Things that make me cry

Last night, Jazz was mostly asleep when I came to bed. He was patting the bed, his side, and then occasionally me in a recognizable pattern- the way we used to call Kenya to jump on the bed at night. I asked him what he was doing, and he told me the dog was cold and lonely.  ¶ 10:17 AM

  Anyone who did not celebrate Earth Day because they felt it was worshiping the planet and therefore idolatry should be slapped. I made the mistake of stumbling into a page of rants about "How we should not be bothered with anything 'green', as we are going to be raptured soon and anyone with environmental concerns is putting the Earth before God and therefore violating the idolatry commandment."

I'd like to point these assholes to Genesis, where God has put the earth and the creatures upon it into Adam and Eve's keeping and *makes them responsible for everything*. Even if Global Warming is a myth, and yes, I know a few responsible scientific types who do believe this, we still should have every reason to continue to try to recycle and reuse, and do all we can to glean the earth of the toxins that we created. We cannot continue to live in our own filth and it's Not God's Job to clean up our mess.

Even if you can find the justification for believing in the Rapture- because as far as I know, the whole thing was invented around the 12th century- Revelations says that Jesus is coming back to rule over us all for 1000 years. Do you really believe he wants to come back to a shithole?

Wake up!  ¶ 12:25 PM

  Sassy made it through. :)

It was such a huge feeling of relief to find that out. They added several things to the normal protocol for her, including applying a few drops of lidocaine to her throat directly instead of spraying cetocaine before intubating. They also started giving her extra oxygen before the surgery. As a result, she didn't flutter at all during anesthesia.

So that's a huge sigh of relief as much as it is a dent in the pocket book. Cheaper to just put her down, of course, but who the HELL wants to do that? She's happily napping in the sunshine now, and I loves that.  ¶ 12:41 PM

  Life goes on, as it will.

The next drama is poor Sassy Fat Cat, as if she has not had enough with which to deal. She has bad teeth. She has had them for a while now. We tried last year when dentals were on sale to get her in to get them cleaned. Unfortunately, there was a problem with anesthesia/intubation and she asphyxiated on the table. They brought her back, but it was a very near thing and her teeth did not get cleaned. As a morbidly obese and diabetic cat, this was a very real possibility and I knew that before consenting to treatment. Now, she's eating less than she should. She's in danger of starving herself to death because her mouth hurts so much. So we've consented to trying the dental procedure one more time. They will anesthetize her a slightly different way in the hopes of making intubation easier on her, and hopefully it will work this time. With her not wanting to eat, the risks are even higher. We have to accept that she might die on the table again, and if she does, it will be easier for her than dying by inches as she starves herself.

The basset is not taking his only dogness well. He is very much a pack animal and wants another dog. He doesn't like to eat unless there's competition. He's gotten even more needy about not being left alone. We may consider getting another dog. Maybe this one, maybe not. I'm not that fond of cockers, but she is the right age range and also a medium sized black dog.

We shall see.

I'm making myself knit some more cat blankets. I want to send them to the Herkimer County Humane Society, where we met Kenya. (It's also where we met Spider and Sassy too.)  ¶ 9:01 AM

  I met Kenya Dog about a week after Jazz and I started dating. I met Jazz at the same place- Herkimer County Humane Society, where Jazz was working as a caretaker, and I was a volunteer. She was a small black dog in a big concrete run, and she always looked so sad with her foxy face. She caught everything that went through the shelter in the two months that she was there. Parvo, distemper, kennel cough- she probably had them all. So I spent some time every day coaxing her, "Can ya take another bite? Can ya have another drink? Can ya be here when I get back in the morning?" And that's what her name became. Jazz and I agreed on her name without even talking about it. We just knew she was Kenya.

Then Jazz and I moved in together, into an apartment that would let us have pets (mine didn't). We moved in his three cats (of which we still have two), and took Kenya and Beauford home from the shelter. Beauford and Rags came to us as old pets, and we knew we would not have long with them. Beauford was a basset beagle mix, and we gave him one wonderful year before he could no longer get off his pillow at all. Rags surprised us by living another 8 years or so- she must have lived to 25 or 28, given her history. Kenya became known as Dog, as the solo dog in a house of cats. We had brought home a few other cats from the shelter, so she was the only dog among as many as six cats.

