Monday, November 07, 2005

Toms

A few weeks ago one of our elder tom cats came home with what was obviously a broken upper arm (what I'd call shoulder in a cat but not a human). I splinted the break. His paw swole up. I took the splint off, held him in my lap, and asked him, the universe, and the Gods of the vet I did not become, "What do I do now?". Immobilize the shoulder. I did. It stayed that way for only two days, but at the end of that, the arm did not swing in that sickeningly unnatural way.

Animal Girl daughter has been daily caring for him, feeding him, loving him. All the kids have strict instructions to NOT pick him up no matter what. Everyone checks on him. He stays mostly in the upstairs of the building and has no trouble getting up and down from there. Once he got used to tripod transportation, he hasn't seemed to have any trouble doing anything. He is fat and slick and clean and obviously happy.

And now he is beginning to actually use the arm. I am amazed. He moves the arm, tentatively puts it down (but no weight yet), and even licked it as though he would wash his face and then thought better of that.

Every household should have two rolls of vetwrap at all times.

1 comment:

Madcap said...

Tom is a lucky boy that he landed in your lap! I'm very impressed with your "all-roundness".