Hello, meet Calvin!
On February 2, 2023, Calvin fell off the second-floor stair railing inside our home down to the first floor, hitting a wooden dog gate before landing on the floor. The impact on that wooden gate not only pulled out a large tuft of hair but also broke his femur bone. Please read below for the whole story about how this happened.
The details of the injury:
It was a Thursday morning. I was up and had already started working from home. Around 8:30 am Todd was in the kitchen making breakfast. The biscuits just finished baking and the scrambled eggs were done as well. Todd ran upstairs to get something, and Myra (the chihuahua) and Calvin (the kitten) followed him upstairs. When Todd came back downstairs only Myra followed him. Todd was at the coffee machine when he saw a dark blob fall from the upstairs landing on the wooden gate. That blob was Calvin.
While we did not see what caused the fall, we suspect he tried to jump onto the handrail of the upstairs landing not realizing its rounded and very slick and instead jumped right over the handrail falling to the ground below.
Picture of the landing at the top of the stairs and the dog fence at the bottom of the stairs.
Picture from the top of the landing looking down at the fence below.
Calvin laid there for maybe 1-2 seconds and Todd feared the worst, that Calvin had died. But thankfully Calvin started crying. He tried to get up but was limping. When he got up there was a large lump of fur on the floor from where his side hit the fence. I immediately knew he most likely broke his leg but wasn’t sure if there were any other injuries at the location of his hair loss.
Here are two pictures of the wound and patch of hair loss on his side.
We immediately went into emergency mode. I didn’t even log off my work computer, but text messaged my boss that Calvin broke his leg and we were rushing him to the ER. We live an hour away from Sacramento in a small town and weren’t sure which vet we should take him to. We tried our regular small-town vet but no answer. We called UC Davis Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital - Small Animal Clinic (UCD) but they had a 10-minute hold, so we just started driving there. It was about a 45-minute drive.
Once we arrived at UCD they took Calvin to the back. Because this was an emergency case, not a regularly scheduled vet appointment, we knew it would take a while for any answers. Around an hour later we were updated that they were going to sedate him and give him some medication because he was in pain. They would also do some x-rays to see exactly what the injury was and consult with the orthopedist.
About 4 ½ hours later we finally were able to meet with the doctor. She informed us that Calvin had fractured his right femoral head. She informed us that Calvin will need surgery to correct this injury and there are two surgery options. Option one is a repair using pins and/or plates. With this option, surgery must happen no later than Monday. Option two is a femoral head and neck ostectomy (FHO) which is where they remove the head of the femur creating a false joint. This surgery can be done after the 72-hour period but the soonest available is best. However, UCD would not be able to do either surgery as they have a very long wait list and directed us to find another vet to do the surgery.
We went to our vehicle and started calling around to vets all over our region. Almost all the vets we called did not offer orthopedic surgery. The few vets we did find that offered orthopedic surgery didn’t have any surgery openings until March at the earliest. Thankfully we did find one vet an hour away that had an orthopedic surgery opening on February 16th. So, the plan is that we will take Calvin there on February 15th, they will do further x-rays and evaluation, he will stay the night and have surgery on the 16th and he will stay the night again and go home on February 17th. We are planning to have surgery option 2, the FHO. This surgery is estimated to cost between $4,200-$4,500.
FHO Description:
Mind you, all this time Calvin is still in UCD being prepped to go home. He was finally released around 5:30 pm. His vet care at UCD was over $600 for that day. He was given a shot to help with the pain and sent home with two pain medications. One is used only short-term for the first three days and the second medication is to be used longer until he gets his surgery on the 16th.
We were given strict rules to keep Calvin confined to a small area with restricted activity. He is not allowed to run, jump, or climb at all. Once we got home, we set up a temporary way to keep him confined for that first night. Just the prior weekend we had bought a mesh cat tent that we planned to use on an upcoming trip (which is now canceled). We used that tent and put his litter box, food, water, a bed, and a small toy inside.
