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Gracie was flat the next few days. The toll of the sedation and stress from the travel really got to her. We’d been through these lows before after every test and with any luck, Gracie would begin to perk back up. We just had to make certain Gracie’s medication schedule was kept on track and that if she wasn’t eating enough we’d syringe feed her to get the extra calories into her.
Gracie had lost some muscle mass and felt very thin, even though her belly was round from the fluids in her abdomen. I foolishly thought that if we were getting Gracie to eat 5 or so small meals, it would add up to enough calories for a day. I was very wrong. I knew it as I ran my hand along her spine and felt the padding slowly vanish over the course of a week or so. I knew I had to do more so that meant doing math, but first I had to find out how many calories to feed Gracie.
Dr. Carolyn said to aim for 200 a day. Once I sat down and read labels, then had to get on the internet to do research because far too many cat food companies don’t include calorie counts on their labels. I realized that Gracie was grossly underfed even though she WAS eating. She’d only eat about 1.0 oz of food per meal and many of the foods were only 20-25 or so calories per ounce. It meant if she was lucky she was getting a little over 100 calories a day. We HAD to do a better job ASAP.
I returned to my trusty notepad. Sam bought a food processor so we could blend down the foods we knew were better quality and higher in calories. We could also use prescription emergency support foods but I didn’t like some of the ingredients as much. We’d have to experiment because our goal was not just to provide nutrition to Gracie, but to make it as tasty and as positive of an experience as possible. We didn’t want Gracie to feel miserable even though we felt miserable having to take this step.
I always keep 35 mL syringes on hand. I like them for syringe feeding because the tip is rather long and they hold a good amount of food. There’s no hard and fast rule about exactly how many cc’s to feed because some cats can’t handle much and others can handle a bit more. It was trial and error all the way and some times the error really upset me because I didn’t want to make things worse for Gracie.
Friday arrived and Gracie acted a bit perkier. We’d just begun to give her a second dose of prednisilone (steroids) and it clearly was helping. Buoyed by her good spirits I could focus on getting some much needed and overdue work done, even though in the back of my mind I knew that today was the day we’d possibly get some concrete news about Gracie’s future.
Late in the day Dr. Carolyn called. The all-too familiar lump in my gut returned as I tried to calmly answer the phone. I reached for another note pad so I could distract myself by taking notes.
Delivering bad news must be something Vets get a lot of practice doing as Dr. Carolyn described what the report said. She was calm and not alarmist so I remained calm, but as she spoke I felt my body begin to slump against my chair.
She paraphrased the medical jargon by saying that we still had NO DIFFERENTIAL DIAGNOSIS. There was NO sign of CANCER, but…
…now Gracie had something called Myelodysplasia.
“Myelodysplasia (myelodysplastic syndrome, MDS) is considered a preleukemic syndrome characterized by ineffective hematopoiesis, resulting in a nonregenerative anemia or other cytopenias. MDS has been described in dogs, cats, and people. The disease can be primary or secondary and is commonly seen in cats with feline leukemia. Primary syndromes probably arise from mutations in stem cells. Secondary syndromes are caused by other neoplasia or drug therapy. Some cats and dogs respond to treatment with recombinant human erythropoietin and prednisone. Supportive care with transfusions may be helpful. Survival is variable because MDS can progress to leukemia; many animals are euthanized or die of sepsis, bleeding, or anemia.”
So basically Gracie’s bone marrow wasn’t working right any more and with low white blood cells and platelets it was dangerous for her to be around other cats because she could easily pick up disease from them. Since she didn't have Feline Leukemia (she'd been tested multiple times for it) I asked what this could be coming from and Dr. Carolyn said either a toxic event or most likely a very bad cancer, probably in the liver. I asked her if there was anything more we should do, treatments or medications. She replied that what we should isolate Gracie (that was NOT going to happen-it was too late now and honestly not fair to put her away in a room by herself at this point. We'd keep our hands washed and she already had her own dishes and litter pan) were doing was good for now and that we should re-test Gracie’s blood work in two weeks. If she was perking up, that was great, it could mean this was immune mediated and that perhaps she’d do okay for a time. We didn’t need to return to see Dr. Carolyn, but if Gracie improved enough we could think about doing the liver biopsy again.
Sam and I began to read as much as we could about MDS, but there wasn’t a lot out there. MDS is rare in cats and there aren’t a plethora of treatments for it. One of them, darbepoetin, could help for a time, but it's very confusing on whether or not anything would help her now. I kept thinking about how Gracie got so sick right after her dental procedure and how that my Vet had just moved his office, he didn’t do the procedure and things were chaotic at his practice. Maybe someone made an error and this, indeed was due to a toxic exposure. A rage began to build inside me that had my mind going to very dark places. At my Vet’s office we joked about not giving my cats Metacam, EVER and now I wondered if that was what was killing my cat, or did she get an overdose of medications with all the other chaos going on with the Vet's moving...because WHERE is the CANCER? We’d done THREE biopsies and NONE had shown cancer.
If this was a toxic event I realized I would have to end my 20+ year friendship with my own Vet—someone who I consider family, whose staff I count as friends. I had to tread very carefully if I was going to go down this path. I needed to calm down and get information about the details of the dental cleaning. I put in a call to speak with Dr. Larry. I was terrified of jeopardizing our relationship, but I needed answers. I knew he would be honest with me even if it was something I didn't want to hear. If they made an error then it would be devastating, but more than anything, I only wanted what I’d wanted these past three months, to find out what was slowly killing my sweet cat and I was desperate for answers.
next up...a consensus on Gracie's illness and the remarkable gift she gave us.
(Continued from Parts 1, 2 and 3, 4, 5,6,7,8 and 9)
Sam and I returned to the waiting area. What was once a twilight zone was now beginning to fill with other people and their pets; many had dogs of varying sizes. For some reason a good number of the dogs were paralyzed in their hind legs. Some people in the waiting room wore the same sort of anxiety-ridden expression I knew all too well while others had retreated even further into a blank stare of total shock over what was happening to their pet. I didn’t want to see this so I took my homework out and began reading. Thankfully the medication was working well enough so I felt I could concentrate.
