Good Bye Sweet Girl !

Stormie, 

We are so proud of you for winning your fight. What a wonderful example of strength  you are. You will be missed and never forgotten. 

Could you keep a look out for a fiery Tortie who should be crossing your way pretty soon?  She's my sister and we want her to find friends over where you are. She's never been very good at making kitty friends. 

We know that now that you are pain free and for that, we are grateful. Enjoy yourself and we'll try and take care of your family over here. 

Until we meet again.

Headbumps and purrs,

Tyler

Kali is still not eating. I tried giving her heated chicken baby food, heated chicken liver (suggested on a website). I gave her the antibiotic, but I don't think she has an infection. I also gave her  some of the Lickable Super Charger that Moki's mom recommended. It's similar to the paste they make to get rid of hairballs. It has calories and nutritional supplements in it. It's the only thing she would eat, yet she started gagging after she first ate it.  After forcing the antibiotic down her, I didn't have the heart to force food down her too. As a Tortie, she's always prized her dignity.  She still is drinking water on her own. But she looked me in the eye and I feel as if she asked me to let her go. 

I still have to go to work today and I don't want to spend the day tearing up in front of my first graders like I did last week so I'm not making any decisions about when I'll take her in exactly. School is over next Tues. Although I welcome a bit of time off before I'll work again during summer school, there is so much required of me right now. I feel as if I can't concentrate on doing as much for Kali as I'd like to. 

I bought so many foods yesterday that I still want to see if she'll eat. Chicken has always been her number one love, but I need to try the other things too.

Oh Darn!

So, now Kali isn't eating. She refused a piece of cheese and Temptations. I want to start her on the antibiotics today just in case that's the problem. I want to try giving her baby food. Does anyone know what type I should buy? Or do you have any other suggestions?

If she still doesn't eat, well that's my sign to let her go. I will ask you to purr for her still. Thank you. 

PS She did eat her pill pocket.

News from Vet

Lynn again: Kali's blood work is back and it's not good news. She has beginning kidney disease. She has some sort of heart disease. Her heart is enlarged. Her thyroid is fine. So that's not what caused her heart to get out of whack. The radiologist thinks she "may" have an infection in her lungs. It's not typical, but it could be what was causing her lungs to look like they were filled with water on the X-rays. So we're going to put her on antibiotics. If that doesn't show a big improvement, it's probably something serious like cancer. 

The vet wanted to have two ultrasounds done at $500 a piece. I cannot afford that. She's an old girl. They might be able to pinpoint what she has, but at her age, what are they going to do to help her?

 I will  need to have her put to sleep as soon as she is not living a good life. The vet said to check out if she stops eating or drinking or showing signs she wants to go off and hide and be alone. I haven't been home a lot, but when I am I still hear her coughing. Before when she was vomiting she would always start with a cough. The same thing she has always done if she had a hairball. In the morning she did vomit after her cough but this afternoon I just heard the cough. Her white blood cells were slightly elevated but that could have been caused by stress. 

Here comes my old geezer girl...

Ah, well that was a quick visit. I opened up the Temptaions' bag for Kali and all of a sudden I had four cats in my lap.  After eating her treat, Miss Kali took off again. I think she read my thoughts and wanted to prove to me that today wasn't her day to go. Normally she would have whapped the others away until she could lie down nest to me.

Thank you Girl, I'm thrilled to know that today your still here to hug and kiss.

Tyler at the keyboard: Sheesh, I finally get to write on my own blog. Mom has been giving my big sis Kali WAY to much attention. She looks like the same old annoying sister of always. She's walking around, eating and drinking, I really think much too much was made of a little hairball yacking. She still is doing that a bit. And mom is feeding her those delicious Pill Pockets three times a day. And when I ask her, "Mom may I please just have one", she says, 'No.' Can you believe that? That old geezer girl is getting on my last nerve.

 I'm having to sit in mom's lap in the evenings and turn on the old charm, just so she remembers that I live here too. I did get some Temptations last night for allowing her to furminate me. The funny thing is that I like getting my hairs stolen. I have way too many of them for these hot June days. Cookie started growling at mom for the same offense. That one has quite the attitude. Doesn't she know that getting rid of the old hairs feels good? Finally she allowed mom to continue, but she wouldn't put up with changing sitting postions so that mom could have more access to fur. And the surprise was that Jake seems to be liking the Furminator. He hated the Zoom Groom so mom assumed they'd be the same. He actually sat still for a little bit.

