The Cat's Meow

Sometimes I think life is a conspiracy of narrow escapes all clustered together and biding their time, waiting for the moment closest to perfect vulnerability to reach maturity, join hands, and all strike together.  In and of itself, no single one is enough to strong enough to deliver a fatal blow but there is great strength in numbers. 

My sweet tuxedo cat - normally so placid and serene that I sometimes forget she's here - expressed no interest in Sunday supper.  I discovered her lying in a corner of the dining room, unnaturally quiet and lethargic, and in the way that people who love cats have, sensed rather than knew something was wrong.  She began vomiting not long after that - nasty, mucousy puddles of bile - then bile with a reddish tinge - and then by morning, all blood.  Something cold happened to my heart at the last and for a second or three, I found I couldn't quite breathe.

She caterwauled all the way to the vet, a heartbreaking and supernatural sound that sounded like death to me.
Funny, I was thinking - as if I was thinking at all - how your mind races non-stop to the worst possible scenario at such times.  Why is it that I've never learned the art of optimism?

Just a few more minutes, I tell her and stroke her ears through the carrier, Hang on, baby, please hang on.

She answers with a chilling, searing wail then begins to dry heave.  A moment later a spray of blood explodes through the carrier's opening and mists over the metal bars, over the car seat, over the gear shift, over me.  I think it was at that precise moment that I began - probably desperately -  to talk to God.

Arriving at the vet's seems to steady my nerves somewhat, knowing there is help just the other side of the heavy glass doors calms me down.  There's another wildly painful moan from the carrier and a second explosion of blood.  It splatters over me from the knees down - I realize dimly that I'm in two day old (and slept in) clothes, green striped pajama pants and a barely decent tank top - worse, I've somehow forgotten my battered Nikes and am barefoot.  I spare a fraction of a second to grab my floppy straw hat (for those days when I skip the shower and shampoo but must appear in public) and run for the doors.  My last coherent thought is oddly comforting - at least I remembered my teeth.

There's no time to wonder what the girls at the front desk may have thought at the sight of a more than half crazed madwoman covered in blood and looking like an unmade bed stumbling and staggering through the glass doors. 

Blood! I manage to choke, She's vomiting blood!

Lisa, a long time vet tech and a veritable mountain of a woman in blue scrubs and a pony tail, is suddenly at my elbow.  She snags the carrier with one quick hand, lifting it effortlessly although the tuxedo cat alone is fourteen pounds, eases one arm around my shoulders and with a brisk, no-nonsense C'mon, guides me to an exam room.  

Deep breaths, she tells me calmly as she opens the carrier and eases the cat out onto the shiny metal table, speaking softly and handling her very gently.  She glances over her shoulder and in a less soft and gentle tone tells me, Head between your knees and deep breaths.  We've got this.

Doc comes in almost at once and with hardly a glance at me begins a series of questions.  When did it start, was there blood the first time, is she drinking, when did she last eat.  It's hard but it helps to focus on the answers - my beloved vet of the last 30 or so years isn't smiling but he isn't scowling either - I tell him all I know while Lisa keeps one eye on the cat and the other on me.

Better?  she asks after another minute and to my surprise, I am.  The initial panic has subsided and I can once again think and speak clearly.

No fever, Doc says, all his attention on the cat as he pokes and prods and feels her sides, No soreness, no indication of an obstruction or a tumor.  The vomiting likely ruptured a small blood vessel, and here he finally gives me a reassuring smile, Happens more often than you might think.  Technically it's called hemorrhagic gastroenteritus, more common in dogs as a rule but we see it in cats now and then.  I think she'll be fine in a day or two but if she's not, bring her right back in.   

Then for the first time he seems to notice my appearance and I see a twinkle in his dark eyes.

 Do you need anything?  he asks, Besides shoes and a shower?

The drive home is quiet with only the occasional protest from the carrier - far less fear and anguish, considerable more aggravation at being confined - a subtle difference if you don't love cats, I suppose, but clear as day to my ears.  It's not a happy sound, but it's a welcome one.  I put my own self to rights with a hot shower, a change of clothes, and a small prayer of gratitude to my vet and the hands that guide him.