Saving Miss Mollie is Fantastico!
Donation protected
"Cats seem to go on the principle that it never does any harm to ask for what you want."
-Joseph Wood Krutch
Just one month after Miss Mollie Fantastico's 6th birthday and only a couple weeks after my 34th, she became gravely ill. Since then it has been a constant emotional rollarcoaster of trying to save her life from a very deadly, but also very treatable disease. Miss Mollie can still make a full recovery and live out the rest of her life happy and healthy with continued treatment.
My boyfriend is an amazing human being who has loaned me over $10,000 trying to make sure that she comes home to us, but she still has a ways to go. I am drowning in my own medical debt from an illness Mollie was there to comfort me through and I owe it to her to see her through as well. We just need some help!
Miss Mollie suddenly stopped eating and we aren't really sure why. I was battling my own medical issues and had finally recovered, but decided to take a trip out of town to visit my boyfriend. Shortly after returning home I noticed that she was very lethargic and skinny. She showed no interest in anything but sleeping. The stress may have caused her to stop eating, but really we just aren't sure since cats are just such fickle creatures. I took her into the vet and she was immediately hospitalized due to severe jaundice (or yellowing of the skin caused by liver failure).
She developed a condition known as Hepatic Lipidosis, which is a disease of the liver caused when a cat stops eating and their body tries to sustain itself by breaking down their fat stores. The fat cells build up in the liver and this slowly kills them if not treated aggressively. You can read about it here: Hepatic Lipidosis
She was given a feeding tube and sent home to my care, but she quickly declined. I wasn't warned that any of this could happen, nor fully made aware of the kind of danger she was in. She was vomiting every time I tried to feed her and quickly lost the ability to even move her back legs.
I rushed her back to the emergency room to a different team of doctors where she was diagnosed with Refeeding Syndrome, and later Hypophosphatemia. She has been in intensive care for over a week now battling this condition. You can read more about it in this tutorial: Refeeding Syndrome and Treating Hypophosphatemia
At first she seemed to be responding to treatment, but then started to decline again.
I was called by the vet on staff and told that Mollie might not make it through the night. Her blood pressure was dropping and her red blood cell count was only 16%. I was in total despair waiting to find out if she would pull through. I went to visit her and she was so weak she couldn't even get up to go to the bathroom. She would just urinate on herself. It was absolutely heartbreaking to see and I was certain that all hope was lost. I was faced with losing what I felt to be the closest living being to me. (The tissues in this picture were for me).
Fortunately, an emergency blood transfusion from a generous live donor saved her life that night and she slowly began to turn around. I went in to see her on the 14th and she was still too weak to move much, but while I was petting her she reached a paw out to touch my face. I cried like a baby.
But then very suddenly she turned around. I saw her and she was awake, alert and even felt well enough to play during our visit. I was so shocked by how dramatically she had improved! I shot this video for friends and loved ones...
Unfortunately, Mollie pulled her feeding tube out and it has to be replaced since she still isn't able to eat enough on her own to sustain her life. I found out that the orginial tube was placed very poorly by a vet I am already not very happy with.
Since I started this campaign, Mollie has had to have two surgeries and two blood transfusions. You would not believe the cost! Here is a picture of her bill as of March 23, 2014, as well as all her medications just to give people an idea of what we are dealing with:
Mollie has been sent home to me on a trial run, but she has already had to go back to emergency for vomiting. After the bill tonight we have now paid $12,860!
The doctors still aren't sure why she is anemic and she will probably need another blood transfusion next week and possibly require a test of her bone marrow if she does not improve over the next few weeks. I have to feed her every hour right now until she can handle larger feedings less often, so I have given up sleeping for longer than 45 minutes at a time and only get the chance to eat maybe once a day. Hopefully this schedule will only last a couple days, because we still have 4-6 weeks to go before she is fully recovered. I will do it for as long as she needs me to though, because I truly love her.
She is worth every penny that I have had to borrow, charge and scrape together and if given the same choice I would do it again. Even if it means ignoring my own medical bills or even if it means ignoring my own need for food. If you're one of those rare people who understands the bond between human and animal, then you know exactly why I have to do this for her. You know that every day of an animal's love is a gift and you know Miss Mollie deserves to live out the long happy life she can still have.
Please help us make sure that happens!
This is the day she found me at the Humane Society. She reached her little paw between the kennel bars to grab me as I walked by. She jumped into my arms and I had no choice but to take her home. She knew I was her human, so who was I to argue?
This is the first day she came home with me and we were both recovering from surgery. She still loves when I kiss her head and still thinks that I am her personal bed.
Here is Mollie helping me graduate college and remember to take snuggle breaks in between reading.
Here she is helping me unpack and making sure I never forget to do the laundry after getting her hair all over it.
Here's Mollie being the beautiful soul she is:
Here she is helping me rest when I got out of the hospital in December:
And here we are trying to get her through her hospital stay as well:
Anything helps at this point! If you can't donate, then please share this with as many people as you can. Mollie isn't just a pet to me, she is my family. She is a part of me. Sometimes she looks at me and I see myself because we have been through so much together over the last 6 years that she is just a part of who I am now. She's my fur baby and my kitty soulmate! She still has so much life ahead of her that we simply have to try everything we can, which includes asking for the help of strangers.
I am not too proud to beg to help save this very special girl. Please help her if you can.
Mollie is me in feline form...
Thank you for reading!
And thank you to the amazing staff at WestVet for working around the clock to keep Mollie going! I just found out that one of the vet techs who works there was the one who brought her cat in to donate blood for us. Amazing care: 10/10 would recommend.
Any and all money received as a result of this gofundme page will go to pay for Miss Mollie's future care and to repay the people who have helped her so far.
