The Hand-Me-Down Cat Makes Another Visit to the Vet

Ebony is slowly finding his place at our house. For an old, deaf cat with a thyroid problem, he's doing amazingly well. Our first trip to the vet was too much, too soon for the old guy, though. Plus the meds we got only made his condition worse, so I just let him settle in for a few weeks. Nowadays, he's keeping what he eats in his stomach, most of the time. He was pretty stressed out there at the beginning, and that, combined with the hyper-thyroid thing and the new meds was just too much for him. He's better now.

He's joined the 6:00 a.m. kitty alarm-clock squad, adding his very loud vocalizations to Quint's and Hedge's hopping up on the bed and jumping up and down on Carol until she wakes up to feed them. Carol is very good natured about the whole thing, lucky for them.

Once I could see that Ebony was feeling at home, and holding his own, I made another appointment with the vet. I wanted to see if we could get him on some medication that would help handle his thyroid and not make him throw up all his food. As I remarked to the vet, "It really doesn't make sense to me to have him starve to death just to keep him on the thyroid medications." So, now we're trying some trans-dermal stuff which I smear on the inside of his ears. He's supposed to absorb the medication through his skin. I hope it works. We're on the second day and all seems to be well at this point. I'll take him back in about three weeks and see if it's helping.

I also wanted the vet to look at his teeth. They looked bad to me, but she seemed to think that they were in fairly good shape for his age. I wanted to see if we could get them cleaned, but old cats with thyroid problems often don't survive being knocked out for dental work, so that isn't an option for him. He's got some gum disease problems, too, but I've started him on some topical anti-biotic gel, the same stuff I use for Quint's gums. Ebony doesn't seem to mind, so I'll be working on getting his gum disease under control as well. He's been really good about letting me put stuff in his mouth and he's getting used to me smearing stuff in his ears. I spend a bit of time brushing him when I medicate him, so he's starting to see the whole process as a good thing. I don't want the other cats to get jealous of all this attention that Ebony is getting, so we're working on spending equal time with all of them.

Still no major cat fights, though Ebony is still a bit grouchy. Perhaps he'll lighten up as we get his thyroid and his gums feeling better. I'm very glad that Quint and Hedge are both so good natured and accepting of old Ebony. I hope Ebony will come to appreciate what a great environment this is, and what great friends he has in our family. Time will tell. It always does.