Stabbing my Cat (a.k.a.: The Traumatic Ordeal)

So Ms. Pukesalot’s kidneys are slowly failing. This has been confirmed with continuous blood tests after the settling of multiple health problems which arose at the beginning of the year. Most particularly, her potassium levels are alarmingly low. Now, my family has lost two cats to kidney failure in the past. It wasn’t pretty, but at least I know what to expect. I just don’t know when. The major difference is that I know enough ahead of time to try to give her as much of a quality life as possible in the meantime.

Which, the vet tells me, partially entails giving her IV fluids with potassium every two weeks (at the very least). Ie: stabbing her with an IV needle and holding her still for 5-10 minutes while 100 cc’s of the stuff puff up her neck like a balloon. At least theoretically.

Last night was my first time since the vet walked me through the procedure two weeks ago. I figure I can take her in for the vet to do it at $25 a whack, and put the cat through the ordeal of a hated trip to the vet… or I can suck up my squeamishness and learn how to do it myself. So I gave it a shot… no pun intended. Fortunately, my folks came over to help… with moral support, and to hold the IV bag up high (so it would drip faster) and hold the cat still, while I stuck her and tried to hold her head steady. Of course, I had to psyche myself up for at least 5 minutes to actually stab her, and there’s that panic when the skin resists, and I’m terrified of hurting her by forcing it. Which part she had a whole less problem with than after the needle was in her for far longer than it should have been.

Upon reflection, I think I know what I did wrong… when I checked the flow of fluids through the line before I injected her, I forgot it should have been a strong stream, rather than a drip. So the first… oh, about 80 cc’s went in at an extremely slow drip… when not stopped altogether. And I can’t remember if I put it in with the bevel facing the right direction… which I’m not even sure has anything to do with how fast the fluid goes in, but who knows. This was my first effort without the vet, and, for a relatively simple procedure, I’m sure I’ll find every way possible to screw it up. And the cat was getting antsy and moving around, and the needle could NOT have been comfortable moving around under her skin like that. By the end, she was crying in distress, and I was a basket case.

After Pop pronounced the fluid in the bag down to the appropriate line, and I removed the needle and let her go, the cat promptly ran to a corner and emptied the contents of her stomach… which panicked me even further. I didn’t remember THAT big of a lump was supposed to be in her neck, and I was sure I’d done something wrong to make her physically react like that. But the folks assured me it was just an emotional reaction (which is hardly unusual for her), and they even thought she may have been responding to MY distress.

Fortunately, Ms. Pukeaslot quickly responded to lots of loves and pets, and she didn’t hide from us. I’m just worried now that she’s gonna have a very bad experience associated with the procedure, and it’s just gonna get more difficult in the future… no matter how proficient I get at it. MY immediate reaction to the experience was that I wanted to try it one more time with the vet. The lady was kind enough to offer a freebee moral-support visit if I needed help the first few times. I dunno… I’ll have a few weeks to think on it til next time. Now that I think I know what I did wrong, I’d like to give it another shot on my own before I inconvenience the vet out of her time, and put the cat through the ordeal of a vet visit. I just have to figure which experience will be a BIGGER ordeal for the poor cat until I can get my act together. *sigh*

Oh well. So that was my fun last night.