A lady wearing lots of purple sat down near Sam and struck up a conversation. She bred Labrador Retrievers and somehow one of the puppies got Parvo. The dog was named Mabel and she thought that she just might survive after some very bad days.
The conversation helped me forget to worry until I looked up and saw Dr. Carolyn walking towards me. I held my breath as she knelt down by my chair. She said that the procedure went well and that Gracie was starting to wake up from the sedation. That she wanted to keep Gracie on an IV for a few hours to make certain she was well enough to go home. She also added that she wanted to send the sample to the University of Pennsylvania because she knew the specialist who read the samples. She added that bone marrow samples required a very specialized expertise and that she knew and trusted the person who would study Gracie’s sample. The problem was we wouldn’t get results for two more days. Did we have two more days to wait?
I nodded that I understood and thanked Dr. Carolyn, grateful that the worst might be over for the day. Now all Gracie had to do was relax and get some fluids, certainly something that would help her feel better.
It’s funny how your body stops working when you experience long periods of stress. I hadn’t eaten more than a few bite of food for two days and now I suddenly felt a bit hungry. Though I’ve been very careful about my diet for three months I decided that it was okay to get something from the vending machine as long as I didn’t go overboard. Sam and I chose to get a small bag of plain potato chips. They also had Danish rolls in the vending machine which I assumed had to be completely disgusting for a number of reasons. The thing that made me smirk was seeing the smattering of signs adhered to the vending machine asking to “Please Don’t Shake Me.” I wanted to peel one off and stick it onto my forehead.
A few hours later one of Gracie’s team saw us and came over to tell us she was doing well and getting a lot of snuggles and that she personally had held Gracie on her lap for a long time. She remarked at how sweet Gracie was, but of course that was just how Gracie always behaved. She said it would be another few hours but not to worry.
So I returned to my homework, learning about litterbox aversion while Gracie got her fluids. You see I’ve been accepted into an online program held by the Humane Society of the United States. I’m going to become (I hope) a Certified Cat Behavior Counselor. That way I can help people keep their cats in their home any time a behavior crisis occurs. I’ll be like Jackson Galaxy, Junior. Now if I could just get my own TV show I’d be all set.
We’d been in the waiting room for six hours before it was finally time to take Gracie home. Dr. Carolyn came out and talked with us and answered some of my questions about continuing medications or whether or not Gracie needed us to give her subcutaneous fluids (not yet). She handed Gracie over to us. She was quiet, but she was alive.
This horror was over for now and we could finally go home together. There’d be no taking a dead cat to Dr. Larry’s to be sent out to be cremated. There’d be no euthanizing Gracie right then and there because her blood work was getting worse. For now we had this extra time together and we could find solace in that without feeling the need to be greedy for more. I suppose we’d already had two more months than many Vets had told us we’d get, so I’d accept this gift for what it was and not look for more.
In two days we’d might not have “the” answer but we’d have a some sense of an answer. I doubted it would be good news, but we’d know what we were dealing with and what Gracie needed to help her feel comfortable. Until then all I had to do was keep her belly full of good food and love her as much as possible.
I could do that. No problem.
Coming up next…the test results come in and once again I’m left shocked to my core, but not before Gracie gives us a very special gift.
Last week Gracie did really well. She started eating again; a good amount. Sam and I got into a routine of getting her medications to her on time and I continued to make notes in my log book about how she was doing. In the back of my mind was the weight of the decision about whether or not to have “one last test” done on Gracie’s liver (an ultrasound guided Tru-cut biopsy) or whether we should decide to focus on providing only palliative care and let her go when that no longer was effective. I’ve been sick about this decision. I even asked all of you to offer your advice.
For the most part, many of you were supportive and caring. You understood that the only way we can know what treatment Gracie needs is to know what Gracie is suffering from. The tiny liver biopsy will provide that information to us.
One person was pretty cruel and accused me of being a Drama Queen and that I was unnecessarily harming Gracie by taking her to the Vet so many times. It’s really painful to hear something like that, even if I know it’s not true. I appreciate those of you who went to bat for me letting this person know that you had my back. I would rather not have to write this story at all. I don’t need attention, I just need my cat to be okay.
On Saturday, Gracie’s appetite started to fade. She’d done this just a week ago so I wondered if it was from her overdoing it. She’d been walking around a lot more the day before and maybe one of her liver cysts had started to bleed. We decided to give her another round of Yunnan Baiyo, a Chinese herb that helps stop bleeding. We also began to syringe-feed her, just as we had the week before. Once again I hoped that the same cycle would end and she’d begin to eat on her own after she’d had a few bigger meals in her belly.
I admit the one thing I like about syringe feeding is I can control what Gracie eats. I could blend together one of her favorite foods and add a bit of raw chicken liver and goat milk to the mix. It would help boost her iron and give her tummy some comfort. Though we had some struggles, Gracie was pretty calm about being fed, which was a good sign.
Yesterday Gracie ate a little bit on her own, but she wasn’t as perky as she had been so we continued supporting her while I wondered if she would even be in good enough shape to have the biopsy done. The truth is she’d have a transfusion first so she should be feeling quite good after that, but if she didn’t improve we’d have to re-think what we were going to do.
Last night after giving her some dinner I gave Gracie a kiss and told her to hang on. She was still Gracie, still chirping, purring away, maybe getting up a few too many times to lap at water, but she was still there. I went to bed with a heavy heart. I knew that in the morning I’d have to face the music. Either we do this or we give up. Wednesday is the day of her appointment.
This morning I didn’t want to get up. No surprise. Freya heard me moving around and jumped on the bed. She curled up next to me wanting some snuggle-time
so I gave myself an excuse to delay getting up a little while longer. Freya drools like a fountain when I pet her so needless to say I got up a short time later.
