Musings on a Small Life

I don't even remember the early part of the week. It's insane at work right now. I'm good, but I'm not Wonder Woman. And no, as a matter of a fact I can't pull a miracle out of my butt, so don't come to me last minute, with everything else I have to get done, and expect one. Or hey, even two. I do remember that I had two training sessions this week, one Wednesday morning, one this morning. They gave us a "stress-relieving" troll doll today, and I relieved my stress by ripping its head off and stabbing it a few times this afternoon. Very therapeutic, and a safe outlet for my work frustrations. The doll had an annoying voice anyway. Derry had a vet check on Wednesday afternoon; I had taken a quarter vacation day for that. (No need to explain how stressful this was for both of us.) He's gained weight, as anyone looking at him can see, and he's up 0.25 kg from last year, to 6 kg. It's too much for his little body, so I'd ...

(Apologies for the long post.) Nicki went for a dental yesterday. Fun, fun, fun. Enlarge to read the amount! :-O It went okay, except he had part of his left pre-molar missing and "type 2 re-absorption" with the roots. Fortunately, type 2 re-absorption meant he didn't need the roots removed (one already was absorbed into the bone), just the remaining part of his tooth. He has a couple of stitches in the gum which will dissolve in about 10 days. However, his blood work showed his ALT and Globulin levels up -- Nicki's ALT always has been high normal (liver), but the increase in Globulin levels was new. Could be infection, inflammation, cancer, liver disease, other. Anyway, I opted to have the vet do an ultrasound while Nicki was there, to check things out. It was pricey ($275 plus tax), but indicated that his organs appear normal. The vet said he could send the x-ray to a radiologi$t, but since nothing seemed amiss, I declined. Nicki also had his ana...

Actually, it's been a pretty easy week. Several of our staff are away, either on vacation or out for medical reasons, so it's been nice and quiet, a great time to plug away at a couple of projects that are due soon. Mom called last night to tell me that there's a bed for Harry in a publicly-funded nursing home in the city, at her preferred choice, in fact. (Really good care of the patients, great staff.) So I think she'll go early next week to sign all the papers, then Harry will move on whatever day they indicate, presumably next week also. He'll have an adjustment, especially since it's a shared room (one other person), but once he's settled he can go on the wait list for a private room. Each floor has its own doctor, who comes in every week to check on the residents, there are social activities, etc. Far, far better than Harry's current circumstances. The huge bonus is that this will save Mom $22,000 in annual costs, compared to what she's...

I had to take Nicki in today for his anal glands. I had them take a blood sample for his T4 (not checked for a year), but didn't do the ionized calcium test for possible hypercalcemia. (He wasn't fasting, which is necessary.). I also had his weight rechecked, as he had been down slightly (about half a pound) in August, and it was that weight loss, coupled with the at-top-normal calcium level that put me into a such a state of worry and fuss. Well, his weight is back up again, to 5.8 kg (12.76 pounds), so I guess I can stop stuffing his face with as much canned food as he wants.  :-D Anyway, he survived, though he made his unhappiness known VERY, VERY loudly and nastily when the anal glands were being done. Half of me wanted to cry for him, the other half wanted to crawl into a hole out of embarrassment. LOL. Now he's alternately chowing down on his favourite Weruva and cleaning off the vet stink. I'll get the T4 results next week, and hope that will be no...

Crap, crap, crappity crap, crap, crap. The vet emailed me to let me know that Nicki's calcium level had come back slightly above normal (result was 2.8, high normal is 2.7, I don't know the unit measurement), so given there are all kinds of horrendous possible causes (including CRF and cancer), he wants Nicki to fast this time and be retested. Since tomorrow is my last vacation day, I better get it over and done with. Won't Nicki be thrilled? I'll be lucky if I can get him back in the carrier. I hadn't fasted him yesterday, so I suppose it could be related to food, but....Who knows. I'll find out soon enough. I didn't waste any time Googling, of course, because I can think of at least one CB cat who had hypercalcemia, but Googling is scary: http://catexpert.blogspot.ca/2011/12/hypercalcemia-in-cats.html I'm going to try not to think about it all too much, and hope for normal re-test results. C'mon, Nick-man, please be okay!...

