A Celebration of life

Baby came into our home when I was 13 years old. She belonged to my dad's girlfriend who had moved into a place where she could not take cats. When we first got her, she was so scared of people, that she would hide all of the time. The only way we knew we had a cat was when we saw the food disappearing and the litter box filling up.

Over time, she started getting a little more open. If I sat really still, she would come up to me and let me pet her...as long as I didn't move too much. Heaven forbid I had to sneeze...that sent her into hiding for another few hours.

My dad was gone a lot, and I was the one spending a lot of quality time with her. Over time, she started becoming more and more comfortable with me, and was slowly becoming MY kitty. When I moved out of my dad's house in 2003, I took her with me knowing that I couldn't be without her.

She blossomed into a completely normal cat over time. Nothing seemed to phased her anymore. I found out that she had all of these really strange and quirky behaviors. For example, she would get on her hind legs and ask to be picked up. Once you were holding her, she would wiggle her way on her back so you were cradling her like a baby. My guess is that this is how she got her name.

She loved noodles, of all things. Any time I had anything with any kind of pasta, she would beg for it. She would do this adorable thing where she would stick one paw up in the air to let you know that she wanted something. I of course reinforced this adorable behavior and she started to do it all the time. So damn cute.

Sometimes, when she wanted my attention, she would put one paw up on the seat of the chair I was sitting on and tap my arm with the other to let me know it was time to pay attention to her. She would follow that up with some kind of meow or nudge to further her point.

Man, was she vocal. She knew when it was her turn in conversation to speak, and often took the opportunity to do so. All you had to do was look at her and say something and she would meow right when you were done. One time, I came into the bathroom to find Brian having a full on conversation with her.

Brian: "what?"
Baby: "meow."
Brian: "really?"
Baby:"meow."
Brian: "I don't think that is a good investment this time of year."
Baby: "meow."
Brian: "alright, it's your decision."
Baby: "meow."

Too flippin cute.

She came when she was whistled for. Over time, the whistling evolved into a tune called the "sweetie baby call." She came running every friggin time, and would give a meow as if she was asking to find out what you wanted.

She would give me nips under the chin. Whenever she was in a happy cuddly mood, she would crawl up on my chest or in my lap, and give me a little nip right under my chin. I asked a cat expert about this once, and she told me it is a thing that mama and baby kittens do as a sign of affection. I considered myself lucky to have this kind of bond with her.

She was an absolutely amazing cat. I was estimating that she was 1-2 years old when I got her, which would make her around 13-14 at her time of death. Come to find out, she was actually 3-4 when we got her, which means she was more like 16-17 years old! I think that this has helped me to feel even more like she had a long and happy life, and made me feel even more confident in our decision to let her go in the end. Until the last week of her life, she had never needed to go to the vet for any major health issues, and really did live a healthy, and happy life.

Rest in peace my sweet angel. You enriched my life, and I feel so incredibly lucky to have had you in it. You will be missed.

A Sad Day

Rest in peace my sweet Baby girl

Baby 1993-2009

Baby

I know that I said I was on a hiatus, but I felt like I needed to make an exception for this.

About 2 months ago, we noticed that Baby was not grooming herself as well. We figure that at the age of 14, she likely could not reach places as well as she once could and contributed it to age and arthritis. We gave her a bath, cut out a couple mats of fur, gave her a good brushing, and started supplementing her diet with wet food and fish oil to help her coat.

Things were getting better for a while. Her coat was looking great, and she was now eating wet food (which she had never been given before) once a day to help put a little weight on her. She was also eating dry food, which I have in an auto feeder, whenever she wanted.

About a month ago, she stopped eating the dry food completely. We thought (since she has a tendency to be a bit of a princess) that she was getting spoiled on wet food, and knew if she held out that she would get some. We of course gave in, because no matter how fussy she was being, she it a small cat and needs to eat. She now was eating only wet food.

We slowly started noticing that she would get super excited every time Brian and I went into the kitchen to pour a glass of water, and would even jump up on the coffee table and try to steal water from our glasses, even though she had plenty of her own water. Once again, we thought she had been spoiled on the good water and only wanted the nice filtered stuff.

About two weeks ago, we started noticing just how much water she was drinking. She was drinking a TON of water. EVERY SINGLE TIME we got water, she wanted it. And this is on top of drinking the water that was already out for her.

About a week ago, she stopped eating food all together. She would eat little pieces of chicken or tuna here and there, but refused all forms of cat food.

This is when we took her into the vet. No food is definitely a sign that something is wrong. I started getting very emotional the night before, because part of me knew that I was going to find out something I did not want to know the next day.

Unfortunately, my suspicion was right. on Saturday, we found out that Baby is suffering from CRF (chronic renal failure). It basically means that her kidneys are not functioning well and the condition will eventually kill her. The vet remained fairly optimistic and said that while it is in fact terminal, some cats live another couple years with the appropriate treatments. We continued to hang on to these lofty hopes, and came home with all of the things that he vet suggested.

For the last 3 days, we have been injecting her with fluids twice a day. This seemed really daunting at first and I had no idea how I was ever going to be able to stick a needle in my cat and fill her up with fluids. However, it has now become less of a big deal, and believe it or not, she is pretty tolerant of it. The idea is that even though she is drinking a ton of water, her kidneys are not processing it, and she has become very dehydrated. The goal of the aggressive fluid treatment is to get her hydrated and feeling better.

