HOLY CAT!

It's been entirely too long since I last posted here.

Quick update:

Got ready to start the etsy store, and it got derailed by life for a bit.

Tried writing for a contest, but it got derailed by life until after the deadline.

Kids are in school. It's been a weird year for them. Van is doing really well this year, which is a change for him, and one I'm DELIGHTED with. DC is, well, she's being a Demon Child. *sigh* There was some kerfluffle at the beginning of the year in her class, and it's taking her a bit to catch back up, I think. She's doing a bit better now, but her grades were NOT good at the first 5 weeks. *sigh* I say again...

And then there's Madame McFluff. One morning in early August, I came out to find an incredibly sick kitty. It gets a little graphic here. Stop now if you're squeamish.

Did you stop? No? Okay. You were warned. There was blood in the floor of the kitchen, and on the carpet in the living room, and also in the laundry room. I finally saw what was happening. Madame was walking around, squatting, and peeing blood. She was obviously in pain. I offered water, and she took a few laps. Then she would go repeat her rounds (thankfully, she left the carpet alone after the first bit). I was pacing behind her, cleaning up after her, desperately waiting for the slowest two hours of my life to pass so I could get her to the vet. I would have taken her, right that moment, to the emergency vet, but the kids were still sleeping, and needed to sleep.

Finally, she passed a stone, large enough to see when I went to clean up a puddle. After that, the blood faded and faded and faded a little more. Then she ate some and drank some and curled up to rest. I started breathing again.

If you don't know, Madame McFluff was around with my Meezer boys, Piddles the Cat and Lumpy. They're both gone ahead now, and sometimes, when Madame is strutting through the house, I see the little tricks they taught her in the early years. Lumpy taught her to fetch. And to break up fights between other cats. Piddles the Cat taught her the best place to sleep on the bed (I used to find them curled together, close enough to warm my feet, far enough to keep from getting thrown from the bed when I rolled over). He also taught her how to soak up tears in her fur. And she saved his life after Lumpy left us so suddenly. Without Madame, Piddles the Cat would have followed his brother, his best friend, his constant companion.

Madame carries a lot of weight for so tiny a cat.

At the vet, she was taken back to have a large series of tests run. When they carried her out of the room, Tyrannosaurus began to cry and wail: Madame! Bring back Madame! Want my Madame!

I laughed, because it was funny, and I cried, because I felt the same way. Please bring back Madame. I can't lose her yet! She's only 8 years old, and she's my baby, too!

She was so dehydrated, and so very, very sick, I had to leave her in hospital. It lasted a week.

The final verdict was that she had a nasty cystitis flare up, and that aggravated what was hiding beneath: Feline Diabetes Mellitus. She was on the border of diabetic ketone acidosis, and her prognosis was unknown.

She survived. And the vet and I had a bit of an argument about what type of insulin to start her on, and how to best treat her. Because, of course, the first thing I did on diagnosis was hit the 'net.

I am so, so lucky I did, too. I found this site and its message boards, with wonderful, kind, sympathetic people, willing to bend over backwards to help me, to help Madame. They saved her life. Literally.

Today, she's poofy, sassy, sweet and high energy. It's like she's three again! What's even more exciting, she's down to incredibly small doses of insulin, and I have high hopes she'll be weaned all the way off of it very soon (antijinx).

It's like some kind of giant miracle that I've done nothing to deserve, making up for all the horrors Madame has survived which she has done less than nothing to deserve. I have my furbaby. And I'll have her for a long time to come :)

And now for the downer news: Less than a week after Madame had come home, just as her treatment was getting under way, the Kitchen Cat took a major turn for the worse. She couldn't walk well one evening after I had made a trip to the store. She had gone blind. She just seemed so very, very tired.

The next morning, she could barely walk at all. She would take a few steps, then sit down to rest. She didn't want to eat. She took a small tonguefull of water. And then she laid back down under her chair and let each of us humans, including Tyrannosaurus, pet her. She purred for all of us. She nosed our hands gently, purring and nuzzling.

And that, more than her condition, told me it was the end. She has never, never willingly let the kids pet her. She would occasionally accept a small pat from pesimst, and she would often get in my lap when we were up alone in the wee hours. But this time, she accepted all the love we were offering, and then asked for more. We spent a long time telling her goodbye that morning.

After the big kids left for school (Van called across his shoulder as he ran out the door "Tell KC I love her"), I made the call to the vet and prepared to take her in.

Kitchen Cat didn't freak out in the car. She didn't say much to the vet. At the end, she leaned her head against my hand, let me stroke her soft belly that I had never before touched. She kept her nose against my skin, since she couldn't see me, and I whispered in her ear all the messages I wished I could send to those who have gone before. It seemed she left before they gave the injections. One minute she was in my arms, letting me comfort and love her the way I had always wanted to. The next moment, she was in the arms of her beloved first mother, who had been taken away from her so cruelly by Alzheimer's.

I can bear it. I am, of course, very sad. I miss her. I miss having the table and kitchen chairs growl at me. I miss making her growl while she was drinking, so she made that sound like a waterlogged motorboat. I miss our quiet moments when her unbelievably loud purr was the only sound in the house.

But I can bear it. Because she's back with her person now. They're together, and neither one is old, or sick, or tired, anymore.

It's been a long three months. I'm sorry I haven't kept up posting. I did well for awhile, and then it got overwhelmed by other things.

I'll try to be better. I'll try to have more laughs and fewer tears next time I post. But for now, not all tears are evil things, and some are from triumphs worth sharing.