Horace

Horace has been seeming sick the past few days, not eating, meowing really pathetically as if he's in pain, spending an inordinate amount of time with his paw in the water bowl (such that it's always wet and he's getting it dirty in the litter box and tracking paw prints everywhere). So this morning I took him to the vet. And literally like five minutes before I left to take him we found blood on the mat next to one of the litter boxes. It's his kidneys and he's very dehydrated. He's also lost a lot of weight, down to only 10 pounds, which is half the weight he's been at times (obese times) in his life. They wanted him to get on an iv of fluids to rehydrate him as well as something to clean out his system, but they close at noon so there wouldn't be anyone there if they boarded him except someone coming in periodically to check in. They gave some antibiotics in case it's just an infection (otherwise it's actual kidney failure and will be more lasting) and they recommended I take him to the emergency clinic for those things. So I took him right over and they saw him and were going to take him in, but the price was not something I could afford at all so I opted to take him back home (a really difficult fucking decision). But before he left they gave him some medicine for nausea. As had been explained, he has high phosphorous levels because the kidneys aren't cleaning it out and that leads to nausea which accounts for his not wanting to eat or even drink water. Anyway, I took him back home. Justification: it would really only serve the purpose of moving things a day and a half and if I can bring him to the regular vet on Monday it won't be as expensive. I've given him the antibiotic and I've been feeding him water through a syringe. A little after the first watering, he seemed a lot better, actually. Not near 100% or anything but much better than he was. I did one of the tests the vets did, which is pull the skin up on his neck. When he's dehydrated it stays up and doesn't go back down. An hour after I gave him water it was going back down. So I'll keep watering him periodically. His mood seems better. I'll keep taking care of him til I can take him back to the vet Monday before work. I hope my little Meow Man does feel better.