Shortly after arriving home from Florida, I discovered Nimbus in distress. I called our neighbor, who is a vet, for an ER recommendation. He hurried over to give her a look before calling us in to his clinic.

After many hours it was determined that she had a foreign body in her gut. They kept her overnight to see if it was in the colon and would move, but there was no change in the morning. She had emergency surgery to remove the object on Wednesday afternoon. We visited her over the next few days and I pushed to have her discharged on Friday morning. I could tell that she was being stubborn at that point and wouldn’t eat until she came home.

The mouse arrow is on the ohject
Post-op daze
Hospital room
The foam
Visiting the patient

The object was a piece of foam – no surprise to me. She loves to chew on foam: pool noodles, toy parts, styrofoam, etc, and she loves to eat popcorn. Something about that texture. We do our best to keep it out of the house, but she must have found this stray piece somewhere. I had the boys spend 10 minutes searching for foam every day while she was in the hospital.

Once home she visibly relaxed. She used her litter box and ate some food like normal! I was so relieved. This was an incredibly stressful time for me. Not only had we just come home off a big trip, I had another trip planned that weekend. What was supposed to be a 4 day rest period became a sleepless, horrible week with anxiety clawing at me from every side.

Andy came through like an angel. He offered to help with Nimbus while I was away. At first I declined, thinking it would be no big deal once she got home. But as we left the ER clinic with a long list of instructions and medication schedule, Ben and I knew we needed help. Andy immediately started packing and arrived right before I had to leave for the airport. I’m so grateful that he came to be Nimbus’ nurse. He was super attentive and careful with her and gave me reassuring updates. I heard that the boys all had a great time together too, which was also soothing to my nerves.

Home Sweet Home
She had to reclaim all her territory
My loving brother and his patient
Stubborn cat, I found her out here with her cone on even!
First day home
A week later

Nimbus is pretty much back to normal now. She has been making up for lost time on the couch with me, especially after the boys returned to school. Her stitches are mostly gone and her appetite is ravenous. We have a follow-up appointment this week but I’m sure she will be fine now.