Dr. Feelgood

I took Kitty back to the vet yesterday. He was running out of pred and his current dose wasn’t doing the job it had been. I made the appointment for 5 pm, which entailed a rush trip back to the house, grabbing Kitty as he (very cutely) greeted me at the door and slamming him into his travel box. Kitty knew where this was going and he slithered out the top. I gamely tucked him back in while he hissed and spit at me. I did not feel the love.

Kitty in box, I went hell bent for leather to the vet’s office. Once there we checked in and waited. And waited and waited and waited. I didn’t leave there until after 6pm and all the vet did was feel Kitty up and change the dosage of his pred. He also said some dark things about another med The Kitty might end up on as he can’t stay on pred or steroids in general, indefinitely. Nobody wants to live with a house cat suffering from ‘roid rage.

But. The new drug that may very well be on the horizon for Kitty is also a steroid. I looked it up under the spelling the tech at the vet gave me – Budensoide, but that turned into a close but not cigar don’t-you-really-mean- Budesonide”? way. So I went with door number 2. Budesonide - it is prescribed for both Crohns Disease and Asthma. It is a steroid, but according to the literature as well as my vet it’s kind of like a PO ( by mouth) cream for the intestines

Budesonide is a medicine to treat mild to moderate Crohn’s disease in many people. However, it does not work for everyone who takes it. Budesonide is a nonsystemic corticosteroid, which means it works mainly in one area of the body. The medicine in ENTOCORT EC is released in the intestine. Therefore, it controls the symptoms of Crohn’s disease even though 90% of the drug does not go into the bloodstream. Because of this, it causes fewer severe side effects than other corticosteroids.

Now. I don’t know the difference between Crohns and Colitis and Irritable Bowl Disease ( short answer? More or less the same conditions, the only real difference being what parts of the intestinal track and colon are affected) which is what the vet thinks Kitty is suffering from. None of them sound like quick, easy and cheap things to treat. Kitty is way, way too high maintenance to suffer from something so easy to treat as say, ear mites. I mean, if there is an OTC treatment for it, Kitty is not interested in anything so plebian. It is just the most distressing ailments for him and the most expensive, needing to be specially mixed by a real pharmacist with special drug mixing credentials medications for him. I think the Imodium ultimately didn’t work for him because he knew it was OTC.

At least it’s a problem I can more or less deal with and really, totally within my control. It’s a nice change of pace to worry about something I can actually do something about. And there is isn’t really any one to be angry at; I do wish I had never made it clear to the vet that I was fond of Kitty though. It seems to have given him the idea that it gives him cart blanche expencewise, even though I have on several occasions told him that as much as I do really love Kitty, sadly, he does have a DNR and a Feline Living Will and all the various ramifications and meanings of those documents - He doesn’t seem to get it. What I should have done in the first place is just to have stuffed Kitty into a pillow case and told the vet Kitty was just a stray that I found under the trailer and that I wouldn't be in his office at all except that Kitty saved my Dale Ernhart Commerative Kotex™ cozie in some near fatal trailer related tragedy and now I feel I owe him. You never know.