Don't mess with an eight-legged mamma
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Accident -prone Thong is back in hospital, this time with a massive infection
OF ALL THE soi cats in Bangkok, Thong is probably the unluckiest, at least for this year.
You’ve already heard about Thong’s problems with flu and infected wounds. He’s fully recovered, thank goodness, and quite happy to be home.
Life should return to normal, but a few weeks later, when Thong comes in for breakfast, he’s limping, trying not to use one of his front legs.
In English slang, Thong is a klutz, a cat so clumsy he has trouble managing his four feet. Remember the time he jumped from a roof and ended up on his rear end?
I’m not worried, until the vet examines him. Thong isn’t limping because of the leg, she says. On his shoulder, she finds what she calls a “mass”, some tissue so hard that it makes using that leg very painful.
Yes, the boy has to have another surgery. This time, when the mass is removed, a piece is sent to a lab for further examination.
Poor Thong spends another week at the vet’s, waiting for the surgical wounds to heal so that the stitches can be removed.
I keep Thong inside the day he returns home, but the next day, he dashes into the soi to be with his best friend Thep.
Only three hours later, Thong rushes into the house and jumps on the sofa. I go over to pet him – and I see something horrible.
One of Thong’s eyes is swollen so badly that he can’t close it. There’s just a huge white-and-pink ball where the eye should be. The poor cat could play a feline role in “Night of the Living Dead”.
I’m so sorry, readers. I should have taken a photo, but I was too upset.
We rush to the vet, who examines Thong’s poor eye. She explains that the white-and-pink ball is actually his “third eyelid”. The eye has swollen from some kind of trauma, and the third eyelid, or inner eyelid, has automatically covered the eye to protect it.
This third eyelid, called a “nictitating membrane” or “haw”, is found in birds and reptiles – even sharks. Humans don’t have it, but cats and dogs do.
It’s normally hidden, but if you can see it in your dog or cat – it’s red or white – your pet may be ill or injured, but not all the time. Some cats let it show when they’re relaxed.
My vet thinks that Thong’s eye was injured, but not from fighting. Some insect probably bit him.
Myself, I don’t think it was an insect but a spider. In our soi, in fact, all over Bangkok, we have lots of different species of spiders. I love the small ones, whose webs catch lots of mosquitoes.
We do have much larger spiders too. I’ve seen some the size of my hand. They’re very shy, these big ones, and usually keep away from people – but meet a lady spider carrying her egg packet on her abdomen, and you have a very fierce mamma determined to protect her babies.
I can just see that idiot cat playing with his new (and very angry) eight-legged toy!
With a course of anti-histamines, Thong’s eye returns to normal within hours, but not for long. A day later, the eye swells up again, and he has a fever.
Today, Thong’s back at the clinic. His eye looks fine, but his blood test indicates a massive infection. Although we don’t know where it is, he’s facing a long course of antibiotics.
That poor cat. Who wants to be a long-staying guest at the animal hospital?
