I Might Be Loosing Another One

I lost one of my cats, Sadie, in January. She went down quickly with liver failure. It was very quick. One weekend she seemed fine, and then the following weekend she was buried in the backyard. I’m not accustomed to dealing with these sorts of things, so it was tough.

At that time, my other cat, Mortimer, was as healthy as a horse and routinely beating up a big Siamese tom cat on the back porch. He’s no spring chicken, but he was a bruising 15 pounder that roamed the neighborhood and feared nothing. That was just 2 months ago.

Now he is 10 pounds, has a little trouble getting up, and when he does get up, he walks slowly and unsteadily. He eats, but not like he used to. Two months ago if I opened a can of cat food and split it between the 2 cats, he would wolf down his half and then push Sadie out of the way and finish off her portion. Today, he barely managed to eat a quarter of a can and that was over the course of the day.

I first noticed he was walking funny last Wednesday. He’s always climbing trees or fighting, so I didn’t think much of it. Then on Thursday he was walking in the kitchen and caught his back foot on a stool leg. He immediately dropped to the floor and started screaming bloody murder. He was on his side with his leg pulled in and it was shaking badly. I couldn’t figure out what the hell was the matter.

When I went to inspect his foot it was extremely tender. Both of his paws on his right side were. There was no swelling, and he could walk, but it was a slow, awkward walk. I took him to the vet on Monday and there is no infection and no apparent injury. The vet was baffled, other than to say, you know, he’s not a young cat anymore. He’s well over 15 years old. He’s HIV positive. He has a deep ear polyp that causes a reoccurring respiratory infection. He is blind in one eye and missing half of an ear, most likely from fighting before I took him in. He was a feral cat for his first 10 years or so and lived a brutal life. Frankly, its amazing he’s still alive.

Still, just two months ago he was doing fine. Naturally, it is easy to think that he lost his best friend Sadie, and that has affected his health. If the truth be told though, they didn’t really like each other. He was completely indifferent to her, and she was terrified of him. They did not hang out together and never slept in the same room. The only time he paid any attention to her was when he would randomly attack here once or twice a week. And this wasn’t cutesy cat play I’m talking about either. Mort is a pull-no-punches and take-no-prisons kind of cat.

So, I’m not sure what is going on. I refilled his prescription of the respiratory ailment, even though that is not bothering him now. The vet did notice what might be a tumor on his thigh. It is very small. Then today, I noticed a slight lump on the back of his neck. It is extremely shallow, and I’m not sure what it is. If I notice it getting bigger, he’ll go back to the vet. Right now, it’s wait and see.