The Squoosh of Success

It's official! Squooshable is cured! He's had his check-up today, and he is off of the Clavamox and Panalog drops (after a whole month!). Dr Vet says he looks wonderful and to not worry about his next ELISA. As usual, I misunderstood or misremembered and although Dr Vet *will* test him at twelve weeks if I must have it done, he'd prefer to wait until six months. But in the meantime, Squoosh is fine and will probably be fine at six months also, unless he keeps eating dental floss. :-) Dr Vet said that it's more likely (probability-wise) for Squoosh to have a false positive as his first test than a false negative. While that doesn't mean that Squoosh is 100% out of the woods, it does mean that the forest canopy is considerably more sparse than Ancodia likes to make up in her mind that it is. In short, he's probably negative and don't worry. That was the take-home message.

Squoosh is super-quick to pick up on patterns, and has already noticed the absence of nasty cherry-flavoured drops being shot down his throat as a prerequisite to his being fed. :-) He's one happy camper.

When I needed to take him to the vet, I begged Meg to come over and play with him so that I could clean his bathroom from stem-to-stern and then take him to Dr Vet. She agreed, and we got him out (waking him up, poor baby!). I spent about thirty minutes cleaning, and then as the floor was drying, I took him to the vet. We were gone for about an hour, and Squoosh was getting increasingly antsy and trying to get away from me. I thought he was just nervous, but as I was getting ready to leave the vet's, it occurred to me that he might have to use the bathroom; he's somehow managed to be completely litter-trained since I brought him home the first time. How he did that, I don't know. Dr Vet said some cats just naturally take to the litter box. Although he uses the litter box for other purposes (it's apparently a marvellous spot from which to pounce), he's never used anywhere else for the litter box purpose. So it occurred to me that he was probably holding it. I thought to ask if there was a spare litter box at Dr Vet's that he could borrow, but if I were to be wrong I didn't want to seem like one of those silly people that attributes sheer brilliance to their animal, so I figured I'd just test out my theory by taking him home and planting him immediately in the box.

Well, aren't I a stupidass.

On the way home, Squoosh let me know--in NO uncertain terms--that he was miserable. I drove as fast as I could, and kicked myself all the way; at this point, the poor baby had been holding it for probably over an hour and a half! I got home, ran him into the bathroom and put him in the litter box, where he immediately squatted and urinated half of his body weight, practically. I mean honestly, he had his eyes half-closed as he did it! As if he were saying, "Oh, thank god!" I felt *horrible*!

Next time I know--if he tries so hard to get away from me, it's 'cos he's looking for a place to bathroom himself. Sigh. I promise, Squoosh; next time, I'll ask if you may use their bathroom. Live and learn, I guess. I'm just amazed that at only nine weeks, his litter box habit is enough ingrained that he wouldn't even go in his carrier. He's a good cat. :-) And I can tell already that he likes rules, patterns, and things like that--he picks up on them very quickly.

So yay! Squoosh is cured! He still has his head-tilt, and Dr Vet said that he may have it for the rest of his life. :-( The infection was bad enough that it may have wrecked the balance system in his left ear--the little level-like mechanism that tells him when his head is upright. But there are some points that, if not exactly good, are at least ok: (1) He has a cute head-tilt. It's usually cocked in a way that makes him look quizzical, like a Pekingese, or something. And he sometimes holds it mostly upright; (2) Dr Vet says that, while this might be disastrous in an older cat (the loss of the "level" in his left ear making him lose balance, have problems walking, dizziness, etc...), since Squoosh is so young, his brain and perceptions will grow around the problem and he'll walk, run, climb--and pounce--just fine; he'll still see the world the same as if he were straight, and it shouldn't impede him at all. So I guess those are two as-good-as-it-gets things.

And I'll hopefully have time to take some pictures of him this week. :-)