I Dont Know Where To Start...

gareth · Aug 24, 2018

I saw this today and thought of you Joe

If it should be that I grow frail and weak
And pain does keep me from my sleep,
Then will you do what must be done
for this - the last battle -can't be won.

You will be sad I understand
But don't let grief then stay your hand.
For on this day, more than the rest
Your love and friendship must stand the test.

We have had so many happy years,
You wouldn't want me to suffer so.
When the time comes, please, let me go.

Take me to where my needs they'll tend,
Only, stay with me till the end.
And hold me firm and speak to me
Until my eyes no longer see.

I know in time you will agree
It is a kindness you do to me.
Although my tail its last has waved,
From pain and suffering I have been saved.

Don't grieve that it must now be you
Who has to decide this thing to do.
We've been so close - we two -these years,
Don't let your heart hold any tears.

Kiwi's Companion · Aug 24, 2018

gareth said:
I saw this today and thought of you Joe

Thank you so much...

les26 · Aug 24, 2018

gareth said:
I saw this today and thought of you Joe

Just beautiful.....where's my hanky?

Lalexa67 · Aug 25, 2018

The price of love is grief. Reading your post (from start to finish- wink), clearly there is so much love in your home. We grieve the missing presence that made our homes complete. This time of sadness, missing kiwi because she was family and because she loved so much, It is justified. Just breathe for now, let your heart break. Process your regret and then you will realize there was nothing you could have done to save her. You have given her a wonderful life and in return she loved you for it, and at the end you gave her mercy. So now it’s time to grieve. We are here for you.

Bella's Mommy · Aug 25, 2018

I'm sorry for your loss

dustydiamond1 · Aug 25, 2018

Kiwi's Companion said:
I lost my baby girl, Kiwi, on 8/20/2018. I made the choice to euthanize her. She was about 18 years old. After her death I needed to look into the feelings I was having (mainly the guilt and second guessing/hating of myself) which lead me to these forums... and here I am typing with no real roadmap as to what I want... or need to say. Perhaps I'm just hoping writing this stream of consciousness will be cathartic in some way. With that said I apologize for the random nature of my ramblings, but I digress.

My older brother first got Kiwi when she was a small kitten back around the year 2000 (remember when that sounded futuristic?). I remember playing with her when I would visit his apartment, and my wife (then girlfriend) distinctly remembers her giant ears and long rabbit like hind legs... two things that first endeared her to us aside from her sweet and playful nature. He had her for the better part of a year but he was living in a place that wasn't the best area for cats at the time. After he discovered someone near him had shot her with a pellet gun (I still get engaged thinking about that... she was so sweet) he decided to give her up. Having lost my Sugar (someone I had had with me from the age of 6 to my early 20s) about a year before I decided it was time for another friend, so I ended up taking her back with me. We first loved with my parents, then an apartment with my wife (still girlfriend at the time) then eventually we all moved into our current house around 2007. My wife and I adopted 2 more kittens a few years later and had a child of our own as well. Needless to say, Kiwi and I experienced a lot of changes and growth in our time together.

Fast forward to 2 years ago and we started to see her move on into her golden years. Her retired herself to being an indoor car instead of indoor/outdoor, she didnt play with her toys as much and everything else that's common with our elderly feline companions. She eventually developed something where her 3rd eyelids would be inflamed, but this was manageable with regular vet visits and various eyedrops and the occasional steroid injection. That was about 2 years ago. More recently her decline started. She had always been a tiny thing but she was getting very skinny. The vet didnt see this as a major issue but it was a noticable thing to my wife and me. Months later I noticed her urine became darker. I figured she was dehydrated and made sure to give her lots of fresh water and extra wet food. A few weeks later I noticed that this darkening had a pinkish tint to it and not soon after that it was apparent that she had blood in her urine.

We had lots of vet visits after that.

She had a uranalys which looked mostly normal so she was first treated with antibiotics. Hopefully it was a bladder infection.

That didn't help. She was still urinating blood but she had a VERY healthy appetite (3 to 4 pouches of her favorite wet food a day) and was drinking quite a bit of water.

