Help Us Save Jack

On November 25th, Jack had an emergency surgery to remove a blockage from his stomach. He had ingested some tinsel that wrapped around the back of his tongue, down his throat, and created an anchor point in his stomach. It also began to bunch his intestines like an accordion as it tried to make its way out. Surgery had gone well and we hoped after a day he'd be able to come home and continue his recovery here. However, Jack developed a fever and showed signs of pneumonia so he had to stay longer. Monday morning we get a call that his fever had broke, and his pneumonia was looking much better after some antibiotics but more concerning was Jack had now developed postop ileus which is a decrease in movement of the GI tract. He was transferred to a critical care center for longer treatment and it was just a domino effect from there. He began to retain a lot of air in his abdomen because he was mouth breathing due to congestion and a feeding tube in his nostrils. On Thursday morning November 30th, Jack went in for another procedure to have his feeding tube inserted in his esophagus to open his nose better to help stop the mouth breathing. Even though the procedure had gone well, Jack began to have fluid build up in his abdomen, his blood pressure was dropping/staying low and he now had a high wbc and his rbc was low. By Saturday it had been a week since surgery and Jack had still not eaten and was now rejecting all attempts at trickle feeding him through the tube as a result of the postop ileus. His body was beginning to eat the fat stores his has which is placing a lot of work on his liver which was causing the jaundice.

At this point we were told his odds are 50/50 and if he didn't keep something down within the next day or so, we would need to discuss letting him go. However, the center also wanted to see him recover and held a tele-conference with other vets around to brainstorm and get opinions on helping Jack. So yesterday afternoon, they did a full abdomen ultrasound to make sure there were no traces of tinsel left, he had a blood transfusion, and was given a small steroid to bring down inflammation around his pancreas. We will be visiting him this afternoon and have an update as well.

I understand not everyone will understand why we're going so far to save Jack or some even have said we're prolonging the suffering but he's part of the family. Four years ago, I came across a post on Facebook that had a photo of a box filled with kittens. The original poster had said she found the box outside in a park. Immediately we knew we needed to save one and give them a home. That day we drove almost 30 mins to this person's house and our oldest, Lex, went straight for Jack. There was no hesitation, no thinking it over, Jack and Lex found each other. He was about 3 weeks old at the time and I remember staying up with broken sleep to bottle feed him until he was cleared for soft foods. He was literally like having a newborn all over again. Jack has been the piece to fit perfectly and finish our little family. We just can't imagine a life without him. The kids have been anxious with him gone for so long and I've been a wreck trying to not think the worst and how to tell the kids if that does happen. So we NEED Jack to come home. We already said goodbye to Rocco this year, we're not doing it again for a long time.

Currently, we're around $18-20,000 for everything that has been done. Anything donated will first go to any continued care as we've maxed out all we have now and no longer have funds for anything else that comes up. After that, we'll use it to help with the overall cost. If we somehow get more than the cost at the end, we would love to donate it to the care center that has been nothing but wonderful to our Jack and family. They have done so much and reached out to other doctors and have been rooting for his recovery just as much as we have.

Thank you so much for taking the time to read. If you can't donate, shares are also so helpful, thank you again and hopefully Jack will make it home soon!