Diary of a Devilcat: Beware my Evil Eye

Says Chenna the devilcat:

Ellen is letting me write the WANAFriday post today, because the estimable Liv Rancourt has acknowledged that “cats run the internet” and challenged humans to post about their favourite pets, real or imaginary. She might just be my new favourite person…

Well, I can assure you I am very much real and I am going to do a post about ME! Specifically I am going to tell you about my evil eye.

You may well stare… But the fact is one of my eyes changed colour 5-6 years ago, bestowing upon me a rakish air and providing feline eye specialists around the world with much food for thought. Read on to find out why!

(The following has been extracted from my dormant blog, Feline in Therapy — which should totally not be dormant, because it’s awesome, but Ellen will never give me any time at the computer… She’s a computer hog.)

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16 July 2008

We visited the opthamologist this evening. Ellen has been going on and on about my left eye, which has changed colour over the past year or so. Maybe longer. I haven’t thought much of it, but we asked Dr Caroline to look at it when we visited last month and she recommended we visit a specialist.

So today we saw Dr Chloe. And now it seems as though it might be something serious after all. Or at least it might lead to something serious. Melanoma of the iris – skin cancer of the eye! Dr Chloe says if it changes colour, goes darker, I might even need to have my eye removed!

What can you say to something like that? How would I go with only one eye? I’ve heard that cats can’t judge distance when they only have eye. This makes leaping onto things hard. (It’s hard when you’re carrying a bit of extra weight as well!) And probably Ellen would make me stay inside all day, or maybe build me a cat run, instead of being able to go in and out as I choose. But maybe it would be OK . . .

There is a worse scenario of course, but let’s not think about that.

I will add, however, that despite these devastating tidings, I behaved beautifully at the eye doctor today. Only one half-hearted swipe and a faint growl. Other than that, I was placid and very very very good. Dr Chloe might actually even like me.

7 December 2008

The week before last, we went back to the eye specialist. You know, the one who wants to yank my eye out? Well, I did NOT want to go there, and I made sure Ellen knew it. She was so certain I would be good so long as she fed me before we went, but I wasn’t falling for that again. To make it even more worthwhile, the vet had students witness my examination, and I’m not sure they’d ever encountered such a devilcat as I. Ha Ha! I showed them! Hiss, spit, scratch. In the end they had to wrap me up in a towel. (I didn’t like that so much.)

I have to go back AGAIN in another four months. But at least I get to keep my eye for the time being. The specialist vets are fascinated by my eye, and have evidently been asking other opinions in on-line vet chatrooms. Cool huh?

But do you know how off-putting it is hearing people talk about ripping your eye out? As though it was a splinter or something! I mean REALLY! This is my EYE we’re talking about!

8 May 2009

The good news is that I get to keep my eye for another three months at least! Went to the specialist this evening (and I behaved extremely well, I might add), and once again suffered Dr Rachel and her accomplice to shine bright lights into my eye, and poke it and prod it, and take photos of it. Not pleasant! And I didn’t scratch once! (Although I did hiss quite a few times.)

Anyway, Dr Rachel thinks it might have changed a little bit, but not too much, and she didn’t think there were any raised lesions, so I don’t know what Ellen was on about. All in all, they dithered and muttered and postulated and prevaricated, until they finally decided that the odds were slightly in my favour and I should come back in another 3 months.

So that’s what we’ll do I guess.

19 August 2009

Got dragged off to the eye specialist today. If it’s not one thing, it’s another. I’m either suffering home alone in silence, while Ellen goes out socialising, or being shoved into the carrier and subjected to trauma.

And so today they turn all the lights down, luring me into a false sense of security, then they shine bright lights straight in my eye!! Sheesh. AND they take a gazillion photos of it, with the flash spearing me time and again. Hateful.

The only good to come out of it was the knowledge that it’ll probably be six months before I get subjected to that again.

I heard Dr Chloe say that if the eye had been cancerous when she first saw it over a year ago, I would now be dead. So in view of that, she reckons it’s not cancerous. Hmph. Cold comfort!

27 August 2009

Well, it looks like I’m not out of the woods yet. My specialist, Dr Chloe, is in discussions with her colleague about whether or not they should rip my eye out. I’m trying not to think about it.

16 December 2009

We heard from Dr Chloe today and the FANTASTIC news is that after much debate among the various eye specialists at Animal Eye Care in Malvern, they have decided I get to keep my eye for the time being. Woo hoo!

It’s not the end of the road yet, though. We will still be monitoring it carefully for any change, but they reckon it can’t be cancerous yet, because if it were I’d probably be dead already. (Sobering thought.)

So, we go back in February for another check up and see what happens after that . . .

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So what happened after that? NOTHING! We visited the eye specialist every six months for a while and now I’m on annual checkups. There’s very little change — other than the colour getting “more diffuse”, which basically means the striations first exhibited are disappearing. Dr Chole checks no ducts are getting clogged and that the pigment isn’t getting dark and black, which could indicate melanoma.

Imagine if they had ripped out my eye on the pretext it might be cancerous after our first visit five years ago? I was contemplating being ‘Ol Chenna One Eye’ there for a while, but am most thankful it hasn’t happened.

And you wonder why I’m a DEVILCAT?

Heh ~ This is now a very long post. Bet Ellen is regretting letting me loose at the keyboard!

And now, as though you haven’t already heard enough about me, here are some pictures. Maybe if you look close you can see my evil eye…

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To join the WANAfriday fun, tweet your post to #wanafriday and add your link in the comments. I’ll try to update the list of participants here too.

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Has your pet got any weird health issues?