We took her back to the vet for a follow up examination. He did xrays on her and saw her kidneys didnt seem enlarged or otherwise unhealthy for a cat of her advanced age.

Thats also when he found a mass in her abaomen. Out vet suggested we take her to a specialist internist for further examination and we did. They performed an ultrasound did a urine culture and a blood workup. It took a week to hear back from them.

Once we heard back it was good news. They didn't think the mass was malignant and that unless she lost her appetite or severely declined she should be okay for a good while even with the growth in her little belly... we also asked about the blood in her urine. Her urine culture was clean. No infection. The specialist didnt have an answer. She just wanted to do more tests which included sedating Kiwi and invasively taking some of her bladder for a biopsy.

We opted not to do this.

I went back to Kiwi's regular vet and had him go over her info from the specialist. He suggested giving her Ovaban for a week to see if that helps because it would reduce inflammation in her bladder, etc. It was 1 pill a day which I diligently gave to her. She was eating like a pig so this wasnt an issue. On her 5th night of treatment I gave her her wet food with the crushed up pill and she ate it like always. I retired to her and Kiwi slept on my daughters bed like she had taken to doing over the past year (I was jealous but I also knew my 6 year old daughter was giving Kiwi lots of loving attention). I woke up in the morning to have my wife tell me the car vomited under the bed and to clean it. I did, and assumed it was another one of her nasty wet hair all upchucks.

I was wrong.

After that she couldn't eat it drink. At first she would eat a bit but she wouldn't come close to finishing what I gave her. I thought she didnt like the food. I changed it, gave her more "gravy" (the part she liked best) and so on. Eventually it became clear that she wasbt eating or drinking at all anymore. She WANTED to but she couldn't. It pains me to think about it but she would wait patiently in her feeding spot like she always did but she wouldn't eat or drink. She would put her face in the bowl. Lick her lips. But she would not drink or take a bite.

This went in for 2 more days. I saw her go from being mobile and actively coming to us for love to... something else.

She was wasting away. Literally skin and bones. Shed react if you came to her to pet her but she had trouble getting up even on the foot stool we set up bu the bed as a "step" for her.

That Monday we had a follow up appointment with the vet again as she was supposed to have finished her medication course at that point. I knew the night before. I made her a spot on my bed and brought her up to my room. I tried to get her to drink or eat but it seemed like torture because I knew she WANTED to but couldn't (here come the tears again) so I took the feed down and let her rest.

I remember waking up a few times that night to make sure she was still there. I'd watch in the dark to see if she was still breathing. She was, and I finally went to aleep for the last time that night. In the morning she was gone so I immediately looked all over for her. Eventually I found her laying in her litterbox. It was apparent that she needed to eliminate urine (knew which was mostly blood at this point) and stayed in there so she didnt have to walk back and fourth. I took her out and tried to make her comfortable. She even came down stairs in the AM and sat for her feeding, except this time she barely made it down the stairs. She had fallen on the last step when reaching the 1st floor.

I knew it was bad. I called the vet and asked to be seen earlier and they did.

Our vet is very kind and after I explained everything he regretfully told me that he "didnt have any more tricks to make her feel better today". He said he could refer us back to the internist. My wife and I declined and have him the go ahead to euthanize my baby.

I feel so guilty. There are so many things I could have done differently both in her medical care as well as how I interacted with her. I should have been more acutely aware if my limited time but I went on as if everything was the same and I didn't pay extra special attention to her. I even feel guilty because I was more concerned with the situation in the vets office and how I and my wife were feeling than being focused in Kiwi. I was there. I spoke to her. I gave her love. I could have done more... and now I'll never have that chance again.

I wish I had a conclusion for this sad sob story, but today is only the 2nd day since her passing and I'm still in the middle of it all. In any regard, I realize I just wrote a novel for my first post and I don't expect anyone to have read that in its entirety. In fact I feel selfish for having written it. If you did happen to read it though, I thank you. At the very least I will have had someone knew about this amazing creature and that her name is Kiwi. I love her so much.

-Joe