Kitten ate my fake nail, please help

[ScaryGoblin]

Hello everyone, I'm freaking out pretty bad and don't know if this warrants an emergency or not.

My 10 month old kitten swallowed my fake nail (fingernail). It's a plastic fake nail, that was on my pinkie. So it's the smallest of the nails but still, a decent size I guess. Will he be able to pass this? It has no pointy edges or anything, but it still is a decent sized fake plastic nail. I'm really worried it's going to scrape his intestines or puncture something. It's not like it's a huge foreign object, it's a fake pinkie fingernail. But to a kitten it may be large, I don't know.

Does anyone have any advice or has this happened to their cats? I feel so irresponsible and disgusting for letting this happen. I shouldn't have left it in the open where he could get it. I didn't think he'd eat something like that. But I can't find it anywhere so I'm assuming he swallowed it whole.

 

[FeebysOwner]

If he is eating and drinking, going to the litter box, and otherwise acting normal still - this is an 'observation' issue. Check his litter to see if it passes, and even if you don't find it, it may not mean much. The odds are he will be OK, as long as nothing changes about the above mentioned 'activities'.

 

[cmshap]

I am no vet. And no scientist. I work in IT. But I like to do a lot of reading about medicine and science.

The gastrointestinal tract is naturally adapted to pass objects safely. I've even heard of needles being swallowed, and the gastro tract naturally orients it in a straight direction to get it passed out. Of course, that isn't going to happen successfully 100% of the time.

But just think of everything wild cats eat. Bugs, bones, feathers, etc. A fake nail, I would imagine, is probably nothing. But observation is definitely important, keep an eye on it and look for any signs of distress.