She came through the surgery very well. But we had quite a night. Brought her home around 7:30 pm and she behaved for about half an hour. THEN she started licking at her incision, so we put the e-collar on her (the one that looks like a plastic Elizabethan style ruff, without the pleats). Can you say UNimpressed kitty? We'd thought she could stay in the room with Sean while he went to sleep (he's on the early shift again), but the way she was banging her collar around and trying to get it off, we knew there was no f****** way THAT would work. Soooo, I called the emerg vet and they recommended putting her in her carrier with the collar on and leaving her in there for the night. Yeah, right. THAT was dandy advice. Uh huh. She twisted, turned, scrabbled and windmilled her back end trying to get out of the carrier, so I let her out again. Figured she'd do as much damage trying to get out of the cage as she would trying to get the collar off while running free.
About 11pm we moved from Sean's office into the spare room. I knew there was no way we could go back to the main bedroom. Despite being told she'd be very groggy all night, she was the party kitty instead. Of course a lot of that was trying to get the collar off. I took it off her for a while and she used her box, then tried to wash herself. At first she was good, but eventually she went for the incision, so the collar went back on. She then crawled under the bed and spent a good couple of hours under there, trying to get the collar off between little naps. I lay down on the floor to keep an eye on her. Sean came in around 1:30 to see what was up, then went back to bed. At some point she managed to get the collar off by herself, so I gave her another few mins without it, then strapped it back on. I felt AWFUL.
At 2:35, Sean got up, so I moved Cleo into our bedroom and onto our bed. She settled down for a while and Sean tightened the collar one notch before he left to see if that would help. Well, it only made things worse. Normally she doesn't wear a regular collar because she scoops it into her mouth and chokes. Guess what she did while trying to get the e-collar off? You guessed it - she had the bottom half of her mouth around the outside and started to thrash and choke. I was awake (thank the Lord) and unsnapped it as quickly as I could and decided I'd rather stay up all night and watch her than wake up to a dead kitten.
Fortunately she'd pretty much exhausted herself by this point, so when I put her back on the bed, she snuggled into the blue blanket (I swear this thing has magical qualities where she's concerned) and calmed right down. By about 4:15 we both fell asleep - I had my hand on or under her the whole time so she'd wake me up if she started chewing or licking. We got about two hours kip, with me waking up every half hour or so to check on her.
She's been pretty well-behaved this morning - ate breakfast, drank water, used her box again and wandered around. The leap from the bathroom counter likely wasn't so good, but I couldn't stop her. She was full of beans for a while, but has now settled down on my desk - I made sure the overhead heater was on, so she's asleep now. Probably what she needs after such a rough night. Poor baby.
Sean will be home soon, then we have to wake her and take her back to the vet to be checked. For the most part, having only one car for the last year really hasn't been a problem, but I have to admit it would have been nice this morning to just take her in and get her checked without having to bug Sean when he gets home. NOT that he thinks of it as being bugged - he even offered to take her by himself so I can sleep. But I want to be there. I just feel bad for him after working his regular shift. The first morning after a long weekend is always hard for him.
So, there's my last half day in a nutshell :-) I'm hoping to have a little nap this afternoon, but will also hopefully get some work done on my brainstorming.
Thanks to everyone for your comments on goals :-)
Teresa
Link of the Day: Notes et Archives - 1789-1794 (Documents of the French Revolution)
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