Results tagged “Sweetie” from Proud Dad / Happy Husband

Kellie and I did see Star Trek (the movie) a week ago, as I had previously mentioned. It turns out that their first choices for the roles of Kirk and Spock — well, they weren’t quite old enough yet. See what they would have looked like if they had gone with their first choices.

OK, maybe not. Kellie was playing around on the Star Trek site and found the ability to create your own Trek character. So, we get Daniel as Kirk and Sean as Spock. Quite fun, actually. I had to check it out myself, and I wound up creating this Romulan character, with motion and custom speech.

Yes, that was Sweetie. sigh That face almost works as a Romulan.

Hope your weekend was fun. The pool opens next weekend, so you know what that means.

I cannot come up with the right title for this. The emotions of yesterday are still too extreme — between what should have been the highs and ultimately what we faced.

First off — Sorry, Kellie, but a dedicated birthday posting for you is going to have to wait to another day. (You knew it was her birthday, right?) I would have tried to do it yesterday, but now it doesn’t seem right. It also should have been a happy day, as the Christmas tree (and lights) went up.

Kellie’s birthday dinner got an unexpected interruption, as Will started displaying the signs of a stomach bug. That nixed the birthday cake for the evening, though at least she got her presents.

No, as you might have guessed, we got some pretty bad news last night about Sweetie. Her blood tests came back indicating advanced kidney failure, with elevated liver levels also indicating trouble there. An ultrasound and biopsy would have been the next steps, but in a 7-year old cat, those are just not good signs. So, Kellie and I made the decision to ease Sweetie’s pain. We had said our “potential” goodbyes before taking her to the hospital, but it doesn’t make it any easier.

I’m still tearing up as I write this. She was a part of the family, even if she was a slightly off-kilter one. (Have you ever heard of an indoor cat that never wanted to go outside? Me neither.) She had the softest coat you could ever imagine, and she would purr in anticipation of being petted. You didn’t even have to touch her. She’d drive the vets bonkers, because her purring would drown out her heartbeat when they tried to listen to her heart. She was so lovable.

I’m glad we were able to rescue her almost 5-1/2 years ago. You never imagine a cat being gone this soon. I know I’m not ready for it. As I was cleaning up tonight, I know I’m going to miss her on those mornings I get up to workout. She’d race me down the stairs (once she was sure I was going downstairs and not checking on one of the kids instead), then make sure I fed her as soon as possible. A cat has to have her priorities. Those early morning wakeups (before even Kellie gets up — that’s pretty early) aren’t going to be the same without her.

I won’t miss changing the litter box, but the laundry room already seems a little more empty without it there. And I really wish it didn’t have to happen on this day. But she’s given us a full life of memories, and we know she’s in a much better place. She had to instinctively know what was up, as she refused even the food she enjoyed the most (like tuna). Animals can be amazing and wondrous creatures at times. It’s sad that it takes an event like this to make us realize it sometimes.

By now, I’m pretty sure she has gone to Cat Heaven. We’ll see how the boys take it. Will didn’t like the idea of Sweetie not coming back (before she went to the hospital), but when we broke it to him before bedtime, he didn’t seem quite as freaked out. I know he’s going to miss her. Sean and Daniel will probably ask where she is, but it shouldn’t be quite as bad. But there’s no getting around it, and there is never a good time for this.

Thank you, Sweetie, for the memories you gave us (and hopefully we gave you — if cats have memories).

Sweetie (our cat) is in the hospital right now. She’s stopped eating over the past couple of days and has gotten really lethargic and disoriented. She even turned her nose up at canned tuna (her favorite food). So it was off to the 24-hour hospital in Carytown at lunchtime.

As you can see, I’m back home. Sweetie had to stay. She was dehydrated and had a low temperature, so they’re working on that. Her kidneys also felt abnormal when the vet squeezed them. It could be a lot of things, so hopefully with the blood work today, we’ll know so more. She’s staying overnight.

I know everyone is a little concerned about Sweetie, so say a little prayer for her tonight.

