Precisely three years ago, Athena was diagnosed with non-effusive Feline Infectious Peritonitis, AKA “dry” FIP. The disease used to be a death sentence, but we were able to get her treatment, and she’s doing really well. Our little FIP warrior was declared cured about 2 and a half years ago, without dealing with a relapse. If you’re curious about her journey through treatment and observation, you can read through the backlog of posts on her tag page.
I can hardly believe it’s only been three years, because it seems a lifetime ago. There continues to be a lack of information about a cat’s life after being declared cured, so we’re taking it day by day. Or, well, technically, vet visit by vet visit.
Now, without further preamble, it’s time to dive into my biannual update on Athena’s health and life post FIP.
Health
Our little goddess has been pretty healthy this year, with the only issues affecting her eyes. The eye infection issues I discussed in my last post about her didn’t abate. Instead, her left eye started reflecting light in an odd way.
After a couple of standard vet visits, we ended up seeing an ophthalmologist — I didn’t know there were veterinary ophthalmologists until then — where we learned Athena had likely had an ulcer at some point, but it was mostly healed. As I write this, it occurs to me that I didn’t ask if the ulcer was related to her continued dry eye problem.
However, the ophthalmologist was rather concerned about how dry Athena’s eyes are, and prescribed a potentially lifelong course of Optimmune (0.2% Cyclosporine ointment) and Optixcare Eye Lube (lubricating gel) twice daily. She thinks there’s a chance that FIP or the treatment may have killed Athena’s tear glands. We’ll have yearly follow-ups to keep an eye on Athena’s… eyes.
At her October follow-up, she had both the tonometry and Schirmer Tear Test. For the pressure test, she was barely within normal range on the right eye, and just slightly lower on the left. For tear production, she was right within normal on the left eye, but a bit below normal on the right. I’m planning to schedule another follow-up appointment for her in February to keep that as her annual check-up time.
Her most recent standard vet visit was December 11. While we didn’t do the eye pressure test, her Schirmer Tear Test was both better and worse: down 5 mm on the left eye and up 1 mm on the right eye. Another reason for an early follow up with the ophthalmologist.
Athena’s bloodwork was mostly back to normal, although she did have a couple of items outside of the normal range:
- Neutrophils, as always, were below normal, .599 outside of range this time.
- Eosinophils were just barely below normal, and only using the new normal ranges.
- ProBNP was elevated by 38, but that could easily be from stress, so we’re just going to monitor it for now.
| Test | 2.4 Yr PC 12/11 | 1.9 Yr PC 5/15 | 1.16 Yr PC 8/30 | 11 Mo PC 5/30 | 8 Mo PC 2/27 | 5 Mo PC 11/28 | 3 Mo PC 9/29 | 1 Mo PC 7/28 | O Wk 12 6/30 | O Wk 8 6/2 | O Wk 4 5/2 | T Wk 15 4/4 | T Wk 11 3/6 | T Wk 8 2/13 | T Wk 4 1/26 | Ref. range | Unit |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hematocrit | 43.3 | 43.3 | 42.3 | 39.2 | 39.7 | 39.9 | 35.6 | 38.7 | 37.2 | 39.0 | 43.1 | 45.3 | 43.9 | 34.9 | 38 | 28.2 – 52.7 | percent |
| Neutrophils | 2.021 | 2.27 | 1.4 | 2.346 | 1.247 | 1.152 | 2.226 | 4.034 | 1.739 | 2.192 | 2.495 | 3.295 | 3.618 | 2.244 | 4.560 | 2.62 – 15.17 | thousands per cubic milliliter |
| Bilirubin | — | — | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.1 | <0.1 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.0 – 0.3 | milligrams per deciliter (mg/dL) |
| Total Protein | 8.2 | 9.2 | 8.6 | 8.5 | 8.6 | 8.6 | 8.6 | 8.5 | 8.8 | 8.8 | 8.3 | 8.2 | 8.9 | 9.0 | 8.9 | 6.3 – 8.8 | grams per deciliter (g/dL) |
| Albumin | 3.1 | 3.2 | 3.1 | 3.1 | 3.2 | 3.2 | 3 | 3 | 3.1 | 3.0 | 3.1 | 2.8 | 3.3 | 2.4 | 2.9 | 2.6 – 3.9 | g/dL |
| Globulin | 5.1 | 6 | 5.5 | 5.4 | 5.4 | 5.4 | 5.6 | 5.5 | 5.7 | 5.8 | 5.2 | 5.4 | 5.6 | 6.6 | 6.0 | 3.0 – 5.9 | g/dL |
| A/G ratio | 0.6 | 0.5 | 0.6 | 0.6 | 0.6 | 0.6 | 0.5 | 0.5 | 0.5 | 0.5 | 0.6 | 0.5 | 0.6 | 0.4 | 0.5 | 0.5 – 1.2 | |
| ALT | 36 | 37 | 28 | 26 | 30 | 36 | 42 | 32 | 38 | 30 | 35 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 28 | 27 – 158 | international units per liter |
As always, I’ve also updated her FIP Bloodwork Google Sheets file, which includes all of the blood work values that could be related to FIP and her blood work history dashboard.
Social Life
I’m sure no one is surprised to know Athena is still 100000% dad’s girl, although mom can sometimes be an acceptable alternative if he isn’t available.
Her relationships with the other members of our clowder haven’t changed much either. She has an ignore-hate relationship with Dante. If he ignores her, she ignores him. But if he so much as looks at her, she starts growling, and heaven forbid he thinks about approaching her.
Sometimes she’s OK with Ritz, and won’t complain if he’s near her. Other times, she treats him just like she treats Dante.
Her relationship with Floofenstein is better. She lets him get much closer than the other two boys and is less likely to start growling if he approaches. There are moments, though, where she lumps him in with the other “stinky boys” and wants him far away from her.
It’s too soon to tell what her relationship will be with Ginny. They’re still figuring each other out. I’m hopeful they will get along, maybe even become friends, since they seem to have more respect for each other than for the boys.
General Info
So, what other news is there to share? First of all, after adopting Ginny, we gave both girls collars, and Athena actually really likes hers! We got it at PetSmart and it’s from the brand Sassy Meow, but I can’t find it on the site to link to it.
She hasn’t made a single attempt to remove it, and was actually rather growly when I took it off the other day before her bath.
We’ve had Athena on calming treats since June, and those seemed to help for a while, reducing her growling with the boys. But recently, she’s gotten more growly, which has made them more antagonistic, which makes her more growly, and so on.
So, we’ve added a calming supplement that has done wonders for Dante. We’ll have to wait a couple of months to know for sure if it makes any difference. *fingers crossed*
Related to the antagonistic behavior between the brothers and Athena, she isn’t using the litterbox consistently because she doesn’t want to give them the opportunity to ambush her. She has no problem using the litterbox, and will sometimes even meow for a “Huber” (Human Uber) when she needs to go. But, if we don’t figure out what she needs, or if we aren’t paying attention, she’ll just go on her heating pad.
I wish we could just leave it so she would learn that isn’t a viable option, but we have to clean up, and that likely makes it seem — to her anyway — that everything is OK because the waste vanishes.
If anyone has any suggestions, please let us know. Dante is on a calming supplement and low-dose gabapentin; Athena is on two calming supplements; and we have multi-cat Feliway in their main hang-out area.
To end this main part of the post on a high note, Athena has also started doing some adorable little stretches in the middle of her naps. Keep in mind, these photos are while she’s asleep, or mostly so.
Photos
Of course, I can’t end one of these posts without a recent photo dump.
What would you like to know about our little warrior? Let me know in the comments! I’d love to hear from you.
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