I made my morning trek down the stairs, pausing on the landing to look across the living to see if Gracie was still there, still okay, still alive. Yep. She was sitting on her heated bed looking up at me.
Morning chores take forever so I got started: warm up cat food, scoop litter pans, clean up Gracie’s area, then put out freshly washed bowls with fresh water, add new litter if pans need them, clean up any “surprises” from the night before, go out to the garage to feed Barry and scoop his litter pan, then prepare some food for Gracie and pray she eats it (and that's only for OUR cats, then I do it all over again for the remaining foster cats, too).
Gracie DID eat, not as much as usual, but she ate. That was a good sign. I decided to keep syringe-feeding her because she’s getting thin. She looked perky and was doing about as well as I could have hoped, but today is the day we decide about her future so Sam and I sat down to talk about it once again.
Sam was surprisingly blunt. He felt we needed to do this or we needed to prepare to put Gracie down in about a week. She can’t go on as she is and she needs help-more than what we can do for her at home. Yes, it’s a risk and yes it could end badly, but we need to help her and that means we need to do the biopsy.
And now I will be blunt. We need help to make this happen. Our fundraiser for Gracie only brought in about $200.00 last week. We need to raise at least $1200, even though it will cost $1500+ for tomorrow’s procedure.
Perhaps you’re not sure it’s worth it to help this time because there are no guarantees of a happy outcome. I get that. But if you look beyond it, you could help just because you like what I’ve been doing, the cats I’ve rescued, the stories I’ve entertained you with. At this point of Gracie’s crisis, I hope you’ll find a way to share your love with us because we really need it. It doesn’t take much if a lot of people chose to donate. $5 here and $10 there can really add up.
For every person who donates more than $100, I will send them a special thank you treat (while supplies last and I have quite a few goodies!). I have some fun cat-centric things from books featuring cats to cute goodies and cat products.
We get more of your donation if you donate directly using our PayPal address:info@kittenassociates.org or if you go through our DONATE page on our web site.
You can mail a check to Kitten Associates, P.O. Box 354, Newtown, CT 06470-0354. Put a note "for Gracie" it so we can direct the funds to her.
Just SHARE this post with your friends who have kind hearts and love cats. That helps Gracie, too.
Your donation is Tax Deductible.Kitten Associates is a non-profit rescue and our IRS EIN is 27-3597692.
We will stop our fundraiser as soon as we’ve raised $1200.00, which we hope will cover Gracie's care. Any funds we don’t use for Gracie, we'll set aside for other kitties in our program who need help, like our recently rescued big guy, Barry.
One of the things about sharing your life with cats means having to deal with their claws—claws that catch in the loop of your favorite sweater leaving a big hole or turn the side of your sofa into mince meat. Declawing your cat is inhumane and cruel and certainly NEVER a solution for dealing with your cat's claws-but even in a home full of cardboard and sisal cat scratchers, most cat parents are left with having to trim their cat’s claws from time to time.
Keeping claws trimmed is particularly important with older cats because their claws can grow faster and thicker, eventually curling under the toe and possibly embedding itself INTO the paw pad. This actually happened to my dear cat Gracie many years ago (You can read her story HERE) and after that nightmare we began checking her claws once a month and kept them trimmed. I discovered that ONE of her toes would grow a curiously thick, longer claw so being mindful of your cats claws is important.
As someone with lousy close-up vision, I am not a fan of doing claw trims. I fear cutting into the “quick” which is where the blood supply of each cat’s claw ends. If you cut it, the cat’s claw will bleed and, of course, it’s painful for your cat. If you’re really awkward, you can do more than harm the claw you could even clip the tip of the toe depending on the type of trimmer you’re using.
The other day the folks at Zen Clipper® contacted me about writing a review of their new nail trimmer. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but agreed to have them send me a product to try out. I couldn’t imagine it being any different than the drawer full of other clippers I had.
I was so wrong.
As a graphic designer, I enjoyed the bright colors and stylish design of the medium-sized clipper. Once I removed the clipper from the backer card, I noticed that unlike scissor-type clippers, these clippers cannot be opened very far apart due to a small spring that confines the movement of the clippers. What the spring does is causes the clipper to immediately go into an open position right after you close and release. This is a clever design feature because it gets the clipper ready to go faster than if you had to re-open a scissor-type trimmer after clipping a claw. It seems minor, but it ended up being an important factor.
In truth, I usually hold the cat needing the claw trim and Sam does the work. I had a bad scare with a kitten (she’s fine now) and since then I haven’t wanted to try trimming claws.
Since I promised to give it a try, I decided to test our foster cat, Woody. He was sitting on my lap, relaxed. I gently held his paw. All I had to do was line up the conical hole between the blades with a claw. I read on the package that you have to be careful the first few times you use it to make sure the claws don’t go too far into the opening. If they do go too far it means you need to exchange your Zen Clipper for a smaller size (Zen Clipper will exchange your clipper with no charge to you if you bring it back to the store where you originally purchased it). The claw easily slipped into the hole, not too far. I pressed the Zen Clipper closed and released. It made NO SOUND. Woody didn’t seem to even FEEL IT. His claw didn’t get crushed as it does with some types of trimmers. It was neatly trimmed back.
I tried another claw and another. Eventually, I didn’t have to look too carefully since the hole would only line up with a claw and I was trimming off the tips. I trimmed one paw in a few seconds, tops, then did the other paw while Woody sat there purring away.
Energized by how effortless it was to use, I looked around for another cat who I could try it on. Freya was nearby so I did her claws, too. She fussed a bit, but again because she did not hear that telltale “Click” after each claw was cut and because the blades make a clean cut, she didn’t act as though she was uncomfortable.
I never thought I would be so blown away by product that I also never thought could be improved upon. The Zen Clipper out-performed my expectations and gave me confidence I’d lost long ago. I actually find trimming most of my cat’s claws a fun task since I don’t have to feel scared I’m going to hurt them in the process and I can get the job done quickly.
