The Hundredth Monkey Phenomenon

A few months ago Michelle and I started noticing some abnormal behavior with our cat; namely, she peed on us when we were sleeping. She had also been peeing on the couch and using the litter box with surprising regularity. Thinking that something might be wrong with her, I brought her to the vet and got a full urinary analysis done. It came back and the young guy who had seen her claimed that everything was normal.

Well, after another few weeks she started defecating all over the house. A pile on the floor here, a stain on the couch there. One time I came home from work and there were 6 distinct events scattered throughout the living room. I started getting increasingly angry, to the point that I was considering giving her away (I had thought that her behavioral issues may have been due to our new puppy, who loves to antagonize her). However, we called the vet again to see if something else might be wrong, and the vet on call–who was different and older than the previous one–was shocked that we weren’t treating her given the results from the last test. I brought her in immediately and it turns out that she has an absolutely massive bladder infection. So now she’s on a heavy dose of antibiotics, has a radically new prescription diet, and is expected to be done ruining my house in about 5-7 days.

The guy who screwed up cost my cat 2 months of pain and discomfort, me an incredible amount of aggravation cleaning up after her and $250 in various resulting medical costs, when all he had to do was correctly read the results of a chemical analysis that he didn’t even have to perform. Four years of vet school, fella. That seems like a pretty straightforward thing to be able to do for a ridiculously common house pet.

I’m very relieved that she’s now on the path to recovery, as she really is a terrific cat, and I’m sure she is as well. She’s coming with us to Connecticut for Christmas so that we can continue to medicate her.