Phase Two

Since last week Banana has been more or less fine. Not normal, mind you, but not self-destructive and insane. He last had a crazy itching/grooming session last Tuesday night, three days after we started decreasing the phenobarbital. And three days after switching to the soy-free food. So convenient that both of those things occurred precisely at the same time, so we can't be sure what is having the positive effect. He's still on 15mg of phenobarb twice a day, which is the dose he was taking when he clawed his ear bloody - so either his body has gotten used to it to an extent, or that food did not agree with him. I (jokingly!) suggested doing an experiment wherein we give him the old food again to see what happens, but Ben nixed that idea. He should be eating the lower calorie food anyway.

Regardless, we press on. He is very wobbly and uncoordinated on the phenobarbital and it's hard on the liver so it's the right decision to get him off it. One happy surprise is that the compounded version of Keppra is only $59 a month - half the cost of the pills I got from the Target pharmacy. The 4th of July holiday pushed us back a couple of days - the compounded Keppra has to be Fed Exed from Arizona - but it has arrived so we're going to start that tonight.  Keppra only takes a couple of days to reach therapeutic dosage, so I'm going to decrease the phenobarb again starting on Friday. I really really want to get him off that crap.

He still has glimpses of wanting to be bad - attempting to jump onto the top closet shelf is a classic Banana maneuver - which makes it all the harder when he, for example, falls off the kitchen counter because he turns around too fast.

He is still pretty affectionate a lot of the time.

Possibly we keep the air conditioning turned down too low. They have been all over the warm stovetop lately.

So we'll see what happens with this Keppra. The worst part of this medication, which is (supposedly) free of side effects, is that it has to be given three times a day. I can't see a way around getting up at 6am every day given that we both have to be at work all day long. And one of us is going to have to come home every single day at lunch for the midday dose. SIGH. And let's not even get into whether or not we will ever be able to spend a night away from home again. 

I'm also finding myself forgetting about the seizure aspect entirely, writing it off as unlikely to ever happen again, which I know is dangerous thinking. It's been two months since this all started but lots of cats go months with no seizure activity and then it crops up again. We're just going to have to take it slowly and see how it goes. Most vets want to try weaning cats off medication if they haven't had a seizure in a year, and I'm having trouble not flashing forward to next summer, imagining how great it will be if I can just have my regular healthy cat back. Is it likely? I have no idea. But I hope so.