They found roundworm in our cat's poop.
Being that she has no outside exposure and that she can't get five-inch worms in her intestines from sniffing air, I would say that she has had these suckers the entire time we've had her (I refuse to believe we have mice that she could have gotten them from). When I asked if this was possible considering that last year's sample yielded no parasites, they replied that they only test a portion of the sample and that some worms are discriminatory-layers. In essence, it's likely that they missed her nasty worminess.
They gave her the first deworming treatment and sent a second home to be administered in two weeks. I am so completely grossed out. They have me on the lookout for squirming poo, and I am wigging out. So seriously. Nick and I threw out all of her current litter. The instructions I found were to first scrub it out with bleach because bleach is toxic to ringworm larvae, and then the scrub away the bleach because bleach is toxic to cats. Then we scrubbed her bathroom. My eyebrows physically itch. Why my eyebrows? Good question. I feel like the psychologist from Miracle on 34th Street.
I don't remember feeling quite this disturbed since we had to read How to Eat Fried Worms in fourth grade. Some describe the Antichrist as a horned demon with flaming nostrils—in my mind, he's slimy and squirmy, and he should be fed to baby birds. I will spend the next weeks trying to overcome my revulsion and work up the courage to so much as touch my cat.
