March 2012 - Update! Lucky had her surgery for PRAA on October 29, 2011...and her mom says she is doing very well and no longer has any problems from the PRAA!
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| I'm a big girl now and I'm very pretty, I know! |
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| Come on, Boca... |
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| Come on, Ivy... |
Here is Clive's new friend, Lucky! Isn't she precious? And she really is lucky, too! Not only did she survive running across a busy road but then she had surgery to correct her PRAA when she was 2-3 months old! Here is her amazing story as told by her mom...
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| right after rescue |
"I spotted Lucky scrambling across a busy road a few months ago; she was so tiny I initially thought she was a rat, but I realized she was a little black kitten and pulled over to scoop her up and take her home.
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| nom, nom, nom, slurp... |
"She appeared malnourished and dehydrated, and was started on weaning milk fed through an eye dropper, graduating to a little bottle. She quickly gained strength, and would often gaze directly into the eyes of the person bottle-feeding her; she developed a habit of sitting on shoulders and perching on laps, and would sit on my shoulder when I played the guitar.
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| about a week or so after rescue |
"My intention was to wean her and then give her away, as I already have 2 cats, one of whom does not like “intruders”. But as she was being weaned, she began to appear to aspirate her food and milk and to have a gasping reaction while she foamed milk out of her nose and mouth.
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| trying baby food |
"Sometimes she would regurgitate her meal directly. Her hair appeared sparse, and when she breathed, it was as if she were breathing from her throat instead of her chest and stomach.
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| where am I and why am I here? |
"Reading about Clive’s success story, though he ended up having a different diagnosis, helped me decide to take the chance to have the surgery for Lucky and I scheduled it after coming to peace with the expense involved. She was so tiny and vulnerable, and would cling to my chest as I went about doing my regular activities (one-handed); seeing her like that, I knew I had to take a chance to help her have a normal life.
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| take this off, please |
"She had the surgery on Oct. 29th when her estimated age was between 8 and 12 weeks, and she stayed 2 days at the clinic before I could bring her home. Waiting to hear back from the hospital was agonizing, but I finally got the call that Lucky did well through the surgery and was recovering. My local vet’s diagnosis had been correct and she did have PRAA, which was corrected by snipping the ligature constricting her esophagus.
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| resting after surgery |
"She had to be kept still for 14 days until she got her stitches out Nov. 14. It was so wonderful to see her able to eat a meal and digest it properly! She has had a few incidents of foaming and regurgitating, but those incidents seem to have been precipitated by giving her another kind of cat food; her food needs to be very slurry and I am feeding her upright, and initially kept her upright 10 min. after feeding to help the food move down through her esophagus.
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| I'm cute. I know. |
"She is active and appears very healthy; the hardest part was keeping her relatively still during the recovery period, but now she is out in the “general population” and is active and hilarious like all kittens.
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| OK, can we play now? |
"As I type this, she is sitting on a pile of papers on the desk watching me, and when she is not running around, she is curled up in a lap, purring with one of the loudest purrs I have heard!"
What a beautiful girl and a wonderful kitty mom!
If you would like to say Hi to Lucky and her mom, you can go to our blog and leave a comment for them under Lucky's blog entry! We will also publish updates about Lucky as her mom sends them over!