Well, notes and pictures that extend into today. We finally took the twins back to the pool on Saturday, this time with floatation devices to make things a little easier to control. They actually both seemed to enjoy getting to float around like that for a while. They got to splash, kick, and do other things, and it kept Mommy and Daddy from getting too tired trying to hold them the whole time.

We eventually ate lunch at the pool before Mommy took the twins home for a bath and nap, while Daddy stayed with Will to continue to practice swimming and do other fun pool things. Will is actually taking to swimming under the water for a few strokes before needing to come up for air, which is kind of impressive, considering he doesn’t swim on the surface for more than a few strokes before needing air and stopping swimming. In due time, I’m sure Will is going to put it all together.

On Sunday, we caught Sweetie flaking out in the middle of the floor. I guess things are getting a little too hot for her. And no, she’s not possessed (as far as we know). But there’s no easy way to get rid of that type of redeye (at least with the tools I have). She still can be a bit of a goofball at times.

Sean and Daniel have been showing off their charming sides recently, too. We caught some snapshots of them at the table that are sometimes mischievous, sometimes silly. I think what’s clear from these pictures is that the boys love to eat, especially their fruit. Tonight it was apples.

We tried, but didn’t get any good shots of Will. So he’s going to have to get a rain check on displaying his good side here.

We don’t exactly know when Sweetie’s birthday really is. We adopted her 5 years ago this month, and she was about a year old (give or take) at the time. But she had already been a mommy, so we figure she was at least a year old. But being rescued from being abandoned gives us no chance of figuring out how old she is.

As Will was working through the extended family’s list of birthdays a few months ago, he figured out that Sweetie needed a birthday. He declared that July 23rd would be Sweetie’s birthday. And if you have a birthday, you have to have a cake. Daddy had the “bright” idea that Sweetie should have a tuna cake for her birthday. So, this is what you get when you give your cat a tuna cake (can of tuna mixed with a little mayo to bind it together) for her birthday.

Since taking Sweetie to the vet on Friday for some tests, we now know more. Both tests for heartworm came back negative. The bronchiola pattern detected on the x-rays was real, as was the heart murmur. So, she probably has asthma/allergies instead, though there was no audible wheezing in the lungs at the time of the exam.

The heart murmur will not go away, and there is a feline cardiologist in Carytown, if we want to drop a bunch of money on an echocardiogram. I’ve had them done for myself and a couple of the kids - somehow, the cat just doesn’t quite make the cut yet. We’ll watch for lethargy to see if it is effecting her somehow. (I know — lethargy, cat, how can you tell the difference?)

So, that’s good news and bad news. Right now, it looks like we just wait. At least it looks like the weight-loss is real, as just asthma is not going to cause abnormal weight-loss (unlike heartworm). Hopefully, that will take some strain off her cardio system.

Cats can sure be expensive at times. And she hasn’t had a turn in the blog rolls, so it’s only fair that she be brought up. She’s a darling cat and has definitely mellowed with age — she hasn’t messed with the twins yet when they invade her space, unlike some incidents with Will.

Sweetie had been sneezing a lot recently, and her breathing occasionally sounded wheezy. But it would occasionally come and go. But today, while working from home, she got a really bad cough - almost like a hairball attack (which she rarely gets), but much more violent and the breathing was really wheezy and labored.

Considering the accumulation of symptoms to this point (Kellie and I were getting a little worried), I decided it was time for a visit to the vet. Got a last minute appointment, and after a bunch of x-rays and other tests in person (plus blood drawn for further testing), we wound up dropping a few bills on her. Wow. What we can say is that there is no edema or fluid in the lungs, and no true wheezing in the lungs, but she does have a grade 3 (out of 4) heart murmur and some interesting lung patterns on the x-ray. She’s a completely indoor cat (afraid to go outside or even near an open outside door), but it appears that she might have adult heartworm. Yes, even in a cat who never gets outside.

We’ll know more on Monday. For now, she’s on antibiotics and steroids. The one bit of good news that we did get is that she’s lost over 10% of her weight in the last year (from 11.25 pounds to 10 pounds). She’s always been a bit soft and pudgy, and now she’s a little less. But I don’t think we’ll ever get her back to the thinness she had when we first adoped her (the picture to the left) back in 2003.