. But she seemed to perk right up after about ten minutes. So that's an excellent sign. She was jumping all over the place when I got her back in the car, looking out the windows and being very curious, back to normal... so also a good sign. She drank some water when I got her back home and ate some of her soft food and now she's curled up on the couch, napping.

So, for the infection, we have some antibiotics. And the vet will call with the results of her blood test on Monday. We won't be home, but they're going to call my cell phone, and if they can't get me on my cell, they are going to call the house to leave a message here, either on the machine or with Joe. If I don't hear from them, I'll call home on Monday to see if Joe heard from them and if not, I'll call the vet myself. If she is having some kind of problem, we'll discuss options then.