She was diagnosed pretty early on with hip displasia, one side really badly mangled. So she was on mild pain killers and glucosamine for many years. So we got used to her not liking to hunker for a poo- it never felt very good. But last fall, she started insisting on going out to pee every hour. Since Jazz sleeps through the night *very* well, she wasn't letting me sleep. This is what drove me to take her into the vet's and I wish I had done it sooner. The ultrasound came back as transitional cell carcinoma of the bladder and probably invading the urethra and possibly the ureters. Going to Cornell where we could do chemotherapy or radiation therapy was immediately discussed as well as surgical options. None were promising any relief. She was given 4-6 months to live at that point, and chemotherapy and radiation therapy would probably put her through a lot of pain but offer little chance of a cure and maybe give her another month. Surgical removal of the large tumor at that point would like mean regular dialysis and a permanent catheter directly from the kidneys. Not a viable option. We agreed to up her pain medication and augment it with piroxicam, an anti-inflammatory aimed at the bladder. She responded well to the piroxicam according to following urinalysis when she had been on it for a while. Shortly after Kissmoose, she found out we'd been hiding pills in cream cheese for years, and the arguments about taking pills began.

Two weeks ago, she upped her peeing frequency again. We did another urinalysis, which came back positive for urinary tract infection. More pills. She Did Not Like the antibiotic. I know almost every trick there is for getting a dog to take pills now. She improved a little, but that's also when we realized how bad her heart murmur was, and we started noticing episodes of shortness of breath. She started to have less playing energy, although the urges certainly were still there. We upped her pain medications.

Last night, she kept insisting on going out, even though it was pouring rain. I got maybe 4 hours of sleep. I went out this morning to the post office, and came back and noticed blood on the floor, and it had to be from Kenya's derrière. This was either an anal sac explosion (meaning more pills and more discomfort for her butt while she poops) or the cancer was attacking her lower GI system, and that also would mean more pain, more pills. I told Jazz, if it's serious, we probably ought to consider it her time. The vet's office wanted to call me back. During that time, we sat in the sun with her. We agreed it was probably time. When the doc called us back, she was set to talk us into it. So we all agreed. It was tender, but dammit it had to be done. Any prolonging would not have been a kindness to anyone but the doc's coffers, and she'd have felt horribly guilty about it.

So today about noon, on her blanket out on the front lawn of the vet's office, Kenya Dog passed on, in the arms of those who loved her. I cannot regret her passing, but I'm going to miss her terribly.  ¶ 12:26 PM

  I'd post, but it would be total whinge.

You don't really want whinge.

I don't want you thinking along these lines:

  ¶ 5:35 PM

  The trip to the vet today confirms that the odd thumping sound we've been hearing in the house is indeed Kenya's heart and she does have a grade 6/6 murmur, which is extremely rare and rather loud. Fortunately, she doesn't have any other cardiac symptoms except a precordial thrill (which means you can feel her heart beat with your hand an inch off her chest). Everyone in the medical center came to feel and listen to her thumper because it's so impressive.

Yesterday she decided she didn't want her belly touched, so we made sure her innards got groped well while she was being seen by the doctor, and we did take the precaution of muzzling her first, or she gets bitey. She was definitely tender in these areas, so we are going to have to up her pain medication. It's possible that she's getting a bladder infection, so I'll be taking a sample to the office tomorrow to get that checked. It's possible that there's no real change in the bladder cancer and it's just an increase in pain. But it's also possible the tumor has grown and is blocking the outflow of one or both kidneys. If one kidney, she can limp along on one, with more pain medication. If both kidneys, we're talking down to a number of days left.

She is still eating, still playing, and not peeing excessively, so her quality of life is still there. When she stops the first two and really increases the latter, we'll know it's time. But she's an old dog limping along, and so far so good.

Note: Since I wrote this yesterday, the vet called and said that yes indeedy she has a urinary tract infection and needs the antibiotics.  ¶ 3:27 PM