Now, does this product calm a cat who hates getting their claws trimmed? No, but I believe that between the quiet operation and what it does for the cat-parent’s confidence might also make those tough-to-trim cat claws a thing of the past if you take it very slowly and only aim to trim a claw or two at a time.
The Zen Clipper comes in Small, Medium and Large. Medium is a good size for most cats. Older cats with thicker claws would need a Large and kittens and some reptiles and birds, too, would benefit from a Small size.
Thanks to Zen Clipper, I have a Medium-sized Zen Clipper (a $23.95 retail value) to give away to TWO lucky readers! All you have to do is leave a comment here on why you hate trimming your cat’s claws and I’ll chose the best two comments to win! Deadline is Monday, October 12, 2015 at 12:12 PM EST. Only ONE COMMENT per person. Multiple entries will be disqualified.
After careful consideration, from time to time I write product reviews. If you see it here, it's because, at LEAST I think it's worth you knowing about even if I have an issue with it and, at BEST, I think it's amazing and we should all have one, two or more of whatever it is I'm reviewing. I get NO reimbursement for writing these reviews, though to write a review I am supplied with the item and I may be provided with an administration fee, as I was in this case. This review is MY OPINION, ONLY. The result you experience using this product may differ.
Both of my parents were scientists. I think that’s why when one of my cat’s gets sick I spend a great deal of time trying to sort out what is going on if we don’t have a clear cut answer. I’d been keeping a diary of when Gracie should have her meds, which meds she should get, what time I tried to get her to eat, if she ate and how much she ate. I also added other notes about her, like “Perky today” or “Kinda limp.”
When she’d do badly for a few days I'd look back over my notes for clues. Nothing added up. I also never knew if “this was it”-sort of decline or if she could rebound. We had no idea which, if any, of her medications were helping her. She’d go through periods of not eating for a day or a bit longer. I’d syringe-feed her and she’d perk up and eat again, getting her energy back, too. Though she didn’t return to her “old self” she'd sit up and meow at me when I came near or she’d, at least, walk over to the kitchen, far beyond her regular spot in the living room where she spends a majority of her day. One day I gave her a rainbow shaped catnip toy and she loved it. She even fell asleep with her head on it. She was still a cat by all definitions.
Monday arrived. Test result day. Once again my gut was in a knot. I had my phone ringer turned on and turned up. I carried my phone wherever I went. Every time someone else called me I jumped out of my skin. Would this be the day I find out my cat has a deadly cancer or would it be treatable? We’d been down this road before but truly this time we’d KNOW.
Or would we?
Dr. Carolyn called early that evening and told me that the test didn’t tell us much. There was, once again, no sign of cancer in the spleen. Gracie didn’t have hemolytic anemia. Gracie didn’t have a portal shunt in her liver. What DID Gracie have?
“We don’t know just yet.”
Dr. Carolyn went on to describe our next options. We had three:
1. Do a Tru-cut ultrasound guided biopsy of Gracie’s liver because most of the Vets on this case agreed that the culprit still is her liver. Yes, she has benign cysts there that we know of but there’s a chance there's more going on than we realize. A needle aspirate can't get enough tissue to give us a more complete picture, which is why we only found out there were cysts when we had that done a month ago. The Tru-cut would tell us what's happening in the surrounding liver tissue. Doing this type of biopsy, while gets good results, isn’t as accurate as doing a “wedge” biopsy (see below).
With this procedure there's a risk Gracie could bleed more and possibly not recover. It’s a quick procedure and the least invasive. There isn’t even a suture needed, the opening created is so tiny. They'd also do another transfusion, this time doing it FIRST to give Gracie the best chance to survive and feel good after the procedure is done. If she starts to decline they would do a SECOND transfusion, which of course adds to costs and is no guarantee she will come out of it.
Dr. Carolyn felt that this test WOULD tell us once and for all what is going on and if we knew, then there would be a chance for some sort of treatment, though a cure is very unlikely. It would buy us more quality time and we could treat her with appropriate medications and stop giving her ones she didn't need in the first place. It would cost another $1500.00 or so.
2. Do nothing. Keep Gracie comfortable and she may become so anemic she'll die. We could try to up her dose of steroids, but that's not a fix and we'll never know what happened or if we could have done something about it. She'll have much less time with us and potentially be much more uncomfortable.
3. Do a wedge biopsy of her liver. This way a surgeon would SEE her liver and be able to take a sample that was big enough to test, as well as suture closed any bleeding issues. It would cost about $5,000.00. It would likely KILL Gracie before she was even out of sedation.
It was pretty clear we really only had two options, numbers 1 and 2. I wouldn’t cut Gracie open like that. Sure, they could see what's going on, but that’s no way to die. The problem was…what DO we choose to do next?
I’ve had a number of conversations with all the major players in our story. Two of the three said YES, do the Tru-cut. Dr. Carolyn feels there's a very good chance Gracie WILL survive the procedure. Gracie's 13, not 18. We would finally know what's going on and know if there is more to be done to help Gracie feel comfortable.
Not knowing would be a continuation of the painful roller coaster we’ve endured for months. Gracie would take a turn and we’d wonder if “this is it” yet again. If we knew this was part of her disease, it would be easier on us, too. I could ride out the lows and I’d know better when Gracie was in trouble instead of being terrified all the time. We could treat her more appropriately instead of throwing everything we’ve got at her. She would respond better, too…but there are risks and the price could be her life.
One of the Vets said not to do it because it was too risky and that some times you just don’t know and that we could come in to see him and he’d discuss treatment options. For what? What are we treating if we DON’T KNOW what it is?! Frankly, I think he was back-peddling because he should have caught something worse was going on with Gracie over a month ago and he didn’t.
Sam and I have discussed this a few times. I’ve asked questions and still have more to ask. Three days ago Gracie was not eating and I wouldn’t have done a thing to her. Today she she's on her third day of feeling perky and eating again, but how long will that last?