They also sent us home with a liquid phosphate binder to help bind up the toxins in her body so they may be excreted, and some pepcid to help her tummy feel better enough to eat again. These have been a little more difficult as she is not eating well and it is difficult to mix in food. Giving her these has been pretty hit and miss. Some times, it's super easy, an others it is impossible.

The first day after she was diagnosed, she looked miserable. She jumped up on my bed on the warm fresh laundry and slept for nearly 24 hours. I was miserable too. I think I cried that whole first day.

The next day (yesterday) she really started to rally. She started walking around, jumping on things, folowing me around, and even ate some tuna fish. We started feeling pretty confident that even though this was terminal, maybe she would be one of those cats that could last another couple years.

Today, while her behavior is still pretty promising, her apetite is totally gone. She has eaten nothing but the juice from a can of tuna. They are giving her a perscription that I will pick up tomorrow for an appetite stimulant. We have made the decision that if we give her the stimulant and her appetite increases, and her behavior still seems good, we will continue to try the treatments. At that point, her quality of life would be pretty good.

If she does not start eating in the next couple of days, the next step would be hospitalization for super aggressive treatment. We have decided that we are not willing to take it this far. It's not that we are not willing to pay for 3-4 days of hospitalization, but it is that we are not willing to put her through that kind of torture. Cats don't have the cognitive ability to know that we are doing it to help them. As far as she is concerned, it would be the worst thing that has ever happened to her, and even if it did work, it is really only prolonging the inevitable.

Am I ready to let her go? No way. However, I don't want to put her through that kind of torture simply because I can't get over my selfish inability to let her go.

So we've decided that if her apetite comes back with the stimulant and we can get her eating on her own, then it will be a sign that she isn't ready to leave just yet. However, we realize that with how incredibly advanced her condition is, there is probably only a 20% chance that this will happen, and we are trying to prepare ourselves for the possibility that we may need to make the choice to put her down as early as this weekend.

It has been a very hard and emotional few days for me. I started my new palcement, and also started school again. I am working 2 jobs AND I am a full time student, which means I'm pulling 12-14 hour work days on some days. Brian has been coming over at 7am every morning to help me with her fluids, and again when I get home at night. I want from thinking she was going to die on Sat &Sun to thinking there was hope on Monday, and to a realization this is highly unlikely today. It feels like I'm on a roller coaster this week. It is so hard not to let this affect me as I'm trying to train at my new job.

This is going to be a very difficult process for me. She is my Baby. We adopted her when I was 13 year old, which is half of my life. She was so skiddish and scared when we got her and over time she started to bond with me, and began to trust me. Since then, she has gone with me everywhere I go, and she has always very much been MY baby.

11 years later when I started dating Brian shedecided that she was going to open up to him as much as she has opened up to me. She started wanting to cuddle in his lap and even gave him little affectionate nips on the chin which up until then, she had only ever done to me. While he hasn't had as much time on this earth with her as I have, he to has bonded very closely to her, and is taking this very hard.

I've been thinking more and more about the euthanaisia process in the past couple of days. I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around the concept that it is my responsibility to decide when to let her go. Furthermore, I am having a hard time understanding how people can sit in the room with their pets and be with them as they die. I guess I understand that some people need this for closure, but I can't even fathom the idea of watching my baby die.

Anyway, that's where I'm at with things now. I know that this has been an entirely depressing blog post, but I feel like I needed to do it to get all my thoughts and emotions out into a different space other than where they have been lurking and festering in my head.

This next week is going to be a very difficult week, and we are trying to prepare ourselves for the most likely outcome in the next few days.

Hiatus

I started this blog a while back and as some may have noticed, the distance between posts has become longer and longer as time has gone by.

Mostly it is because I really only have one person who comments regularly and another two who do from time to time. This leads me to believe that only 3 people total are actually reading this thing, and that really isn't much incentive to take the time to keep blogging.

I'm not trying to say that people have to comment every time, but I really have no way of knowing who reads it if they don't. While I love hearing from Holly, Marni, and Lidia, three people hardly seems worth maintaining a blog for.

That's all for now I suppose.

Vegas Baby!

My cousin Nichole is getting married this October, and had a big bachelorette party bash in Vegas this past weekend. 13 girls + 3 suites at the MGM + 1 strip club + 2 limo rides + 1 ultra hip club on the strip = 1 awesome weekend.

The BacheloretteThe Group

Sexy Sardines

Wardrobe malfunction (busted zipper) saved by all our silly bachelorette party buttons! We've got her back...literally!

YAY STRIPPERS!

Later on at Tao
See the tub behind me? This is what was in it...

Dance, DanceI'm obviously not in a lot of these since I was the one taking them, but I'm sure some more will surface soon as everyone starts to upload off their cameras. In any case, fun times had by all!

Another new Etsy seller

This blog is the site of another new Etsy member like myself. She currently has a giveaway where you can win a cute little handmade letter of your choice. It looks easy to enter and could be a cute addition to a child's room...I'm thinking of YOU my preggo friend! Hehe.

Our Trip to Boston

Wow, it feels like there is so much to catch up on! Brian and I went on vacation to Boston the 25th-31st. We spent our first full day in Boston doing the Freedom Trail, the second day at the Stone Zoo and Fenway Park, and the last few days up at Brian's brothers house to spend time with him and his family. It all feels like way too much to blog about, so I think I'll do an update in photos. All of these photos can be found on Flickr if you want to look at them separately, see titles and descriptions, or view larger. Be sure to watch the "Sweet Caroline" video in the Fenway Park set....such a frickin cool tradition!

Freedom Trail



A's V.S. Red Sox @ Fenway Park



Stone Zoo