and time marches relentlessly along…
Well, last week Ching went to have his six monthly dental checkup. Ching has always been a somewhat “lazy” eater, much preferring to slurp up his wet food and “vacuum up” his pussy biscuits (that’s “Oral Prescription” kibble to the non cat-owning hoi poloi) , rather than chew it. This led to enormous problems with his teeth, needing six-monthly veterinary supervision – and yesterday, unfortunately, massive surgical intervention involving the removal of six teeth, and the loss of a seventh tooth, which literally fell out when the Vet touched it! And he’s only two and a half years old! 🙁 (sigh) Well, at least he’s kept his front teeth and fangs….
According to the Vet, this is a fairly common problem with Burmese cats. It seems that their immune system’s over-enthusiastic attack on oral bacteria not only kills (some of) the bacteria, but also damages their gums to the point where they develop ulcers, which erode the tooth – and bone – below the gum line… leading to a large amount of pain – and eventual tooth loss. 🙄
And now to the Satai problem…
As many of you know, shortly before his first birthday, Satai inherited the fairly rare breed-specific condition called “Bengal Polyneuropathy“. It took a while to work out what was wrong with him, but eventually we were sent off to a really good animal neurologist who confirmed the diagnosis, and put him on steroids. He’s completely recovered now, thank heavens, but the whole process from go-to-whoa entailed a massive number of visits to quite a few different Vets. Satai hated going in cars anyway, but all those trips to lots of different Vets were understandably extremely traumatising for him. I don’t often go out, but when he sees me putting on my shoes, he runs and hides (usually extremely well, and by the time we manage to find him, he’s terrified, and we’re running a lot short on patience!) because I always went with him whenever he went to the Vet. Now, of course, if we’re just going “out” somewhere, we don’t bother to go looking for him, and that’s usually fine… Last week when Julian took Ching up for his dental examination, I stayed home, and the day proceeded as normal. Julian and Ching came home, and the pattern of our lives just muddled along as usual. Yesterday however, Ching had to be at the Vet between 8 and 8.30 am so our morning was slightly out of kilter… well alright, extremely out of kilter… no breakfast… the cockatoo’s and fish didn’t get fed… mummy and daddy were acting strangely and running around like chooks with their heads cut off… Ching ran and hid. Satai was bewildered, but mummy wasn’t putting on her shoes, so he was safe, wasn’t he?! After a lot of fruitless searching (and a lot of bad words, because by now they were starting to be a bit late) Ching was captured, unceremoniously basketed, and whisked off, and sensitive little Satai was scared… Daddy came home without Ching! Without his big brother there for him to bully, Satai ran off and sulked in the Library all day. Daddy went off about mid-afternoon and came back with a very vocal and very strangely smelling Ching (all those strange chemical smells! and what’s more, his neck, and both of his front legs had bare patches on them!) Satai was upset, confused, and quite a bit scared. Dinner time arrived. Ching was ravenous – he’d been “nil by mouth” since 10 pm the night before. We’d been told that he was to have raw meat cut into 1 cm pieces, and as they both adored raw red meat, we decided that Satai could have some too, instead of giving him his usual half tin of ordinary cat food. Ching, despite his sore mouth and stitches, scoffed the lot. Satai refused to eat at all. We eventually managed to get Satai to eat a few “lollies” (Greenies) but he was very upset and unhappy – we wondered how he’d go overnight (we wondered how they’d both go overnight!)
We needn’t have worried – Ching, despite his recent surgery, played a noisy game of “chase the mousie” up and down the corridor outside our bedroom until about 1.30 am when he nestled up in the crook of daddy’s knees. Satai assumed his now customary position on the top of my legs, and the rest of the night passed peacefully…
“Brrriiiingggg” – the alarm clock went off, and we slumbered on for a few more minutes 😉 When we eventually got up, it seemed to be “business as usual”, “seemed” being the key word there! We’d decided that Ching would have some more chopped up raw mean (a beautiful piece of lamb backstrap, if you must know) and half of a Dine Tube “treat” – Satai would have his normal breakfast. They were both hungry – Satai specially so because he’d refused to eat his dinner last night. Now, normally, both cats mill around my legs, playing fisticuffs and biffing eachother over the head (why, I have no idea!) while I’m getting their food ready. They started off that way this morning, but I soon realised that Satai had vanished, and that Ching was sitting there sedately, waiting for his breakfast. Most odd! 😯 I finally finished preparing their breakfasts – Ching was there yowling for his, but there was still no sign of Satai. I called him and called him – what was going on? Did he somehow think that after what happened to Ching yesterday that it was probably his turn today, and that we were trying to trap him with….food?! …Anyhow, still no show! Julian went looking. Would you believe, he was hiding under the bed? Right at the back, where it’s almost impossible to reach him?! 😕 Grrr! Ching was getting frantic by this stage, so we fed Ching, and I put Satai’s in the pantry. Julian fed the fish and went out to feed the birds and I retired to the Den. Shortly thereafter, I spotted Satai skulking past the door to the Den… looking for his breakfast no doubt, so I went and retrieved it from the pantry, and took it to him in the Library, where he was already sitting on his dinner box, waiting for it. As usual, he cleaned his bowl, and now he seems to be back to his usual self, mooching around me begging for “botty pats” (he stands with his tail towards me and I briskly pat his flanks in a clapping motion. He loves it, and can stand there for 10 to 15 minutes, smooching my desk lamp, and getting patted!) No wonder I never get anything constructive done! 🙄
And thus endeth today’s episode of The Continuing Saga of Ching and Satai… 🙂