Please Help Nightmare Get Through This Surgery

Nightmare is my baby and I need some help. Last week we were out of town and I had my friend checking in on our pets while we were gone. He let me know that Nightmare had thrown up and that it was quite a lot. At first I thought it might have been a change in food/feeding schedule and separation anxiety from me being gone for so long. But he stopped eating and just kept getting worse.

On Friday I had my friend go ahead and take him to the vet. The same day we took the drive to come home. They gave him fluids and ran some tests and decided he had a urinary infection. They gave him an antibiotic shot and sent him home with rebound, a food supplement to try to get him eating again.

His follow up appointment was yesterday morning (Monday July 8th). I let them know that he still has not eaten any food and had only had the prescriptions give to him. They ran more test and found that his white blood cells had doubled again since his last visit on Friday. They asked to do X-rays and found a mass they believed to be in his intestines and called me to tell me they needed to operate. We drove back to the vet so I could see him before he went under for surgery.

While under, they called me to tell me that a section of his bowels was enlarged and that it was likely cancer but they won't know for sure without a biopsy. Either way the section would need to be removed. So they removed the mass they saw in the X-ray, a section of his bowels, and took a couple small pieces of one of his lymph nodes so that they could do the biopsy if I could afford it later.

After surgery they kept him overnight to monitor him and make sure he had fluids and they let me pick him up this afternoon.

They told me to keep an eye on his incision site for any redness or puss because that could mean infection and that would be considered an emergency and to bring him back in immediately. They also said to watch for swelling or redness of his abdomen because that could mean that the internal sutures in his bowels have torn and it would also be an emergency that would need immediate care. I just checked on him and noticed redness and called the emergency vet right away to see if I should take him in.

The emergency vet had me send in pictures and I'm currently waiting to hear back from them as I type this.

So here's my dilemma. The vet bills so far have cost $2,344.43. My CareCredit is maxed out and I pretty much have nothing left to put towards vet bills right now and emergency vets are incredibly expensive.

Nightmare is my baby and I love him more than anything. He's 11 years old and he's been with me since he was orphaned at 3 weeks. I had to bottle feed him and his sisters every two hours and teach them how to use the litter box. He has been with me through every place I've lived and has been there for me at my lowest points. I cannot imagine my life without him and I'm honestly terrified.

If I have to take him into the emergency vet I don't know how I'm going to pay for it. I have things listed for sale on Facebook Marketplace but nothing has really sold recently. I need to make up the money quickly and do that's why I'm here. I set the goal for $3,500 because I have no idea how many more appointments he'll need or if he's going to need another surgery and even then $3,500 is low. I also need $250-$900 if I want to go through with the biopsy to find out if the section of enlarged intestines is actually cancer.

I want to thank anyone who actually donates to this and even if you can't donate but you can share it so that other people might see it and be able to donate I'd really appreciate it. I hate having to ask for help but I wouldn't be here if I wasn't absolutely desperate.