-Joseph Wood Krutch
Just one month after Miss Mollie Fantastico's 6th birthday and only a couple weeks after my 34th, she became gravely ill. Since then it has been a constant emotional rollarcoaster of trying to save her life from a very deadly, but also very treatable disease. Miss Mollie can still make a full recovery and live out the rest of her life happy and healthy with continued treatment.
My boyfriend is an amazing human being who has loaned me over $10,000 trying to make sure that she comes home to us, but she still has a ways to go. I am drowning in my own medical debt from an illness Mollie was there to comfort me through and I owe it to her to see her through as well. We just need some help!
Miss Mollie suddenly stopped eating and we aren't really sure why. I was battling my own medical issues and had finally recovered, but decided to take a trip out of town to visit my boyfriend. Shortly after returning home I noticed that she was very lethargic and skinny. She showed no interest in anything but sleeping. The stress may have caused her to stop eating, but really we just aren't sure since cats are just such fickle creatures. I took her into the vet and she was immediately hospitalized due to severe jaundice (or yellowing of the skin caused by liver failure).
She developed a condition known as Hepatic Lipidosis, which is a disease of the liver caused when a cat stops eating and their body tries to sustain itself by breaking down their fat stores. The fat cells build up in the liver and this slowly kills them if not treated aggressively. You can read about it here: Hepatic Lipidosis
She was given a feeding tube and sent home to my care, but she quickly declined. I wasn't warned that any of this could happen, nor fully made aware of the kind of danger she was in. She was vomiting every time I tried to feed her and quickly lost the ability to even move her back legs.
I rushed her back to the emergency room to a different team of doctors where she was diagnosed with Refeeding Syndrome, and later Hypophosphatemia. She has been in intensive care for over a week now battling this condition. You can read more about it in this tutorial: Refeeding Syndrome and Treating Hypophosphatemia
At first she seemed to be responding to treatment, but then started to decline again.
I was called by the vet on staff and told that Mollie might not make it through the night. Her blood pressure was dropping and her red blood cell count was only 16%. I was in total despair waiting to find out if she would pull through. I went to visit her and she was so weak she couldn't even get up to go to the bathroom. She would just urinate on herself. It was absolutely heartbreaking to see and I was certain that all hope was lost. I was faced with losing what I felt to be the closest living being to me. (The tissues in this picture were for me).
Fortunately, an emergency blood transfusion from a generous live donor saved her life that night and she slowly began to turn around. I went in to see her on the 14th and she was still too weak to move much, but while I was petting her she reached a paw out to touch my face. I cried like a baby.
But then very suddenly she turned around. I saw her and she was awake, alert and even felt well enough to play during our visit. I was so shocked by how dramatically she had improved! I shot this video for friends and loved ones...
Unfortunately, Mollie pulled her feeding tube out and it has to be replaced since she still isn't able to eat enough on her own to sustain her life. I found out that the orginial tube was placed very poorly by a vet I am already not very happy with.
Since I started this campaign, Mollie has had to have two surgeries and two blood transfusions. You would not believe the cost! Here is a picture of her bill as of March 23, 2014, as well as all her medications just to give people an idea of what we are dealing with:
Mollie has been sent home to me on a trial run, but she has already had to go back to emergency for vomiting. After the bill tonight we have now paid $12,860!
The doctors still aren't sure why she is anemic and she will probably need another blood transfusion next week and possibly require a test of her bone marrow if she does not improve over the next few weeks. I have to feed her every hour right now until she can handle larger feedings less often, so I have given up sleeping for longer than 45 minutes at a time and only get the chance to eat maybe once a day. Hopefully this schedule will only last a couple days, because we still have 4-6 weeks to go before she is fully recovered. I will do it for as long as she needs me to though, because I truly love her.
She is worth every penny that I have had to borrow, charge and scrape together and if given the same choice I would do it again. Even if it means ignoring my own medical bills or even if it means ignoring my own need for food. If you're one of those rare people who understands the bond between human and animal, then you know exactly why I have to do this for her. You know that every day of an animal's love is a gift and you know Miss Mollie deserves to live out the long happy life she can still have.
Please help us make sure that happens!
This is the day she found me at the Humane Society. She reached her little paw between the kennel bars to grab me as I walked by. She jumped into my arms and I had no choice but to take her home. She knew I was her human, so who was I to argue?
This is the first day she came home with me and we were both recovering from surgery. She still loves when I kiss her head and still thinks that I am her personal bed.
Here is Mollie helping me graduate college and remember to take snuggle breaks in between reading.
Here she is helping me unpack and making sure I never forget to do the laundry after getting her hair all over it.
Here's Mollie being the beautiful soul she is:
Here she is helping me rest when I got out of the hospital in December:
And here we are trying to get her through her hospital stay as well:
Anything helps at this point! If you can't donate, then please share this with as many people as you can. Mollie isn't just a pet to me, she is my family. She is a part of me. Sometimes she looks at me and I see myself because we have been through so much together over the last 6 years that she is just a part of who I am now. She's my fur baby and my kitty soulmate! She still has so much life ahead of her that we simply have to try everything we can, which includes asking for the help of strangers.
I am not too proud to beg to help save this very special girl. Please help her if you can.
Mollie is me in feline form...
Thank you for reading!
And thank you to the amazing staff at WestVet for working around the clock to keep Mollie going! I just found out that one of the vet techs who works there was the one who brought her cat in to donate blood for us. Amazing care: 10/10 would recommend.
Any and all money received as a result of this gofundme page will go to pay for Miss Mollie's future care and to repay the people who have helped her so far.
Organizer
Christina Lynn
Organizer
Boise, ID
