We're having a family crisis right now. As we speak.
It seems that Alex is allergic to cats.
We have a cat. What the heck are we supposed to do? It seems easy doesn't it? Get rid of the cat. It's just not that easy.
We've suspected Alex was allergic only recently. He's had skin problems pretty much since birth and we've tried eliminating different foods, trying a kazillion topical skin creams and came up with nothing.
The doctor confirmed he doesn't have a food allergy. The dermatologist thinks it's from the severly dry climate here. And my friend who's son has several allergies is the one that put all of his symptoms(constant rash, sneezing, itchy eyes, phlegm, post nasal drip...) together and suggested cat allergy.
So when Alex was on a hiatus at Nannie's house we cleaned his room thoroughly and seen a huge difference. A lot of the common symptoms like the sneezing and phlegm seemed to disappear and the redness of his rash.
And today when he was hanging out downstairs in cat-territory he developed some wheeziness.
Then we went to the dentist and he asked in the first 10 seconds of meeting Alex what he's allergic to. I said we're pretty sure it's the cat and he said flat out 'get rid of the cat'. Well, that went over well. I was crying and Alex wasn't sure why we'd get rid of the cat or why I was upset.
Apparently his allergy has caused a massive tongue thrust which has affected his speech and given him an overbite and now we're looking at orthodontics.
I left the office thinking we're finding Romy a new home tonight. But in reality, no one wants to adopt a 13 year old cat who's part Siamese and a bit tempermental and really likes to just be left alone to do her own thing.
I've done some online research and a lot of crying tonight.
We adopted Romy and took on that commitment and love her and she's a part of our family but how can we compromise Alex's health?
Any suggestions?
6 comments:
No suggestions, but just wanted to say how sad .. wish I could think of something.
will an anti-histamine help Alex? or maybe romy needs to get a brazillian...shes kinda already on her way there any hows? (hope that gave you a bit of a haha...:)maybe Mom and Dad need a cat? it is kinda Karmic after-all...they left Curtins with Nannie and Pappa...and they took care of Chow...why not Romy?
Oh Lesley you did make me cry. But more for you and the difficult time you are going through. I can only imagine how agonizing it is. I do like your sisters idea, that maybe you could find someone to take the cat, and your parents do seem like caring people. I think the other challenging part is that Alex has lived with Romy for 4 years now... but it does sound like it may be getting worse for him. Oh what a difficult situation... I am sorry for you.
Jenn
I too have nothing.
It all hurts.
I've been in that position before with a well-loved cat. It's heartwrenching.
I hope some lovely home comes out of nowhere for your kitty-cat.
Could you make Alex's room a Romy free zone? If you can keep it cat free and school is cat free then that's 16 hours or so. Maybe it will be enough to make a difference.
I would take Romy in a heartbeat. I am very partial to older kitties.
We had the same issues when I was young, except it triggered asthma for me which would then lead to pnemonia and bronchitis. Even though we gave our old kitty (she was 13 too I think), to a loving neighbor, I came home with a new kitty (5 weeks old) that I found abandoned. We ended up keeping that one because I was determined to get over my allergy. :)
It did work as we would rub kitty down with a wet facecloth (it takes excess hair and dander off) once a day and feed her a natural diet. (see "raw diet" in google). Canned product that you can find in the stores often attribute to excess dander due to dry skin themselves. And, after two months, I developed immunity towards her. There are arguments that one can overcome an allergy to cats, if you get them when they are kittens, but perhaps you could try little things like this to help control kitty's dander for Alex .....
Just a thought. Either way, it is such a tough thing to deal with because kitties too are part of the family (although not nearly as important as our babies ....)
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