Toby day 45: Vet visit

Toby went to see Dr. Colleen this morning. She was thrilled with his weight gain, appetite, energy, and developmental progress. She now gives him a 60% chance of survival, maybe a bit higher. It's amazing how good that sounds after last week's 5%. He had another antibiotic shot and is to continue on the oral antibiotics until next week, when he will probably have another x-ray. His heart and lungs sound great.

It's not all good news. He's tiny, and my scale reads higher than the vet's, so I thought he was over a pound and he's only 12 ounces, very small for his age. Most kittens his age are eating 4-5 hours apart; he needs to eat every 3 hours, and he still needs to live in a pretty narrow temperature range.

He's still too small to vaccinate and too sick to worm again.

We'll hope.

We've reached a compromise on the elimination issue, led by Toby. I gave him a paper grocery bag to play in, and he decided it would be a lovely, peaceful place to do his potty duties. That was a lot better, by our standards, than his previous choices, which were his carrier (where he sleeps), his cage (the dog crate where we try to litter-train him), or a secluded corner of the carpet. So we went and bought a package of paper grocery bags from our understanding grocer. I put one in his cage every time he goes in. He uses them every time and has stopped going anywhere else, praise be. I can start introducing litter into the bag one piece at a time; eventually, I can put a bag in a litterbox, and with any luck I can, eventually, remove the bag.

She gave us some dry kitten food. I admitted that last week I bought a bag as an act of faith. She says to keep doing what we're doing, so we will.