Picture This

I dress. I brush my teeth. I crate Trinket. I feed and cuddle Gidget so she does not feel orphaned just yet. 

As I drive to the vet's office, I realize that this ordeal started at 5:15 and I am on the road to a pretty heinous day at 5:45. A day that starts like this is not likely to pull out an extra innings win.  And again, I am crying. Just a little.

I try to be hopeful. Maybe the needle and thread are on the floor at home and I just didn't find them. Maybe the needle is stuck somewhere convenient and not too painful and the doctor can just pull it out. Maybe almost anything else happened.

I get to the office and walk in sullenly with my foreign-object swallower. The tech is a Goth enthusiast with 11 facial piercings and some scary tattoos and gauges in his earlobes that are filled with blobs of amber in which there are little entombed scorpions. Guessing he opted out of charm school.  He is very nice though, in spite of his almost scary appearance and he is very sweet to Trinket. 

The doctor comes in and asks me about the episode from this morning. He's pulled her chart. He knows all about the bat and the rabies and the fleas etc. Seems Trinket has been the Story of the Day at rounds these last few weeks. Which makes me Owner of the Day each time, for sure. I am so proud.

The doctor assures me that it is not uncommon for cats to eat weird things.  He's seen lots of oddball things come out of  cat, in spite of the dog species getting the bad rap for eating things that aren't food.  He says that for some reason, needles and thread hold great appeal to cats.

Somehow this makes me feel oddly better. Like if he's seen this situation a few times he's a pro.

He tells me he'd like to examine Trinket (who is with the tech) to see if she's really swallowed the thing.  I am encouraged that one of my other dreamed up options might not be so far flung.

He returns in a few moments to say that he did not find the needle protruding from her tongue or stuck in the back of her throat, or resting peaceably along side her gums.  He'll have to perform an X-ray to know for sure.

I consent.

They will have to sedate her a little.

I consent again. 

A few minutes later he returns.  He logs onto a the computer to show me the images.  I am alarmed that Trinket looks all stretched out and elongated like the cats we dissected in 10th grade biology. It gives me the shivers to see her body like that.

But the most alarming thing lies in the middle of the image.

There, shining like a beacon in the night, is the precise outline of a sewing needle. In such great detail that I can even see the eye of the needle.

"Well, no disputing that she ate it," I say.

And then, "What do we do now?"