I want to know what’s killing my cat, but to find out she may die anyway. There’s a very decent chance she'll make it and we’ll have answers, but I have to be willing to let my cat pay the price if I’m wrong.
So now I find myself like a deer caught in the headlights. I don't know what to do. I think we should do the Tru-cut biopsy since Gracie is stable. The costs are an issue. In truth, we need help to make this happen.
If you’d like to take Gracie under your wing and help with a small donation toward her care, it could mean a world of difference to her and would honor our hard work helping others.
We get more of your donation if you donate directly using our PayPal address:info@kittenassociates.org or if you go through our DONATE page on our web site.
You can mail a check to Kitten Associates, P.O. Box 354, Newtown, CT 06470-0354. Put a note "for Gracie" it so we can direct the funds to her.
Just SHARE this with your friends who have kind hearts and love cats. That helps Gracie, too.
Your donation is Tax Deductible.K.A. is a non-profit rescue and our IRS EIN is 27-3 597692.
We will stop our fundraiser as soon as we’ve raised $2000.00, which we hope will cover Gracie's care and allow some funds to be banked in case she needs a second transfusion. Any funds we don’t use for Gracie, we'll set aside for other kitties in our program who need help like our recently rescued big guy, Barry.
Thank you to everyone who has been so kind to share their love, prayers and good wishes for Gracie. We can't do this without you. #ComeOnGracie #LoveYouGracie
Words fail me. I can’t eat. I lost 5 lbs in 4 days. I don’t have the brain-function to work. I can’t sleep. I’m terrified that I’m going to find my cat, Gracie dead.
Every morning I wonder if I’ll see Gracie lying strangely still on her heated bed in the living room, where she spends most of her day. Every morning I hope I'm wrong and that she’ll be okay, sitting up, hungry. Even better, will she be in the kitchen meowing at me to be fed? Or worse, will she be quietly sitting in a “meatloaf” position that tells me she’s in pain and doesn’t want to eat even though her last meal was so many hours ago.
The ups and downs of Gracie’s health crisis are taking a toll, while Sam and I are working so hard to get a definitive diagnosis of what has been causing Gracie’s hemorrhaging and serious anemia. We’ve seen an oncologist, three general practitioners, and two Board Certified specialists. We thought we had a diagnosis of biliarycystadenoma and while that may be partially true, it wouldn’t cause Gracie’s other issues.
A week ago Gracie wasn’t doing as well as I’d hoped, so I brought her in to see Dr. Larry. Her blood work showed the anemia was back and Dr. Larry could feel that Gracie’s liver still felt enlarged. I was shocked and scared. He asked if we could do yet another ultrasound to find out what was going on. I was reluctant because I didn’t think we’d find anything out, but he reminded me that we’d see if the bleeding was worse and if the liver looked bigger or smaller. We had to act fast, but I was already exhausted and couldn’t face the idea of making the hour-long drive. Sam had worked all night to make up for all the time he’s been on Vet runs with me and unable to work. How could we make this happen?
Super-Deb and I made calls, trying to find a place to do the ultrasound. In the end I realized we had to go see Dr. Sean, who did Gracie’s previous procedure. I was able to get an appointment two days later, but what I wasn’t ready for was that we ended up being at the hospital all day.
Gracie’s appointment went quickly, but Dr. Sean strongly felt we needed to meet with an Internist to discuss his findings. It was 11:30 AM, but she couldn’t see us until 3:00 PM. Did we want to wait? Neither of us wanted to drive over an hour back home, turn around and come back so we opted to wait. Sitting in a waiting room with nothing but a blaring TV and patients with their pets in different states of decline was not my idea of a good time. Sam and I both just wanted to sleep. Gracie was in her carrier between us. We had the top unzipped and we were both gently petting her. I knew she wasn’t strong enough to run off, so we each took turns closing our eyes for a few minutes at a time.
Dr. Carolyn finally came to get us a little after 3 PM. She seemed very clever and was eager to give us her take on what she thought was Gracie’s issue. We were all looking at Gracie’s liver, but no one bothered with the fact that Gracie’s spleen also had a strange shape that was seen on ultrasound. Something was wrong with it, too and no one had even considered it as part of the equation. Dr. G carefully described how Mast Cell cancer could be in the spleen and be the culprit. Gracie could also have hemolytic anemia or a portal shunt that basically meant something was blocking blood flow from Gracie’s digestive tract into her liver.
She further explained that she’d like to do another blood test on Gracie to make sure she could clot, that she’d do another type of blood test (I forget what it’s called) that measures her blood differently and would tell us if she had the hemolytic anemia. Lastly she wanted to do a needle aspirate of Gracie’s spleen to rule cancer in or out. I was having a bad flashback to a few weeks prior when we’d done the needle aspirate of Gracie’s liver and Gracie was in terrible shape afterwards.
Dr. Carolyn added that Gracie should get a transfusion and stay overnight with the theory that the new blood would help her feel better and give us more time to find out what was going on. Once again we’d have to wait until the following Monday for the results. We just had to keep her going until we had more information.
We decided it all made sense and agreed to let her take Gracie. The bill for that day was $1600.00.
The traffic was terrible going home and we didn’t arrive until nearly 7 PM, to a house full of anxious cats who needed to be fed right away. We finally got everyone settled when my phone rang. It was Dr. Carolyn-
She asked me if something went wrong did I want them to do CPR on Gracie? I said YES if it was appropriate and if she could be revived, but why was I being asked this? Then Dr. Carolyn dropped the bomb: Gracie was not doing well at all. The needle aspirate was done quickly but now Gracie was flat. She was rushing the transfusion and hoped it would be enough to help Gracie recover, but that she wasn’t sure and that it didn’t look too promising.
My gut hit the floor and I tried to choke back the tears. I told her to go; to take care of Gracie and not bother with me on the phone. I hung up and told Sam the bad news. What made it unbearable is that we just did what we promised we would NOT do to Gracie—let her die alone, without us, surrounded by strangers. I asked Sam if we should drive back to Middletown, to Gracie, to be there for her. I knew that even if we left right away, odds are we’d be too late. If she survived, they’d want to keep her there overnight so we decided to stay home.