 I'm still the best kitty, I don't give my mom any troubles, ever. Ok, when I whap Kali I do agravate my mom and get in trouble for that. But she deserves it, I promise you she does. Have a great day!

Lynn here: I played phone tag with the vet regarding Kali's blood results. She looks a lot better. Yet as Tyler said above she did yack up her breakfast this morning. I need to ask the vet if I should have repilled her after that because I had given her the meds only 15 mins. before. Thanks again for all your good thoughts and wishes. They mean so very much! Enjoy a good day.

7 pm (PST) Update

Dear Friends,

Tyler's mom speaking:

I am overwhelmed by the beautiful comments you have all left on Ty's blog. I believe in the power of prayer and I believe that you all have brought a miracle to our doorstep. I came home from work to find an almost peppy Kali. She got up out of her bed and greeted me. Something she hadn't done for the past three days.  I took her to the new vet and I fell in love with this person. She was so compassionate. She told me all of our options and let me decide. She did say that Kali seemed to have too much spunk today to be helped to the Bridge. She recommended having blood work done and X-rays taken. She wanted to find out if Kali could enjoy more life if we managed her care with medicine. 

The blood work results will come in tomorrow. The x-rays showed some concerns with her heart. She had heard an irregular heart beat and the film showed that her heart was over to the right. Also their might be fluid in her lungs. A radiologist will be in the office on Wednesday to give more feedback. The vet thinks that Kali may be suffering from hyperthyroidism which may be the cause of her heart problems. We'll know more once the blood work comes back. For now I'm suppose to put her on Pepsid AC and then she gave me 2 perscriptions, Reglan to prevent her from vomiting and Lasix for her heart. She wasn't dehydrated so she was able to drink water without spitting that up. I'm to feed her in ver small amounts to see if she can keep  that down too.

Forgive me for calling wolf and saying that she was most likely going to the Bridge today. I honestly thought she would. I wasn't trying to be over dramatic. I plead ignorance. With her age, I assumed that any troubles would be too serious to try to fix. I'm grateful for being wrong.

 But it looks like we have bought her a little bit more time. I am so surprised. With her poor heart and possible fluid in the lungs I'm not sure how much time has been bought. The vet gave me the option of having an ultrasound of her heart and possibly an EKG, although she thinks my girl might be too fiesty to sit still long enough for the EKG. The more I think about it, the more I think that she's too old to go to such extreme measures to try to save. 

I asked the doctor to just make sure that Kali isn't suffering. If she isn't suffering, I'll spend every extra day with her that I can. It's such a huge responsibility to decide what's best for her.

Thank you, thank you, thank you for your loving thoughts. We are so lucky to have you all as our friends. We are in your debt. Headbumps and purrs,

Lynn

Kali continues to yack everything up. She even yacked up yesterday's Temptations. I'm going to call my vet today. I'm preparing to say good-bye. Part of me will feel better once she's out of pain. The other part will feel alone without my companion of nineteen years. 

Update

My vet's office only has one vet in today and told me that I'd have to leave her there and they would look at her when they could. Well I know Kali and she freaks out whenever we leave home and at the vet's she has had fits in the past. She's had a lot of painful dental work and I think she's just too smart to put up with any strange people a pokin' and a prodin'. She is a Tortie after all and she can be very opinionated. I am not leaving her somewhere so that they can then call me and tell me that she needs to be put to sleep.

The person who answered the phone felt very badly that she couldn't work me in. But this service just isn't acceptable. I searched high and low for a vet clinic that people seem to like around here. I found one that has glowing reports, has 5 different vets, and who's website has the title "Full Service Care for Pets Who Are Part of the Family." I made an appointment here. She will be seen at 4:00 pm PST. I will be moving all of the cats to this vet, if I like it there. It is so difficult to get into my current vet's office. I like my vets personality, but if I can't see him, then it's not fair to the kids. And these are my kids.

Thank you so much for your kind comments. Only cat people can understand. I saw her up and walking about this morning and I'm sure it's your prayers that gave her the strength to do that.

Hugs to each of you,

Lynn/The Mom