so, after all my fretting about louis staying in the cattery when we got home from england and picked him up he seemed fine – glad to be home but healthy and happy. about a week later i walked in the door when i got home from work and when i saw him an alarm bell went off inside my head – louis is sick! he had a weepy eye, he’d been sleeping a lot the past few days, and i’d heard him cough the day before. and he was doing this bizarre thing with his jaw, like he was chewing on something or trembling involuntarily. i got freaked out, and we took him to the vet that afternoon.

when the vet saw him he looked at louis’ eyes, took his temperature and said, “oh he’s definitely got a cold”. the vet gave him a shot of antibiotics, an envelope of tablets and sent us on our way. when I asked about the jaw thing the vet thought it was due to the fact that he had some swollen glands in his neck, and he was probably trying to clear his sore throat. i was satisfied with that, and off we went home.

six days later he’s still doing this strange jaw thing, seems to have trouble eating, is drooling a lot, and is less energetic than the spunky kitten he was before we went away. i’m really worried about him, i don’t know what the problem is and i’m thinking through all the possible risks – did he catch a nasty virus at the cattery? did he eat a slug pellet? am i making a bigger deal of all this than i should? ack, the guilt. i feel terrible. i think we’ll have to take him back to the vet today.

UPDATE:: Louis seems to be on the mend. he’s still a bit under the weather, but he is outside chasing bugs and eating grass and generally doing his cat thang. also, he’s not having as much trouble with the shaky jaw and drooling/snotty nose as before. i think he’s getting over whatever it was that was making him sick, which i suspect was probably a virus from the cattery. i seriously couldn’t take the worry and stress of it though. i think i need more deep breathing and relaxation exercises or something…

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