Tammy Cat's Christmas Tinsel Surgery

What started as $1 bag of Christmas tinsel has ended in a nightmare that I never could have imagined…

After putting up some tinsel Christmas decorations with my sons, our beautiful 4-year-old family cat Tammy, somehow, managed to eat some of it, resulting in an extremely sick cat and leaving us out of pocket almost $9000 in vet bills, care and medication, without even the guarantee that Tammy is going to survive.

I, like many others, didn’t even realise that tinsel could pose such a risk to cats and pets in general, so I’ve started this Go-fund-me to raise awareness to hopefully save other peoples’ pets’ lives and prevent you the financial hardship we are facing, in hope you can help us in return.

Tinsel isn’t toxic to cats, but when ingested, tinsel can lead to conditions known as a “foreign body” or a “linear foreign body.” The tinsel can become tangled in the intestines and cause blockages, which can be life-threatening. Beyond this, the sharp edges of tinsel strands can cause irritation to the delicate lining of the cat’s digestive tract.

Tammy wasn’t acting her normal happy self. Being such a loving little soul, she normally jumps up on the beds of both my boys, saying goodnight to them before they go to sleep and then settles on the couch next to me for a cuddle and a pat.

Three nights ago, Tammy had just taken herself straight to bed (at the end of my bed) and was sound asleep. I didn’t really think anything of it and continued with my nightly chores before going to bed myself. Then, in the dead of night, I hear Tammy starting to make that awful “I’m going to vomit” sound. I rush to pick her up to try and get her off the bed, but she ends up vomiting all over me, the path between the bed and the tiles. The vomiting didn’t stop. Tammy vomited until there was nothing left in her stomach and continued to wretch, until she hid herself away, exhausted. I noticed sparkly flecks in her vomit which is when it clicked that she must have eaten some of the tinsel the kids had put up that very day.

The next day, Tammy continued to hide away, which is very out of character for her, and then began vomiting again, but this time it was tinged with blood.

It was 5:30pm and I rushed her to the local vet who sent us home with some medication to help her pass the tinsel. The medication cost $153.

An hour later, Tammy vomited up all her medication. This was when I made the call to take her to the Pet Vet Emergency in Cannington. Despite being, what I can imagine to be, in so much pain, Tammy was still purring as she sat on my lap, lethargic, as we waited for the vet.

The first big cost of $2000 I had to pay to cover consult and tests. At 10:45pm Tammy went in for surgery. After multiple tests, the vet said she was full of tinsel and it was causing an obstruction in her stomach and bowel. I had to pay another $3000 dollars before the surgery could go ahead.

By this point my boys are beside themselves, not being able to sleep and blaming themselves for wanting to put the tinsel up early. Being 6 years old and 8 years old, it’s hard to explain to them that it wasn’t their fault.

At 1:45am Tammy was out of surgery. The vet said her bowel looked good but there was so much tinsel in there, some clumps as big as your hand! They kept her in for the rest of the night for ‘special care monitoring’ because things can go south very quickly after surgery.

At 9.45am I received a phone call from the vet practice saying that a vet-nurse had set Tammy’s pain relief too high and Tammy had taken a turn for the worse… The gave her the reversal drug and said they would cover the cost of her staying in longer because of their mistake. At this point I’m sleep deprived and heartbroken. Tammy has been through so much already. This is the last thing she needs.

At 4:30pm I went up to the vet practice to visit Tammy and hopefully bring her home. She seemed in good spirits, purring and giving cuddles, however no one had had any luck getting her to eat so they suggested I take her home where she would be more comfortable. I paid the remaining fee of $2206.65.

I set us up in the bathroom. Tammy on pillows and towels in the bath and myself on my doona on the bathroom floor next to her. I had my alarm set to give her her medications every 6 and 8 hours.

At 11pm she still hadn’t eaten. I had all the tasty things set up for her; canned tuna and a chicken breast, but she wouldn’t touch it.

At 3:30am Tammy had the worst diarrhea I have ever seen and pooed all over both of our bedding. At this point neither of us had slept. I called the emergency vet again and they told me to go back to the High Wycombe Vet again in the morning because Tammy still hadn’t eaten to get some syringable food and also a probiotic for her.

At 9:40am I brought the food home to try and get her to eat. I took Tammy back to the vet that afternoon. She had a temperature of 40degrees. Still being quite spritely and nobody was going to be at the vets overnight, I was advised to take her home and either call PVE if things went bad or bring her back first thing in the morning.

At this point I have also taken off 2 days of work to care for Tammy as she needed round the clock supervision to monitor her health. As I work casually, I don’t receive any sick leave. So not only am I out of pocket thousands of dollars, I can’t even go to work to help replenish those funds.

At 4:40am the following morning I thought we were going to lose her. She went all glassy eyed. I held her tight and said my goodbyes. But she pulled through and I continued to syringe feed her water, medication and food.

At 8:45am I took Tammy back to the local vet where they put her on intravenous fluids and antibiotics ($506). It was at this point that they asked “did the Animal Emergency vet send you home with a cone for Tammy?” My heart sank… they hadn’t… I don’t know why they hadn’t, and I didn’t think to question it because I was sleep deprived, emotional mess. The High Wycombe vet then said, “Did the Animal Emergency vet send you home with antibiotics?” I didn’t know. I assumed they must have? Apparently, they didn’t as it fulls in line the standard to combat antibiotic resistance… so now Tammy had an infection in her wound.

It was at this stage that I just broke down. I’ve handed over thousands of dollars and the after care that was given to me wasnt enough to help her.

It’s now been days since Tammy ate the tinsel. I never could have predicted it was all going to cost so much or that after the surgery she would be so sick. She’s normally such an energetic and loving cat. We believe in our strong girl and desperately hope she’s going to pull through. Her temperature has started to come down and has eaten small amounts of food on her own. The next challenge we face is managing her wound and the break down of the tissue. I have been told to keep a close eye on it because there is a chance the whole wound can open up resulting in her intestines popping out.

Please, if you have pets, remove any tinsel from your home. It can even be found on some pet toys! Please learn from our family’s misfortune. I’m not normally one to reach out for help, but this whole ordeal has crippled me financially, leaving me with no savings and the costs keep coming. Thank you for taking the time to read our story. If you can afford it, we’d really appreciate your help with getting our Tammy back to her vibrant self.