Less than an hour later, Dr. Carolyn called. Gracie had bounced back and was eating and up on her feet! Sam looked at me while I got the news. I gave him the thumbs up sign while I tried to choke back the tears, telling Dr. Carolyn to please give Gracie a kiss from us and that we’d see her in the morning.
I hung up the phone and sobbed. I cried so hard I started to hyperventilate. My heart felt really wonky and I knew I was in trouble. Sam sat near me and put his arm around me and helped me calm down. I couldn't stop saying; We almost lost Gracie, but we didn’t. She's still with us. I was so grateful and relieved.
Gracie didn’t come home the next morning. Dr. Carolyn wanted to keep her longer so we picked her up that night. Gracie seemed perkier and even ate for me when we got her home. I hoped the effects of the transfusion would last, but I also knew that Gracie’s updated blood work showed she didn’t bounce back as well as Dr. Carolyn would have hoped. I have the paperwork but I don’t have the heart to even look at it. Knowing what that number is didn’t change that Gracie survived the procedure. Frankly, I didn’t know if I could take much more. I just wanted to sleep and feel certain that when I woke up Gracie would still be with us.
Part 7 is next...where we have to make a life or death decision for Gracie and I sure could use some advice on what to do.
I thought a lot about Karma last week when Sam and I decided we had to call an exterminator to rid our house of a nest of social wasps. They’d built a home under the siding over the summer and although I knew they would perish naturally in a few weeks, there were so many of them swarming outside that I worried they’d be chewing through the walls breaking inside the house next.
As a Buddhist I am told to consider every living being in the same way as I would think of my mother. Every fly is my mother. Every spider is my mother. Each creature has a precious life and to take even one on purpose is definitely not something you want to do.
The morning of the event, I wept. I really did. My cat Gracie is constantly wavering from circling the drain to maybe feeling better. I didn’t want to kill other creatures. I thought about the Queen wasp and all the drones. I thought about how they would be dead soon and how could I do that while my own cat was so ill. I knew that there would be a price. I just couldn’t imagine what it would be. I just hoped Gracie would be left out of it.
Joe, the exterminator arrived. He has a Brooklyn accent and a friendly demeanor. When I told him my concerns he said that the wasps would have to go because they really could case a great deal of damage. In my own defense, last year they built a big nest on the underside of a bird feeder so we just didn’t go out on the deck much and the birds got fed elsewhere.
Joe explained the process. It was a powder. It was safe for us. It would work pretty fast. I didn’t want to see the wasps die but it was happening right outside my office window. As he applied the powder I heard the wasps making a familiar “tick” sound inside the wall. They were moving around trying to get out. Some were trying to get in because the alarm, sent via hormones through the air, had gone out and the wasps who were outside were coming back to save the Queen…but it was already too late.
I said a silent prayer. I said I was sorry to the dead wasps. They aren’t just bugs. They are part of the natural world and now they were gone.
Joe said that we should be all set and wished us well. I tried not to dwell on it and went back to fussing with Gracie, trying to get her to eat.
Until that night when Fluff Daddy knocked over a lamp.
He was trying to get at the wasps. Yes, that’s plural, WASPS. They had found a way into the house and there were about a dozen of them skittering about around Fluff Daddy’s head. He and Freya were having a blast racing after their newest toys.
It’s funny how quickly things can change. I went from pure remorse to hyper-protection-mode. I had to get the cats away from the wasps and I had to get the wasps OUT of the house, fast.
I ran for the vacuum and Sam and I spent a few minutes sucking up every one we could find. We managed to take a very few of them outside, but there were too many. We decided to leave the vacuum out because we didn’t know if there’d be any more. A few minutes later the cats would go crazy, signaling that there was another…and another...all in the same room by the front door. But where were they coming in from?
We looked around and found nothing. Only the front room had wasps so it had to be from that room. I flashed back to a day when we found a mouse in the house. I figured out it came in from inside the coat closet by the front door. The sheet rock from the back of the closet didn’t go all the way to the floor. There was no molding at the end of the sheet rock so anything inside the walls could get into the house. It took me until the next morning to figure out that was the problem.
Joe returned and we began emptying out the closet. Sure enough wasps continued to come into the house from inside the closet. The tables certainly were turned. I was struggling to consider the wasps as blessed living creatures. I just wanted them out of my house.
Joe treated the areas and he took another look around. We thought that things were settled once and for all. Joe cautioned us that maybe we’d see one or two more wasps but they’d be heavy with the dust and too off-kilter to sting any of the cats.
It was late morning so I went upstairs to the foster room. I began doing the daily cleanup when I noticed Piglet playing with something. It was a dead wasp. Their room is directly next to where the nest was in the wall. Joe told us there was no way they could get into the ducts and fly into the rooms so I couldn’t understand where this lone wasp came from.
I had shut the window when the spraying was going on so I decided it was okay to open it again. A few moments after opening the window about 10 wasps appeared in the foster room. I called out to Sam to bring me the vacuum quickly. I couldn’t risk the cats getting stung and these wasps were none too happy. Though I would have preferred to catch the wasps and let them go outside there was no time. I sucked up each one, then waited, then another would appear. I wondered if they, too, had an entrance route through the closet in that room.
It seemed as though I’d turn my head for a second and another would appear, but it couldn’t be from the vent, right?
Wrong.
I decided to put a flashlight on the vent. I turned it on knowing it would attract the wasps. A moment later, a wasp appeared IN the vent. I called for Joe yet again. The receptionist was stunned when I told her, no it wasn’t just one or two wasps, it was over a dozen. She told me to cover the vent with a doubled over garbage bag, to seal each edge of the bag perfectly because wasps can slip through a space the thickness of a piece of paper. She promised me that Joe would return, but not until the next day. I was to cover up the vents near the nest and report back if it got worse.
