Nemesis, aka Nemy!
Written by Bernadette Rivet:
Meet the newest feline addition! Nemesis, aka Nemy!
Nemy was brought to the general practice clinic where I work to be neutered as a “feral”, which usually means he would have been released back into a backyard cat colony with little aftercare. The second I walked into the clinic door that morning, the veterinary technicians warned me something was wrong with how the feral neuter patient was breathing. After my physical examination, I decided to take an X-ray to determine the cause of his increased respiratory effort - a diaphragmatic hernia (this could be due to trauma or can be congenital).
I called up the lady who dropped him off to chat about his condition - the surgery required to correct the defect is expensive (I once spoke to a referral hospital for a similar case seen at the ER and they quoted $10K) and highly risk due to having to assist the patient in breathing throughout the surgery. She was not prepared to pay for such a procedure, even if our price was much less expensive than a specialist procedure. This little orange tabby cat was very sweet though, rubbing all over our legs and very curious in the clinic environment despite the scary smells and sights. I wanted to give him a chance, AND David and I had talked about wanting an “orange boi”. I decided to ask his keeper if she would be willing to let me try this surgery (which I hadn’t ever performed) if she would be willing to surrender him to me, letting her know he would then be in my care and taken home to an indoor life with my own kitties (provided he tested negative for FIV and FeLV so not to bring back infectious viral disease to my own kitty cats).
She agreed to sign over the necessary paperwork and off we went to surgery! Sure enough, as soon as I opened the abdomen to pull out the liver from his chest and replace his organs in their correct position and repair the diaphragm, he stopped breathing. I could see his little heart beating appropriately, but my veterinary technician had to breathe for him every 6 seconds for a full 30 minutes during my surgery. Even after everything was fixed, he still wouldn’t breathe on his own. We had to reverse all the anaesthetic drugs, and only as he was waking up from the surgery did he start breathing on his own. Which is to say he opened his eyes, started breathing with his endotracheal breathing tube still in - that had to be quickly removed so he would not chew on it!
After 3 days in isolation in the clinic, to treat his fleas and be sure he would survive, Nemy was brought home! He stayed a couple more weeks isolated in our guest bedroom and finally was introduced to Nyx and Nero. Thankfully he fits in perfectly; living up to his name as a play buddy and “frenemy” to Nero, and being respectful of Nyx’s boundaries. He’s a chatty little guy who brightens up our days!
