My brain in blog form.
Our formerly outdoor girl, Athena, has been diagnosed with Feline Infectious Peritonitis (FIP). We’ve set up a GoFundMe to help lessen the burden of her treatment. Subscribe to my blog or check back on this page to keep up with her treatment and recovery.
Check out my Veterinary Definitions and Resources page for useful veterinary definitions and resources to help understand the terms used in explanations of Athena’s diagnosis and treatment.
Posted in Cat
This post is an overview of Athena’s second month of treatment. If you haven’t already, I suggest reading my posts on her first week of treatment and her first month of treatment. If you want to dive deep into her story, check out her tag page.
Like the previous posts, this one is in a journal-esque format. I intend to only touch on major/important events and updates, rather than what happens each day as I did in the first week post.
When Athena was diagnosed with FIP, Jim and I had no information about what to do or expect. With research, we’ve learned a lot, but there are things I wish I’d known before starting her treatment, both to spare her some trouble and to better prepare myself.
Please note: At the time of writing, I do not have any experience with the oral (pill) form of treatment. It looks like we’ll be starting oral treatment soon, so I may have some “lessons learned” a bit further on.
Posted in Cat
Phew! This should be my last Athena-centric post for a little bit. I look forward to some variety in my writing again, despite how proud I am of my recent posts.
This post is an overview of Athena’s first month of treatment. If you haven’t already, I suggest reading my post on her first week of treatment. If you want to dive deep into her story, check out her tag page.
Like the first week post, this one and future monthly updates will be in a journal-esque format. I intend to only touch on major/important events and updates, rather than what happens each day as I did in the first week post.
I questioned writing this post because it seemed a bit over the top. But, this is my blog, and I can write about whatever I want.
Also, I could use a chance to write something easy. The recent Athena posts have been exhausting. The posts about her illness and FIP, especially, each required hours of research to turn veterinary and diagnostic reports into something understandable.
Posted in Cat
com·pen·di·um [ kuhm-pen-dee-uhm ], noun: a brief treatment or account of a subject, especially an extensive subject; concise treatise
Dictionary.com
Like my previous post about Athena’s road to diagnosis, this post will be more technical. I’ve done my best to link to highly technical information — rather than include it in the text — in an attempt to make this more “readable.” Where I’m unable to easily link to the information, or when I have to use medical terms that don’t have a plain language equivalent, I’ve provided explanations through [def] (definition) links.
Posted in Cat
This is the second installment (chronologically) in Athena’s history. If you haven’t already, I suggest reading the first installment on her life before she got sick.
Be Aware: This post is rather different than usual as it serves a dual purpose. While I’m hoping that this account of how we got to a Feline Infectious Peritonitis (FIP) diagnosis will be helpful and/or informative to others, I’m also providing this for transparency with regard to our GoFundMe campaign.
To hopefully help others on the road to an FIP diagnosis, I’m including some more technical information alongside my more typical plain language. I’ve done my best to link to the highly technical information for those who are interested, rather than include it in this post. When I have to use medical terms that don’t have a plain language equivalent, I’ve provided explanations through [def] (definition) links.
To address transparency, I’ve added an “accounting” section with an itemized list of the charges for each vet visit to explain the amount we requested. Perhaps that information may also help someone trying to determine if they can cover diagnosis and treatment because it is expensive.
NOTE: We live in the DMV — District of Columbia, Maryland, and Virginia — area, where the cost of living is rather high. Therefore the prices I include are almost certainly higher than they are in other areas of the United States.
Posted in Cat
Before I get started I want to note that, for the rest of January, Fridays will be “Feline Friday” as I share the Athena posts I have planned. Also, be aware that this post is rather long. It covers from November 2019 when we first met Athena up to October of 2022.
Alright, yes, my title for this post leans toward cliché, but it’s true. Athena definitely adopted us as her humans before we officially adopted her into our family. But, for you to understand, I have to look back a few years, to November of 2019.
We were in our garage when “MEOW! MEOW!”
“Oh, hello little one!” Jim spotted the adorable little furball first. “How are you?”
“MEOW!” The kitten couldn’t have been more than 6 months old. It was all black and puffed up, sitting next to the downspout by the garage door.
Posted in Cat
When I wrote in my fundraiser post that I’m planning some posts on Athena’s story up to her diagnosis, and updates on her progress, I intended to start with her life before her illness. However, given the timing, it seemed prudent to provide an update on her first week of treatment. My next post will be about her life pre-diagnosis. If you’re interested in that, subscribe to my blog (link below) or bookmark her tag page.
Posted in Cat
As I mentioned in my post on Saturday, our formerly outdoor girl has just been diagnosed with FIP. She will need 81 more daily injections — as of this morning — of a fairly new, and rather expensive, medication. The total volume of medication she’ll need over the course of treatment will depend on how much weight she regains.
As of yesterday morning, she’s 6.4 lbs — she’s a rather small cat, and she’s still underweight — up from a horrifying 5.7 lbs at her lowest. Our goal is to get her back up to between 8 and 9 lbs. We don’t currently know exactly what her dose per injection will be as her weight goes up.
Posted in Cat, and Fountain Pens
Update 12/27/22: Thank you so much to those who have purchased pens! It’s truly appreciated.
I’ve had some pens for sale at Bertram’s Inkwell for a little while. I appreciate how easy Bert makes his consignment process. Under normal circumstances, I’m in no hurry to sell pens. They sell when they sell. That said, we’ve had something come up.
If you follow me on Instagram, then you’ve likely seen posts of our “outdoor” girl, Athena. She was once a feral kitten, and came to us for help when she was about 6 months old. She was outside our garage, meowing at us. And she never really left.