The next morning Joe returned, a bit embarrassed. He’d never seen wasps get into duct work, but we have a cheaply built house so I’m not surprised. He told us to simply leave the vents in my office and the foster cat room sealed shut for the next few weeks. Any remaining wasps would die once it got cold enough outside. He did not want to put any chemicals into the duct, nor did I want him to do so.
He re-inspected the area outside the house and declared that the siege of wasps was over and this time he was right.
I’m pretty sure I’m going to have a crappy re-birth over this, but at least I don't hear buzzing.
I truly believe that sooner or later every cat will find their forever home. In some cases it's taken months and in two rare cases it's taken more than a year. Typically I'd expect it to take longer when we have an adult since without a brick and mortar shelter for people to come visit, the cat would have to be very appealing to cause someone to come over to my house to meet them (after the person goes through our screening process first). It's not ideal, but I also want to make certain the match is a good one, one that lasts a lifetime.
Woody was born on the last day of March in 2014 to a feral mom named Mia. Mia was toughing it out on the grounds of an apartment building where we were told they were going to start poisoning the feral cats to get rid of them. Mia, swollen with her unborn kittens would have perished if not for the efforts of a small team of very caring people. Once in our program, foster mom, Moe got to work preparing a space for Mia to safely give birth.
We were lucky in that Mia didn't lose a single kitten when she gave birth just two days after being rescued. Her kittens were a kaleidoscope of colors and patterns. We reached out to some friends and asked them to name the kittens so their names would be as varied as they were.
This family was like many of our others, but what was better was that they were quite a bit healthier and more robust. The months passed as the kittens grew, opening their eyes, taking their first steps, being weaned, getting their vetting done, learning to be confident kitties of the world.
The only problem with this family was Mia. She was too wild to be a pet, but I couldn't just leave her behind when it was time for her kittens to join the 1100 mile transport to my home. My job is to find the forever homes for the kittens AND mom, but what if mom wasn't adoptable?
I knew it would potentially cause me many problems to have a cat I couldn't handle mixed with friendly kittens who were ready be adopted. I also knew I couldn't work with Mia if she was with the kittens, so they needed to be adopted first.
It didn't take long before Ivy got adopted. Not long after the start of the New Year, I met a family who was interested in adopting Snickers, Woody or Greta or some combination of the three. Not everyone in the family was ready to adopt three cats, though they'd had as many as four in the past. They'd set their sights on Woody, but as they agonized over which ones to take, my hopes that Woody would be chosen began to fade.
In the end, the family adopted Snickers and Greta, leaving the mom with tears in her eyes as she left. She vowed to come back for Woody and she told Woody not to worry because he would be reunited as soon as she could get her husband on board. I'd never push an adoption like that because everyone has to agree it's something they all want. I told her not to worry and resigned myself that maybe this wasn't Woody's family.
It took a few more months before Fernando was adopted. He went with Astro, who was one of Celeste's offspring. I'm glad to report that they're doing very well together.
That left Woody and Mia.
As Woody's first birthday approached, I began to worry that his home might not be out there. After nine months of living with me I'd never even gotten ONE adoption application for him. I couldn't understand it because Woody is a gem. The cat is friendly, handsome, maybe a bit too chatty, but smart. He either had an elephant head or a heart in the cow pattern on his back. What's not to love?
I had fifteen more cats coming and needed to make room for them. Woody and Mia had to be moved to the small blue bathroom, which is where I normally have a mom and kittens. This year I couldn't rescue any pregnant cats or nursing queens because there was simply no room.
I began allowing Woody a break from being confined to one room to explore the rest of the house. He slowly began to meet some of my cats. The first two friends he made were Freya and Fluff Daddy. He was particularly close to Freya. Each night I'd let Woody out of his room. He'd start meowing frantically since he'd been bored being shut up all day. He'd race around the upstairs and play Tag with Freya. Eventually, Woody made himself a place on a soft bench next to the bed and slept near me every night.
Most every morning, around 4 or 5 AM, he'd also wake me up, crying to be let back into the blue bathroom so he could be with his mom. Mia was his world now and each day that passed meant it would be that much harder for him to be separated from her.
I even tried to get Mia into a situation by herself where she might become socialized but it didn't work out. After two weeks Mia returned. Woody was delighted to see her again, but I knew that it meant Mia might never leave us and both cats would be here for years. I had to do something.
But I got sick and my heart was acting wonky. Then my cat Gracie got sick. Planning an adoption event or even getting Woody's photo in the local paper just seemed to be too much to do. It was August 2015. Woody was almost a year and a half old. He wasn't getting along well with all my cats. He even began to protect the bedroom as his space, which was going to be a big problem since my other cats wouldn't tolerate that. I knew that we'd possibly start having inappropriate elimination issues crop up in the bedroom, or cat fights in the middle of the night. I couldn't come up with a solution.
One day I was going through email and one stood out to me. The subject message said "Woody." I opened it up. It was from the husband of the family who adopted Great and Snickers. He said they were ready to take Woody and when could they come get him. Nine MONTHS had passed since their adoption and just now it was time for Woody? I couldn't believe it.
It took some time before I could talk to his wife. I wanted to be sure this was a family decision. It was. Not only that, but even their two children had been asking about Woody all these months. They'd never forgotten him and they all knew that the only thing that made sense was to reunite the kittens with their brother. I couldn't have been more pleased. If Woody was adopted, then maybe I could work with Mia, at last and maybe there was a chance that Mia could eventually be ready to be adopted one day, too.
Friday night Woody's new mom came to get him. I expected to be a wreck having to let him go after all this time. I loved Woody dearly and considered him part of my family, but I also knew it was grossly unfair for him to be in a small room for a better part of the day and not be with people who would love him, play with him and give him the chance to be with his siblings again. I knew it wouldn't be effortless to reunite them. It would still take some time, but I also hoped that it would be fairly easy for them to remember each other, even after all these months.
