Why Don’t You Just Break My Heart While You’re At It?

Ok – first off I just have to take a little side bar here and be extremely confused as to why Word just tried to grammar correct my title to “Why Don’t You Just Break My Heart While You Is At It?” Umm... Seriously?

So, I guess I must have pissed karma off or something because it seems like I can’t get back on top of anything. (Soooo not what she said.) My desk at work constantly looks like a bomb went off on it – there are days where I have to get through piles of documents just to be able to uncover my mouse and keyboard so that I can answer an e-mail... And my work To-Do List? Out. Of. Control.

And as if that wasn’t enough to make me pretty much completely disappear from here and not have time/energy to read and catch up on blogs I love (to where I had over 300 unread posts in my Google Reader queue at one point...), karma had to go after the furry little creatures that I love...

Sunday night my boy-cat, Fred, had a seizure. It was pretty much the most terrifying thing I have ever seen. He was perfectly fine - hanging out on the couch - and then it was like someone hit his off-switch. He was completely limp - like a stuffed animal... No response to anything and we couldn’t tell if he was even breathing. From the time that he collapsed to when he started to come back around was the longest minute of my life. He proceeded to stumble around for a while - basically pacing from one room to the next and laying down each time he reached one of his usual hangouts. And his breathing sounded terrible - I always call him a grunty-boy because he kind of grunts when he’s not purring and he snores - but this was totally different. I was out of my mind - no idea what to do or what was happening. Luckily he started to seem more and more like himself, so we decided to just keep him close for the rest of the night and I would take him to the vet in the morning.

Vet visit was horrible as they always are. The cat that normally loves everyone turns into a hissing, growling jerk when he’s being manhandled by strangers in a strange place with too many noises and weird smells... We had a full blood panel and urine test done and went back home to relax and so I could keep an eye on him. The next day I got the results and found out that my little old man has hyperthyroidism and will now need twice-daily pills for the rest of his life. Nothing pointed to what caused the seizure, but she said it could just be one of those freak things that happens once and never happens again...

Now, I know that it could have been much worse – he could have had cancer or some other horribly expensive disease, but he doesn’t. And he is 10 years old, which is the age when this type of stuff starts happening. But it sucks. Like “super-mega-ultra-I-want-to-punch-someone” kind of sucks. I hate having to admit that my pets are just tiny tragedies waiting to happen...

So he has to go back in after three weeks of meds to do a thyroid panel again to make sure they got the dosage right. I’m going to take his sister, Emily, in at the same time to get a full workup done on her since they are the same age... And that way they will both smell like the vet at the same time and I won’t have to deal with her hissing and growling at him for two days again... (Seriously – she sounded like she was out for blood any time he came near her...) Hopefully hers comes back normal...

And now I am even more stressed because there are so many things that I have to deal with from here on out – he has to have his medication every day... That means if we go out of town, I have to try to find a friend willing to go to my house twice a day (if it’s not someone he knows, he will most likely hide, so pet-sitters are not really a great option) to give him his pills. I’m not willing to board him – partly because of the expense and partly because of the whole “becoming a hissing, growling jerk” thing (see above). It’s just too much stress for him. So this leaves me unsure as to what to do when we want to take weekend camping trips... And completely at a loss of what to do to make it so we can go to my family reunion this summer... Missing a few doses for a day here or there probably won’t cause a problem, but an entire week?? I just don’t know what to do about that.

We don’t really have anyone that lives near enough to be able to be there in the morning and at night to take care of him. Ok – scratch that. We don’t have anyone that I would trust to get it done that lives near enough. I would trust my BFF, but she doesn’t live super close (about 30 mile round trip) and that’s not exactly realistic or fair to ask of someone. I definitely would NOT trust my MIL – he’d probably growl at her the first day and scare her and she would refuse to go back... What if I picked someone else and they gave the medication to the wrong cat because they don’t know my cats and my cats don’t know them? Ugh.

My brain is super over-loaded right now. I haven’t really slept – Sunday night I got NO sleep. Monday night I was dealing with Emmy hissing at him any time he tried to come to bed. Tuesday I got to bed late. Last night I kept getting woken up because Fred has decided that he absolutely has to do what I call “Freddy Hat” every time he comes to bed – he crawls onto my pillow, tangles himself in my hair, and lays with his head on mine, purring until he gets annoyed by the fact that I won’t hold completely still. SUPER gag-me adorable, but not really conducive to a good night’s sleep. I’m basically roller-coastering back and forth between sobbing wreck, zombie, and good. More so between zombie and good at this point as I’m calming myself down and realizing that it’s better to know than to not know...

Today was his first dose and as long as he keeps not finding the pill, I think he’s going to think that this whole “getting fed cheese twice a day” thing is the most awesome thing since the invention of catnip....

My little old man – he’s staring up at J, who is his favorite person in the whole world.

On a happier note... Nutrisystem Update - soooooo totally working. Down 23.5 pounds! BOO-YAH.