Taki's Trip to the Ark

The veterinarian I use is Sonja Lee, DVM, and her associates at The Ark Animal Hospital http://www.arkhospitalforpets.com/ in Lubbock.  If I have not told you the story about why I use them, I will, some other time.

But, today, I had to take Taki in for her yearly vaccines.  Since Sake has been going in so frequently for her mouth infection, the vet tech asked me about her first.  I told her she had not eaten during the week well, but her eating had improved over the weekend.  So, then we put Taki in an exam room.

Well, this adventure did not start well.  Taki is super sensitive about any changes in the aspect of the cat carriers, so I decided not to move them before I tried to load her into one for the trip to the vet.  That was a mistake.  She overpowered me and ran away, but into the computer room, where I could contain her, and capture her, and take her back to the crate. But, before I did so, I changed the aspect of the crate so it was still not really visible, but I could get her into it. Or so I thought.  The second attempt was not much better than the first.

I decided I could not disguise my attempts to put Taki in the crate, so I put it on the bed. Take had fled to the spare bedroom, but because Sake was under the bed, staking her territory (God bless her) Taki had little place to hide that I could not access.  I got her into the crate.  She cried  and complained all the way to the vet's office. She became surprisingly quiet at the vet's office.

When we got into an exam room, she did not want to come out of the crate, but after the vet tech left the room, I was able to remove her from the crate (They were okay with taking the top off the crate, no exam, and just vaccinating her.) Unlike Sake, Taki is not vicious about her visits to the vet. She is just scared, and I can manipulate her to behave enough so they can examine her before they give her the yearly vaccinations.

And, so they did give her a precursory exam. She did some hissing, and when the second injection was done, she growled and howled.  We let her get into the crate, and that was that.

When we got home, and I let her out of the crate, she let me console her.  And, when I got home from work tonight, she was at the garage door, waiting for me.  No longer angry or upset.

I hate that the cats are so upset by going to the vet. But the folks at The Ark Animal Hospital do everything they can to accommodate my wayward pets. For which I am grateful.