Sam and I packed Woody up into his new cat carrier. I gave him his blanket that smelled like his mom. I kissed him goodbye but I did not cry. I was happy for Woody because now he could really have fun in ways that I could not provide for him. As I said goodbye to his new mom, she told me if Mia came around to let her know. I couldn't imagine her being reunited with her kittens, but heck, maybe anything is possible if you give it enough time?
It's strangely quiet with Woody gone and sadly, the only sound I can hear is of Mia. She's crying. In all the time she's been here I've only heard her hiss. She's looking for Woody. I wish I could tell her how sorry I was and that I'd like to be her friend. I knew this would be the terrible part of the adoption process, but if Mia is to have any chance at being socialized it had to be done.
Now I can focus on her and hope that one day her story will have as happy an ending as Woody's. I've already gotten an update that Woody is a love-bug and doing well. His new family is overjoyed to have him where he was meant to be all along.
The Veterinary Cancer Center is enormous, clean, elegant with a sophisticated interior design. It’s the biggest facility of its kind in the country. We're so lucky to live nearby. The staff is impeccably dressed, smart, capable. You clearly get what you pay for because you can feel that this is “the place” to be if your pet is sick. It was nearly 3pm, the time of our appointment. The door opened and I looked up. There was Katherine, standing in the doorway with a silly smirk on her face.
I went over to her and gave her a big hug. It had been months since we’d last seen each other. She and Sam said their hellos, then she bent down and met Gracie, who looked up at her and meowed softly. Having a friend there helped me forget to be scared. We made jokes, as we often do when we’re worried or having a bad time. She agreed that Gracie didn’t look “that bad” but we all knew how cats can hide illness. At that point I’d take any positive news. Did I dare hope for any more?
The Tech came to escort us into Exam Room 3 so we bid Katherine farewell with a promise to update her as soon as we had news. The last time we’d been in that exam room was with Fred. I didn’t want to think about that again.
The Tech got Gracie’s history, even though they had copies of her records. I told them my thoughts that Gracie getting so sick right after her dental told me that the dental had something to do with it. She’d been given FOUR different antibiotics before and after her procedure. We’d done it because she lost her appetite and we thought the meds were the culprit, not the possibility that the meds were destroying her liver because it was full of cysts. It couldn’t handle the load from the sedation, pain-killers, antibiotics and appetite stimulants she’d been given. To me it added up to be cysts, not cancer, but I was just a mom worried about her cat and cysts weren’t something cats died from so that’s what I hoped it would be.
Dr. Post entered the room with a second Vet at his side. Clearly she was observing while he did his thing. Dr. Post examined Gracie and spoke with us about her history. He nodded his head as he listened. When I told him about how the Vet would not do the transfusion he made the most sour-puss expression I’ve ever seen. He was far too refined to say the Vet was a jerk, but you could tell that Gracie SHOULD have been transfused. He said it WOULD have helped her and couldn’t understand why it wasn’t done.
Before my blood could boil he moved on, saying that he wrote the paper on something called biliarycystadenoma, so he knows them well. That he felt aside from the fluid in her abdomen, that she was presenting as cystic, not a cat with cancer.
Depending on the cysts they usually did surgery to remove them, but if they were too diffuse they wouldn’t. He couldn’t be 100% certain just now, but wanted to do a quick check of Gracie’s hematocrit to see if she was still seriously anemic, then devise a plan after that.
So Gracie might REALLY REALLY REALLY NOT have CANCER. The 10% chance it was cysts just became more like 90%.
Sam and I looked at each other and smiled, too stunned to say a word. I gave the okay to do the test. We were told to wait in the lobby and they’d be with us shortly. I couldn’t believe what was happening.
We waited.
Dr. Post came out with his posse. He greeted us warmly and said that Gracie’s hematocrit was up to 20. I threw my arms up and yelled YES! Dr. Post was taken aback by my outburst, but I was thrilled. In three days Gracie’s body was producing enough blood cells to stave off the anemia. She still had a way to go to be normal but this was a VERY GOOD SIGN. Dr. Post asked us to come back in two weeks. We’d do another CBC and re-evaluate her then. Did we have a diagnosis? No, but we were getting closer.
All I knew was, Gracie was alive and Gracie was probably going to live another two weeks.
In the past four days I’d had four Vets tell me that Gracie either needed to be put down or that she wasn’t going to be with us much longer and to prepare. We could have gone that route and let her go, but we stayed strong. We looked into our cat’s vivid green eyes and we asked her what she wanted. She was critically ill, near death, but she was still Gracie. The flame of life still flickered in her eyes. It took a toll on my health to see her through this, but for the first time in weeks I finally had hope again and this time I could imagine the possibility of better days to come.
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Nine Days Later
The knot in my gut is gone, but I admit I’m on episode 87 of Frasier to keep myself calm. I started working again and getting my life back on track. Though we’ve had some downs, Gracie has mostly been on the up and up. She still sleeps in one small area of the living room on the big oriental rug, but she’s getting on her feet more and more, even meeting me at the door one day, meowing at me to be fed.
Her appetite is not 100% but she’s eating as long as we keep her on her daily meds of Prednisilone and Zofran. She’s purring, grooming herself, using her litter pan, meowing complaints (as she used to do). Yesterday she trotted into the kitchen, tail held high. She carefully jumped onto the bench, then up onto the kitchen table. It was the first jump she’d made in two weeks.
This morning Gracie was very perky. She had her breakfast, then walked over to the sofa where Sam and I were sitting. She looked like she wanted to jump up so I carefully lifted her, placing her next to me. She tried to make herself comfortable by putting her front paws on my leg, half sitting on me and half on the sofa. In her 12 years with me she was never brave enough to sit on my lap. I eased a blanket over my bare legs, then gently lifted her, placing her on my chest. She laid down and rested her head on my chest. She only weighs a little over 8 pounds. I could feel the heat begin to expand between our bodies as Gracie relaxed. I put my head back on the sofa and closed my eyes. In that moment everything I ever dreamed of for Gracie was happening. She was comfortable. She was happy. She was safe.
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