Here are my summary and notes from the 2017 FIP Symposium.
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Wednesday, May 3rd, we picked Luna up from the clinic around noon and said our goodbyes to the team. That was the tricky part. We are going to miss them all. If it were easy, I think I'd pack up, move, and go to work there with them if I could! However, it's time for another cat to take Luna's room and hopefully have a successful trial too! Animals needed nurses, too, right?
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Well, here we are! Not only did Luna make it to day five, but she took it like a boss! Jamison and I said today, "this doesn't seem real. Last week we were saying goodbye to her, yet now we are taking home a healthy, vibrant, pistol of a cat (Dr. Pedersen's descriptive for her). There's real hope we will get to watch her grow up"? I feel like I fell asleep, and nothing awful ever happened. I keep thinking how just a few months ago, we were empty nesters and a pet-free couple who occasionally browsed the Savannah cat breeding sites thinking, "it'd be cool to have one of those cats one day." Yet here we are...two breeders later (the one terrible experience that I will blog about at another time) and then the perfect experience finding Luna, only for things to turn lethal in the blink of an eye.
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Today we visited with Luna at 9:00 and stayed with the entire team (Dr. Pedersen, Dr. Montgomery, and Mike Bannasch) for a good hour. Luna's the most alert and playful that we have seen since she first came home to live with us six weeks ago. She's engaging in self-play with balls, feather toys, and even empty boxes, all while "the adults" have conversations about her progress and expectations after discharge. Her coat is even shinier than yesterday, and her eyes are wide and bright. Her abdomen looks better than yesterday, not 100%, but almost.
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Today is a quiet weekend day at the clinic. We met Dr. Montgomery again at 9:00 a.m. and walked into Luna's room to find a very vocal and playful Savannah girl! Today it was pretty clear her abdominal distention is improving. Her coat appears brighter and less "fluffed up," as seen in the photo below, compared to a week ago.
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Today was a great day! Being the weekend and the clinic closed, we arranged a visit with Luna when Dr. Montgomery (another vet working with Dr. Pedersen). Mike (Dr. Pedersen's vet tech/assistant) will examine and administer her second dose at 9:00 a.m. Little Luna was resting quietly but quickly sprang to her feet and approached her food bowl. Jamison (the catty daddy) swooped her up first to say, "good morning." She wasn't having any of that and expressed herself per her usual morning routine, which means "give me my wet food now"! I dished up the usual mixture of her two foods (chicken and seafood), and she gobbled them up while awaiting her injection.
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Our day started after two days of no sleep to prepare for this last-minute journey to California to enroll Luna in the new FIP drug trial in an attempt to save her life. We entered this knowing it's a trial and not a treatment. There are no guarantees, only hope.
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Our new Savannah kitten, Luna, was due for her second feline distemper combination vaccine and a vet exam shortly after her arrival. After receiving the vaccine, Luna immediately exhibited worrisome symptoms.
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