Three Cats Thursday: Pimp and Phantom's Vet Visit

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Happy Three Cats Thursday, Cuteheads! I wanted to update you on the boys since we have some news. Pimp and Phantom went to the vet last weekend.

I have been noticing that Phantom starts breathing pretty heavy after just a few minutes of playtime. We do play pretty crazy with Da Bird, but I don't think I've ever noticed Pimp or Moo getting like that before, so I was concerned. He doesn't open-mouth pant, but his tummy area definitely looks he's breathing harder than he should at this age. He's only 2.

Our awesome vet, Dr. McAllister, asked a bunch of questions and did an abdominal x-ray to make sure he doesn't have a hernia (this could be very bad if he ever needed surgery later) and to see if he could see anything else, and it turns out that Phantom has chronic lung disease. So he definitely has kitty asthma of some sort. Since he's not bad all the time, we are going to watch it to make sure he doesn't get worse, and one day he may need to take steroids for it.

See the little bit of cloudiness in his chest on the right, and the equivalent spot on the left a little? That's what we're looking at.

There is some part of his lung that is compromised, it looks like, probably from whatever injury he had when I first rescued him from the shelter (remember he had a bum leg and was basically walking flat-footed from the knee down with one leg?). Maybe whatever did that to him, also injured his lung and we didn't know it until now.

He also asked radiologist to take a look, because it looked like there was some other cloudy stuff in the x-ray that could be something else. He called me Tuesday and told me that the radiologist thought it might either be heartworms or lung worms. I freaked out at heartworms. He told me that they typically stay as larvae in cats and that they can just die off in time, but still. I don't want any chances of him not being perfect. :(

So we are going back today to get a "heartworm antibody" test to detect the presence of heartworms or not. And then we'll go from there. Honestly, paws crossed it's lung worms because those are treatable with a round of panacur dewormer, but heartworms are different, I guess. Think good for Phantom today!

He also had the stinkiest poop in the world, so we're waiting for fecal results back too. We are going to the vet at 4 p.m.

Pimp also went so we could check on his thyroid levels. He was such a good boy! The good news so far is that he weighs exactly the same as he did last time, so he's not losing more weight! We should find out today what the results are. Right now he's taking Methomazole - one pill in the morning and a half a pill at night to manage it.

Since we're talking poop, Pimp's poop has been less than impressive lately, so he got a fecal too. (It's OK to talk about poop, right?)

I didn't take any pictures of him at the vet visit for some reason. I usually do. I must have been side-tracked by Phantom's breathing. The car ride stressed him out too, poor guy.

Moo got lucky and didn't have to go to the vet next time. His turn is coming up though!

P.S. Exciting news on my side... I quit my job! Eeeeee! I'm so excited, and so nervous at the same time. I did it so that I could work on CatLadyBox full-time, because I think it can really be awesome! And I thought to myself, if I do all the work I do for someone else all day (I am (was!) the Director of Marketing for a company called Shore Excursions Group) for own business instead, imagine how much more it could grow and how much faster! And that was that. I just jumped off the cliff and gave them my notice a few weeks ago.

I will keep you all posted on how it goes! I figure I put all I have into it now, and hopefully it works! I got a table at CatConLA next month. Have you heard of this?! It's like ComicCon, but for cat people! So hopefully that does awesome and really helps get the word out. I'm excited for this new adventure!

Plus, as far as the boys are concerned, the best part is that I get to work from home with them as my assistants from now on! :)

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