This morning (2/3/23) Todd made a better recovery area for Calvin out of some doggy fences (x-pens) we already had. Calvin now has almost the whole living room area for his house. It gives him better access to his litter, food, water, bed, and some room to move around. It is even large enough for us humans to sit inside his home and give him love and attention.
Here is Calvin’s new temporary recovery area.
Here is Calvin’s story:
Calvin was born approximately May 16, 2022. When Calvin was around 4 weeks old, he was found abandoned in Colusa County. He had no mommy or siblings with him when he was found by a good citizen. He was taken to the county animal shelter where one of the officers bottle-fed him and took care of him around the clock. He was severely underweight and in poor health when he arrived at the shelter. At the time he was called Hobbs but I wasn’t a fan of that name so we renamed him Calvin (as in Calvin and Hobbs) after we adopted him.
Here is Calvin as a little kitten while in the county shelter foster program.
As Calvin got a little older, he went to a foster home. This foster home had dogs but no other cats. Because of this, Calvin was never around other cats but loved dogs - playing and wrestling with the dogs in his foster home. While in foster care Calvin was taken to UCD through their teaching program to receive all his shots and to be neutered.
When we decided we were ready to adopt a cat we started looking on Petfinder at the county animal shelter closest to us in Colusa. There were several cat profiles we saw but when we landed on Calvin’s profile, we instantly knew he was the perfect fit. At the time, we had two senior dogs – a 16-year-old chihuahua (Myra) and a 15-year-old dachshund (Winky).
We met Calvin on October 13, 2022, at the county shelter and it was love at first sight. When we adopted him and brought him home and set the pet carrier on the floor for the dogs to meet Calvin. The dogs were so happy to have a new buddy. We opened the door to the carrier and Calvin walked out of there like he owned the place, and he did! He is not a typical cat that will go and hide under a bed and is not afraid of anything. No, he is very outgoing and curious about everything.
Since Calvin came to live with us almost 4 months ago, in January we did have to say goodbye to our sweet doggy Winky. Winky had dementia in his old age but loved having a little brother (Calvin) to play with. In the evenings all of the animals pile on my lap or around me while we relax. Often during the evenings, Calvin would lay on top of Winky, it was so cute.
The day we brought Calvin home and Winky was still trying to figure him out.
Myra also loves having a little brother but in a different way. She is more of a moody little girl. Calvin will try to entice Myra to play by swatting her, biting her tail, or jumping out to scare her. She in turn will yip at him and pin him to the ground. She loves it just as much as he does but in her moody kind of way.
Picture of Calvin and Myra caught napping together.
Calvin is like a little Tasmanian devil. He is so active and has very little downtime. He will do zoomies around our house. There is no way to keep him calm. He is just wild and into everything. We have had to put baby latches on all of our cupboards because he used to get into all of them and hide or play and cause trouble in them.
He is such a silly little guy and he loves to dress up. He has a couple of t-shirts that he likes wearing. Because he can be a little devil at times we even got him a little devil sweatshirt. He also loves playing with little soft fuzzy balls and will play with them for hours until he finally gets them stuck under something such as the couch.
Because Calvin is so active we have always had a fear of the stairs with him. We did our best and put up a mesh screen at the top of the stairs in hopes that this would never happen. You can kind of see there’s a white portion in the picture above of the stairs. It is so sad to know we have tried our best to keep our little guy safe but he still managed to get injured.
Calvin especially loves his mom and dad. He is so active but when he does finally slow down for a minute, he must be right in our faces giving us love. Literally! He will stick his nose up our noses smelling our breath and will head butt us and rub his head on ours. Calvin also likes to be held like a baby and will reach his hands up and put his paws so gently on our cheeks.
The best way to help us is by sharing his story and GoFundMe with your friends and family or on social media. Any help that can be offered will be greatly appreciated. His medical bills right now are very costly and we just want to ensure he has a long, healthy, pain-free life ahead of him. He has so much love to give! Thank you from all of us!
Picture of Calvin taken today as he rests in his temporary recovery area.
