Gideon

Staples are out! Cone is still on 🙁 Gideon’s skin near his site was really scaly and peeling- they scraped off the gunk and are having us do twice daily antibiotic/antifungal cream for a week then recheck. He sooo loves putting the cream on (not) and tries to help us out while we do it (by swatting and biting at the tube…) Ah well! Here we are. Fingers crossed for one more week and then freedom! Thanks for all the kind words and support from everyone here it means a lot 😊😊

I haven’t been posting much since there’s not much to report! Gideon is doing so great. Off of opioids but still on Gabapentin for now, mostly so he doesn’t go crazy trying to rip out his staples. He’s officially allowed to be at full activity level, which apparently just involves watching & trying to catch the birds outside the window.

Staples come out tomorrow (finally!) so no more cone or onesie after that!! Our only other issue is some scaly skin near his site- looks to me like eczema or some irritation from being shaved, and the vets aren’t too concerned. They’ll have a look tomorrow and we’ll see then. Hopefully it doesn’t mean more cone time…

He is definitely almost back to his old self. Before the surgery we’d put him in the bathroom (with a litter box and water of course!) when he was getting in the way of cooking, jumping on counters, etc. He’s been so low energy since the injury that we hadn’t put him there since he got hurt… But last night he kept jumping up on the table while we ate so into the bathroom he went! In a weird way it felt like getting back to normal? Like he’s finally feeling well enough to be a pain again 😂.  Of course we enjoyed some low-key time when he was just calm and sleepy, but it sure is nice to see him being spunky again.

Anyway, we’ll update again tomorrow or thursday after staples come out. Hoping for good times and no more cone!!

Gideon broke his back left paw jumping off a perch on 12/27/21 (my birthday, ironically). We still don’t know why it happened, apparently it was just the wrong move/twist/landing. After a quick video vet visit to confirm we needed to be seen in person and it wasn’t just a sprain, we called EVERY emergency vet within 2 hours of us. Only 1 could see us within 12 hours. So off we went to new vet who took x rays and confirmed a fracture at his knee (X-rays at end of post).

We talked through the options: someone could do a repair involving pins, wires, and 8 weeks of recovery, or we could amputate with 2-4 week recovery time. Their ortho vet wasn’t comfortable doing the repair so we’d need to find a new one- again the wait times right now are CRAZY. I called vets saying I needed to repair a fracture, they said 2 weeks for initial appointment and then another 4 until surgery. To be clear, I’m not upset with the vets- they’re doing their absolute best and I don’t blame them for wait times. The situation was just so upsetting; imagine waiting 6+ weeks with a broken leg!! He’d still have the leg now if we went that route and I can’t imagine the pain. Also knowing we’d need to keep him still those 6+ weeks as to not injure it further… it just didn’t seem possible. So amputation was scheduled a week after injury (still a longer wait than I’d like but I’m grateful we got in at all).

Surgery came and went wonderfully! They did a mid-femoral amputation so he still has a teeny stump. I hear this isn’t super common, but he didn’t stay overnight and we took him home later that day (maybe d/t the location of the amp at mid femur instead of removing the whole thing?). The vet said the fracture had worsened, he had internal bruising, and she found a bone shard somewhere in his leg. Obviously despite our efforts to keep him still, apparently he’d walked on it and further injured it since the break 🙁

I’m writing this day 5 post-op and we’ve had ups and downs (including getting around the cone and ripping out 2 staples!!), but as I write he’s napping and looks happy. Not at all how I thought I’d be spending my new year, but here we are! Idk that anyone will read this but enjoy my crazy venting post I guess??

The knee break- the head of his tibia was somehow of separated from the rest of the bone? Hard to describe but it’s clearly a bad break, even I could tell.

Normal X-ray for comparison

He had a fibula fracture as well. The vet said if it was just this he’d heal perfectly and just have a cast for a while.

Apparently my arm is comfy? Also safety pins alone weren’t working so we taped the onesie shut

Gideon in his onesie, checkin out the pasta sauce 🙂

Tips for using the onesie on a rear leg cat:

• See This video for the general idea of how to put on a onesie
• Safety pin and/or tape the arm over the amp site shut. If possible, be careful to avoid putting the metal right against the site. I did this by twisting the fabric while I pinned it (maybe I’ll upload a video later…)
• They should still be able to use the litter box. He’s gone twice and we’ve had a 50% success rate with staying clean- hopefully this will go up the more he goes! When we hear him digging, we do a quick check that it’s in the right place then let him go.
• Definitely use with other barriers like a cone! Onesie alone wouldn’t stop him but it makes it a little trickier to reach. Maybe after the staples are out we can try the onesie alone

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