Unfortunately our sweet, wonderful, goofy kitty girl died this week. She was only nine.
Every evening she would sit on my lap for hours as I worked or watched TV. She was shockingly tolerant with our toddler. She loved balls of tinfoil and stealing my yarn and snatching bits of our food if we turned our backs for even a moment. She was incorrigible and funny and just absolutely the sweetest cat in the world.
We never got the chance to say goodbye. For several weeks she'd been suffering from skin allergies, and we'd been trying everything to figure out what was causing the allergy and get her better. We had no idea how sick she really was.
Last Friday she took a turn for the worse. Her tongue had been sticking out a bit for a while, which we thought was a side effect of the steroids she was on (our vet was unconcerned), but all of a sudden it became much more pronounced and she started drooling profusely. We took her back to the vet who said she needed to be sedated for an exam, but he wanted to try and reduce the swelling in her tongue before sedation, so we started her on heavy antibiotics along with the steroids. For a few days she was much better, but on Wednesday she was worse again and could barely eat.
My husband dropped her at our vet on his way to work, and an hour later the vet called to tell me that she really needed the sedated exam to figure out what was going on, but that he wasn't comfortable doing it in his office because she was already sick and he wasn't sure he could intubate her. So my husband picked me up at work and we both drove to our vet, got our cat, and drove straight to the nearest veterinary hospital. Along the way I thought about taking her out of her carrier, but knew it was unsafe.
At the hospital I thought about taking her out of her carrier in the waiting room or even just petting her through the opening, but there were loads of dogs around and she was already feeling bad, so I was worried it would just stress her out. A tech took her back so a vet could do an initial exam. Then we spoke with the vet and agreed to the sedated exam. I thought about asking to see her before they sedated her, but the hospital was so busy and I didn't want to delay the process even more.
A while later the vet asked us to come to the back if we were comfortable seeing our cat while she was under anesthesia. She was so beautiful and looked so healthy. With the anesthesia she was relaxed in a way she hadn't been for weeks, not puffed up and tense. The vet explained that they'd found a large, aggressive squamous cell carcinoma at the base of her tongue and that the only possible treatment would require removing the entire tongue, placing a feeding tube, and following up with chemo or radiation. Even then the chance of survival was very low. The vet said they could wake her up and try to keep her calm if we wanted, but we realized that either way they thought she needed to be euthanized that day, and waking her up would have been for our benefit and not hers.
So we stayed and pet her while they gave her an overdose of the anesthesia. I hope so much that she somehow knew we were with her. She was so wonderful and we miss her so much, but we also feel so, so guilty that we didn't make the end of her life better. Between the skin problems and the extreme drooling we hadn't spent nearly as much time cuddling with her towards the end because she was filthy a lot of the time. We'd had her on that horrible hypoallergenic food to try and control the skin problems and I wish we could have just let her eat whatever she wanted since food was one of her greatest pleasures. I wish we'd had just a few minutes to hold her and pet her so that her last moments had been with us instead of in a strange place with strange people poking and prodding her. The last time I actually touched her was that morning, just a quick pat on her head when I took away her food because she wouldn't stop trying to choke it down. And then the rest of her last day was terrible. She was so wonderful and deserved so much better than the ending she had. We really miss her.
Every evening she would sit on my lap for hours as I worked or watched TV. She was shockingly tolerant with our toddler. She loved balls of tinfoil and stealing my yarn and snatching bits of our food if we turned our backs for even a moment. She was incorrigible and funny and just absolutely the sweetest cat in the world.
We never got the chance to say goodbye. For several weeks she'd been suffering from skin allergies, and we'd been trying everything to figure out what was causing the allergy and get her better. We had no idea how sick she really was.
Last Friday she took a turn for the worse. Her tongue had been sticking out a bit for a while, which we thought was a side effect of the steroids she was on (our vet was unconcerned), but all of a sudden it became much more pronounced and she started drooling profusely. We took her back to the vet who said she needed to be sedated for an exam, but he wanted to try and reduce the swelling in her tongue before sedation, so we started her on heavy antibiotics along with the steroids. For a few days she was much better, but on Wednesday she was worse again and could barely eat.
My husband dropped her at our vet on his way to work, and an hour later the vet called to tell me that she really needed the sedated exam to figure out what was going on, but that he wasn't comfortable doing it in his office because she was already sick and he wasn't sure he could intubate her. So my husband picked me up at work and we both drove to our vet, got our cat, and drove straight to the nearest veterinary hospital. Along the way I thought about taking her out of her carrier, but knew it was unsafe.
At the hospital I thought about taking her out of her carrier in the waiting room or even just petting her through the opening, but there were loads of dogs around and she was already feeling bad, so I was worried it would just stress her out. A tech took her back so a vet could do an initial exam. Then we spoke with the vet and agreed to the sedated exam. I thought about asking to see her before they sedated her, but the hospital was so busy and I didn't want to delay the process even more.
A while later the vet asked us to come to the back if we were comfortable seeing our cat while she was under anesthesia. She was so beautiful and looked so healthy. With the anesthesia she was relaxed in a way she hadn't been for weeks, not puffed up and tense. The vet explained that they'd found a large, aggressive squamous cell carcinoma at the base of her tongue and that the only possible treatment would require removing the entire tongue, placing a feeding tube, and following up with chemo or radiation. Even then the chance of survival was very low. The vet said they could wake her up and try to keep her calm if we wanted, but we realized that either way they thought she needed to be euthanized that day, and waking her up would have been for our benefit and not hers.
So we stayed and pet her while they gave her an overdose of the anesthesia. I hope so much that she somehow knew we were with her. She was so wonderful and we miss her so much, but we also feel so, so guilty that we didn't make the end of her life better. Between the skin problems and the extreme drooling we hadn't spent nearly as much time cuddling with her towards the end because she was filthy a lot of the time. We'd had her on that horrible hypoallergenic food to try and control the skin problems and I wish we could have just let her eat whatever she wanted since food was one of her greatest pleasures. I wish we'd had just a few minutes to hold her and pet her so that her last moments had been with us instead of in a strange place with strange people poking and prodding her. The last time I actually touched her was that morning, just a quick pat on her head when I took away her food because she wouldn't stop trying to choke it down. And then the rest of her last day was terrible. She was so wonderful and deserved so much better than the ending she had. We really miss her.
She felt your love and concern for her, even though you weren't able to cuddle her at the end when she was still conscious.