Thanks so much to all of you who commented yesterday, for being the voices of reason. In my head I know much of it is dependent on the cat's personality, and how much you can push them, even with time, patience and treats. Nicki, for instance, totally freaks--and I do mean freaks --at the first whiff of Advantage, so it's not something I'm able to apply to his neck, even if he's "confined" in a carrier or a room. Poor boy goes berserk. Literally. So it might be that even after a few weeks or a month he just will have none of the Aerokat. I'll do my best, because the potential/probable side effects from long-term Prednisolone use are very much in my mind, and if he won't accept the Aerokat, I'll be out of options. On a more upbeat note, his blood work came back great! His liver values were way down--the range is 27 to 158 U/L. Last year he was at 152 and this year he is at 79. I can't figure out why the significant decline, other than t...

First and foremost, Nicki is fine, nothing too untoward. Slightly elevated ALT level, just above high normal, which has been the case in previous blood work results, but his other enzymes are fine. However, what was interesting was his T4. No, he's not hyper-thyroid, thank the gods and goddesses...but he's hypo -thyroid! How bizarre is that? She said it's rare and that they don't treat it unless the cat exhibits a skin condition, which Nicki does not. But what I recall is that two of my former co-worker's four cats also tested positive for hypo-thyroidism a few years back. Specialists were stumped (she had/has the money to go to specialists). So I wonder if there's something in the food or in the environment. (Actually, she makes her own raw, so it can't be the food.) As for what happened to my stamina...I don't know! I took another half day off work (have a measly half-day vacation left now till January), went for much-needed groceries, th...

It feels like it's taking forever to chug through this week, and it feels like the sanding was done about three weeks ago, not three days ago. My cleaning is at a standstill until I get the priming and painting done. I had thought to get two coats of primer on the main walls on Saturday, then paint on Sunday, but I'm revising that agenda to just getting two coats of primer done over the course of the weekend. I have other things I want/need to do that mean leaving the house in a semi-presentable state. I started to patch the drywall anchor holes in my walls last night, will have a few coats of that to do before it's all paint-ready. And I had a go at the back of my stairs yesterday too--the risers were stapled to the steps at the back. Over time, the stairs have separated, creating a lot of creaks and squeaks, so I hammered in some nails to close those gaps. Should have waited till the neighbours were home to do it. :-p Anyway, my stairs aren't squeak-free,...

The vet called a short time ago, finally able to catch up on non-appointment stuff. He said Nicki's blood work was great, no problems. His EOS level was high the last time (think it was the EOS--eosinophils--I'd have to check). Can be related to allergies, parasitic infections, etc. In Nicki's case, I think it's been allergies; I know it's not parasites. Or highly doubt that it is. In any case, apparently all is well now. I'll pick up a copy of the the blood work results (and urine analysis) the next time I'm in. His UA also came back with good results. Urine pH is down slightly, between 6.5 and 7.0. It was at 7.0 back in the fall, as was Derry's. Between 6.0 and 6.5 is desirable. So there is something to the grain-free canned food with added water theory advocated by the vet at Catinfo.org . The urine is highly concentrated, though, which is typical for him (and for Derry too). Apparently he had amorphous crystal fragments, not a concern to the ve...

I took Annie in early, but they weren't busy, so while I went to a nearby coffee shop for a cup of Darjeeling tea, they got her urine sample, the blood for a full panel (including the T4), got her armpits and chest shaved and her claws clipped. I had a list of items/concerns, had said if she needed sub-qs to go ahead, but they either forgot or she didn't need the fluid. She has lost weight since her previous recorded weigh-in (last winter); she's down to 7.6 pounds, so she's lost about half a pound. Now comes the waiting. They vet clinic is open only until noon tomorrow, so I'm not sure if I'll hear anything before the new year. I'm scared to talk to the vet, frankly. Afraid it will be worse than I'm imagining...and my thoughts aren't happy happy joy joy right now. But c'est la vie, as the expression goes. I appreciate the comments very much, so appreciate the understanding and support. I think the best I can hope for is that it's early...

I have a slew of recent floral snapshots to post, but this morning's sky was so fabulous that I had to share these instead. BTW, Derry was supposed to have his post-dental follow-up on Friday afternoon, but after Googling Convenia (the 2-week antibiotic injection he got, as did Nicki and Annie) plus feline anemia, I was in enough of a panic to call the clinic and get him in at 11:40 this morning. His mouth is healing well, front stitches have gone, and I had the vet draw blood for his blood cell count (not the full panel). She's sending the sample up to the IDEXX Lab (in the greater Toronto area, I think) because their equipment is more accurate than the vet clinic's in-house equipment. Odds are that Derry is fine, but after the scary things I was reading, I was more than happy to pay the $40 to find out. And if there is a problem, well, we'll go from there.  But I certainly have my fingers crossed that he's fine. I do recommend that you ask your vet what meds t...