Instead of a tragic week, it’s just stressful and frustrating. Which is better than tragic

Last Sunday, TYG noticed Wisp was limping badly. When we saw her again a couple of hours later it hadn’t improved so TYG caught her and took her to the emergency vet hospital (meowing from the cage the whole way). Good call: Wisp’s left rear Achilles tendon is partially torn, which requires three months or so of rest. Indoors. Which given she’s an outdoor/indoor cat poses problems. She doesn’t like her splint —And she really hates the cone of shame, though as with the dogs, the fabric cone works better than the plastic. Less jarring when it hits something.The big problem is getting her to use the litter box for shitting and peeing, which she’s never done before. Monday we tried taking her out, leashed, to see if she’d go outside; instead she slipped the leash and ran off. Not fast, but faster than we could catch her. We were grief-stricken: with her limited speed and slowed by meds, the odds were she’d be eaten by a coyote or hit by a car. If she avoided all that, she was bound to get wet outside eventually (heavy storm was predicted for Monday night) and a wet bandage would lead to skin infection. Plus without more drugs, she’d be in pain. Yes, TYG and I were both crying.

Multiple searches got us nowhere. Then on evening walk, Wisp walked up, lay down in front of TYG and was apparently exhausted enough not to protest at coming back into the house. She has not gotten out since. We’re still working on the litter box, and we’ve had multiple suggestions (cover the litter with mulch, use better-smelling litter) how to make it work. That would go a long way towards making the next two or three months livable. We also have to minimize her movement; gabapentin (her pain meds) makes her stoned a lot of the time but other times she’s up and fidgeting in the middle of the night. Which means whoever’s bed she’s in wakes up. She hates being caged but we may have to resort to that.

We’re also worried about Snowdrop. Without Wisp outside he seems to have ghosted on us.

The frustrating part, of course, is that I got nothing done. Sunday night she was peak fidgety and I got no sleep. She was restless much of Monday too. Since then we’ve had an appointment with our regular vet, filling out pet-insurance paperwork, keeping her from moving too much, keeping Trixie and Plushie from feeling neglected … plus a doctor’s appointment that involved waiting around for one hour and could easily have been handled by telemedicine (she said she’d have been happy to do so but the schedulers often don’t suggest it). The time I did have was sliced and diced into tiny pieces and I never got my focus going. Plus my normal morning routine is thrown off and that really hampers my ability to throw myself into the day.

But we will persevere. We have committed to saving her, now we have to make it work.

#SFWApro.