Tygana 11/2/2011

I would like to start by apologizing for my absence from the cat blogosphere. I have not forgotten any of you, but found it near impossible for me to keep up with everything else going on. As some of you may have even noticed I took the blog down. But something has happened as some of you may have already heard that has prompted me to post.

As many of you know, Tygana was diagnosed with CRF, high blood pressure and a heart murmur roughly 8 months ago. He began taking meds for his high blood pressure, calcitriol and receiving subcutaneous fluids for his CRF. He started out doing quite well and even gained a bit of weight as we began to gain control over his condition.

Tygana was receiving 75ml of lactated ringers every other day, a calcitriol pill and high blood pressure pill daily. In his bloodwork his numbers never got back to normal but we got close, which was good enough for us.

About 4 months later Tygana lost his appetite for his prescription food. He was an interesting eater because unlike most cats he would get tired of eating the same thing after so many months, to let you know he would not eat, but if you presented him with something new he would devour it. So I switched his wet food back to his old food but he continued to have prescription dry food, he never get tired of that cause he did not eat it often.

Over the next 4 months we would be switching his food often as he became quite the picky eater. 3 months later he began to lose weight again, I tried upping his intake to get him to gain but he just did not have that strong of an appetite.

Still fairly active and playing around with his brother I did not think way too much of it, just that he was incapable of eating too much cause it makes him uncomfortable or something.

This past week is where things got weird. It all happened so fast, he got even thinner, began to eat less, started taking naps in the bathtub, got less active. We scheduled him a vet appointment to get him checked up. The days before his appointment he completely stopped eating, barely drank and chose a room that he would not leave except to go sit in the bathtub or on the toilet. He stopped cleaning himself, had an awful smell. I wiped him with a damp cloth but the smell was coming from his mouth I looked inside and his teeth were fine, gums looked all right, his balance was starting to get thrown off.

I was terrified to take him to the vet, for fear they might say what I was thinking in the back of my head. What I really wanted was some kind of new suggestion, pill, suspension or injection that might bring my little guy back.

The vet looked him over...he was very dehydrated, his body couldn't hold on to any fluids including his lactated ringers it all went straight through him, his kidneys were done. The smell was toxins in his body his kidneys were no longer processing, they were coming out through his mouth. He didn't fight anything the vet did, he didn't have the energy his muscles had begun to atrophy as his body was eating his muscles to sustain his day to day life.

Of course I did not get the hopeful answers I was looking for, the vet suggested it was his time and gave me time alone with him to think it over and call someone if I needed to. I called his previous owner and let her come to say goodbye, she was holding him saying goodbye and in his last physical act jumped from her arms to my lap. I gave him some last cuddles before our final moments together. The decision was made to help Tygana to the rainbow bridge, I stayed with him petting his head and whispering in his ear. I stayed with him for a while afterwards and finally was able to pull myself away.

Pepper finally this morning realized that tygana is not around, he looked for him a bit but has relaxed. He will probably be off and on like this for a bit. Waking up this morning was terribly hard because tygana is usually right there waking me up, clawing me in the face to be exact. It's hard to look around and see all the stuff I got for him, the pictures of him on the wall.

I miss him terribly.

I know many of you miss him as well and I'm sorry we have not been around. Feel free to leave any messages for tygana here.