Friday, October 23, 2009

Day 4

I had a great lunch today with an old friend I've known for over 20 years and a friend of hers from their work. It's was great to be laughing again, especially because the weather is so lousy today. The high was 45 degrees and it rained. At least it didn't snow - it did about 45 minutes north of here and it's sticking. This fall has just been horrible - it has rained on over 1/2 of the days in October and we were over 60 degrees just once I believe. What kind of fall was that? September was unusually warm and it's just been downhill since then. And November is the cloudiest month in WI, closely followed by February. I'm not looking forward to it. Although my mom wants to go shopping for some winter boots and snowpants for our trip to Pittsburgh in December so maybe I should take her up on that sooner rather than later.

Peanut's health is steadily declining. I shouldn't say it's his health: he doesn't seem to be in any pain, however he sleeps the majority of the day and will only eat his canned food and won't eat his hard dry kibble. It doesn't sound that appetizing to me either as I write that. And it doesn't really smell all that great either, so I don't blame him on that one. My husband keeps talking about his quality of life and I am well aware that it is the biggest factor in all of this. I called the vet today and set up an appointment for Monday morning just for them to take a look-see and run some blood work. I want to see how his kidney functions are doing because he's been drinking an insane amount of water this past week too and he's currently got some small issues there. His BUN was elevated at his annual physical in September but his Creatinine was fine and the Creat. is the more concerning of the two. My 9 years in human healthcare has proven to be very valuable when dealing with the health of my four-legged babies. Or, BWTs as I like to call them: Babies With Tails. The vet tech that I spoke with was incredibly reassuring. He's not on any pain meds right now and she said that is certainly an option. I'm a big believer in the therapeutic value of analgesics, trust me. I was very teary - ok, I was balling - this morning, but she helped put some things in persective. So on Monday's appointment I'm not anticipating good news, but I'm not thinking it's going to be over and done with right at that moment either. My guess is we'll now be moving into hospice stage and I'm alright with that. He's been alive for 14 years and 2 months...I was hoping to get through the holidays because it will be 14 years on the weekend before Thanksgiving that I brought him home with me from that farm in a very small WI town and I fell immediately in love with him, and he with me. I've been his mommas ever since. In human years he's 98 years old and that's a frickin' full life man, you can't argue that. And he's had a good life: he has loved and been loved and that's the litmus test for me. Ooh, I'm getting a little teary again. :-)

I'm going to have a smoke. Enjoy.

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