Its not all bad + a little cat update

You read in the previous blog post about our wedding anniversary being a disaster ... well trying to salvage what was left of the weekend we decided to attempt to do something with the children on Sunday. Hollie had a birthday party to go to in the afternoon so we thought it might be nice to take advantage of the trip out the house and go somewhere for those two hours. But men being slow and 11 year old boys being obtuse we didn't all get ready in time. I dropped Toni off and picked her up myself - BAH. I felt it was all a bit to easy for other half and Mag, there was no way they were getting off that lightly. So I decided for them and TOLD them they were going up the coast for a drive. The intention was to go see a particular cruise ship which was docked in Belfast, but we never did get that far. We spotted the ship sailing down the loch so saw no point in going any further. We stopped at Crawfordsburn Country Park instead, its lovely there with woods, walks, and beach! We weren't prepared for the beach but it did not stop the children from having fun. We returned five hours later, very dirty and very tired.





The CAT situation! Tigger the cat got run over by ME!

Well since Friday poor Tigger has been through a lot including rebuilding surgery on her hips - I saw those x-rays and they were astonishing. The vet called this morning and asked when I wanted Tigger back! I was quite taken aback as I wasn't expecting her so quick and said "erm tomorrow as my husband is away till then". After giving it some thought I decided to get her today and called to make the necessary arrangements. They explained how she will have to be caged for the next 5 - 8 weeks etc. The vet has told me that anytime I feel I cant cope with the physio or cleaning her to call him and he will take her back into the clinic for a few days. I am hoping we can manage this at home, its going to be tough her hind end is paralysed for now.

The old cage we had behind the garage was overgrown with nettles, it's actually a rabbit run but we used it when we nursed one of our other cats from being run over too. It took Mag and I almost an hour in the rain to clear the nettles, empty it then get it scrubbed and hosed down. After all the effort I wasn't really happy with it so decided not to use it. Its old, and despite drying it out with the dehumidifier, and it did very well in a short space of time, it was just not so nice a cage anymore. It was going to have to be lifted up each time to tend to Tigger so I made the decision to buy a proper cage.

Anyways - off to the vet once the kids had come out of summer scheme at 4 o'clock... went through the phsyio we have to do on Tigger three times a day, the meds, the check up visit next week, stitches out the following etc than the bill - only £770. And to top it all Tigger might still lose her leg, though I hope not for both her sake and the bank balance. I picked up the cage on the way home, with the food too it came to £73.

Not to go on about the money too much, I just wanted to share something funny that happened when I told Roy how much it all cost. Other half is away just now, and he always leaves me a couple of signed 'emergency' cheques, and until now I have never used them. Other half called this evening to chat and I was telling him about getting a cage for the cat and how I used the cheques, he was panicking worrying about how much the cage was ... I said "its not the CAAAGE you need to worry about", "why? why?" ... he was flabbergasted. Its a lot of money, and I am saying this in a light hearted yet serious way - I just thought it was funny to hear him worrying about the cost of the cage at that stage unaware what the vet's fee was.

Its hard to put a price on a pet's life, but I wonder if the vet had told us up front how much it was all going to cost how we would have reacted. We love our animals, don't get me wrong but we would have had to think and talk through what treatment the cat was going to have or not have. I reckon we still would have gone ahead with the treatment but maybe would have pushed for the op first, and none of this waiting and x-rays and things ... it took 2 1/2 days for the decision to operate and those 2 1/2 days were filled with general anaesthesia, x-rays, medication, out of ours nursing etc.

One thing is for sure our new bionic cat will never stray onto the drive way again.

This is Tigger in her new cage



And her 'after' photo ... the operation looks like she has had her tail cut off the stitched back on. URGHH not for the faint hearted.