Dani Rose

What a fun day and something it's been. Ian went to pick up Jasper yesterday and our credit card wasn't working (dunno if they rang it correctly because it works today) so rather than half on the credit card and half from our bank account. All of it came from our bank account.

Then when Ian went to the pharmacy the vet wrote the prescription on the wrong paper. Apparently the pain med is a controlled substance.

But by then the vet was closed.

So a phone call to the emergency vet to make sure they could give Jasper the medicine with only an itemized receipt.

Three dogs died while we waited for three and a half hours. I watched a lady name jewelry and chatted while she waited for them to work out a way to treat her cat that was more affordable. She gave me a cute little wire work and bead ring.

Then we were called back. I asked if the gabapentin we give him for anxiety that was prescribed to Miso for pain after his surgery could be used. Because he didn't write anything down or touch the carrier just read the receipt and we already had the pills. They didn't charge us.

I love vets. I got a brief look at Cat Middleton their office cat.

It was midnight. We set up the air mattress for me so Ian could be with Jazzy in the isolation room.

Jasper is walking around and has eaten some. I've spent all day in the isolation room with him.

I made the mistake of looking up whatbthe prognosis is if it's melanoma. It's a death sentence. But!!!! We don't know it's melanoma. It's more likely not to be. So I'm trying to focus on the good.

He's home. He's doing okay and he's not angry at us.




With the cone and without the cone:


I'm still a bit squeamish about the stitches but he still looks handsome.

Glorious beautiful rain. Hopefully this means we're Out of fire danger.

Made delicious naan but our Aldis order didn't include our cake or onions. So rather than our Indian food dinner we ate frozen taquitos.

Jasper has been stressed by getting his meds three times a day mess.

Deleted most social media because people comparing the US to nazi Germany and suggesting people hoard years of food was making me anxious.

And having a public forum where I criticized things was a potential risk if they are right.

I am a ball of stress at all times.

Happy New Years Eve. Hopefully it's a better one than the year that's leaving today.

Had blood drawn this morning. Am super tired. I'm either taking a nap or celebrating the year before I fall asleep.

Normally my tradition is to reflect on the year that was and what I hope to accomplish in the next but...I'm done talking about this year.

As for resolutions. I want to make improvements on the issues that bring me down. I want to be healthy and creative and maybe feel more hope and enthusiasm again.

About to try a pineberry for the first time.

I am so cold this morning. It's only 52 degrees out today which to most people isn't that cold but I'm Floridian. I'm cold. Drinking a nice warm espresso. Since buying a cheap cappuccino machine we haven't needed starbucks best use of forty dollars.

Two good things about the cold, my bills will be cheaper because we don't turn the heat on and I have an electric throw we call the magic blanket. When I turn it on all the cats cuddle. They know that the same rules that apply to the bed (it's a neutral zone!) apply to the magic blanket. So I get a cuddle pile on the couch of four happy spoiled felines.

I've been looking at cats for adoption. Because I don't want it to be like 2017 when Joey died when Mushi was all alone. I don't want Nori to suddenly go from being the youngest of a big household to his mother's only cat. Mushi went through a depression until by chance we found Miss Bitsy when we weren't certain we were ready for a cat. We went into to buy a new feather toy (looks like a feather boa on a bendy stick! Ours was blue, we called it cookie monsters tail!) and a rescue was having an adoption drive. Miss Bitsy clung to our hands from her cage and was so shy and apparently hadn't taken to anyone so they were planning on taking her back when she took to us. And so unable to leave her we adopted our little girl. She's either 7 or 8 now.

However I also don't know yet if I'm ready for adopting another cat. My heart still feels more raw than with any other cat death. Because Usually my cats are seniors when they die. I might let the cat distribution center decide. It brought me every cat I've ever had besides my Bambino, Nori. He's the only one I intentionally went somewhere with the express purpose of adopting a cat and the first one I've raised since he was 12 or 13 weeks old.

Starting soon Ian will be working from home most days a week which means I will no longer have as much time to myself. I suspect that my secret to matrimonial happiness will be making a come back. The leave me alone or so help me god, space. When you are in that space with the door closed it means you need alone time. Once the door is open it's back to being a free space. We used it a lot in the first years of marriage when he worked overnights and then would have almost a week off after working almost two weeks.

I keep seeing recipes for different raw vegetables. No thanks, I'm currently afraid of raw veggies after so many recalls on carrots, cucumbers and other veggies. If it can't be cooked I'm not interested.

I've been hoping to get some writing done because I want to write but no fandom has sparked the writing muse lately.

It's been forever since I blogged. Don't even remember when it was. This year has been probably the worst in my life.

So let's review it from the top:
January 1st: Fifteen minutes before new years my ginger son started screaming in pain. This is obviously not good and it seems like he can't pee. So I call the nearest emergency vet clinic to find out if it's a bring him in right now or a this can wait until your vet office open's on the 2nd of January. Get told it sounds like a urinary tract blockage and so as the new year rings in we are pulling into the emergency vet clinic with Miso. It was indeed a urinary blockage. So 5k later our son is transferred to our vet for another day and we are given some urinary tract diet and told to feed it to him exclusively because our poor boy has urinary tract crystals.

Late January Early February: Miso gets another blockage. Emergency vet tells us he had the same problem and that we should switch to a different brand of cat food for urinary tract crystals. It's the first time I hear of the PU surgery it will not be the last. Another 5k worth of expenses... Miso turns five years old.

The Hills diet does it's job for a bit and we go a few months without a blockage. Our son pees where he wants and we buy some pee resistant blankets and couch covers but at this point even though it's frustrating doing laundry constantly at least he's peeing we've paid an insane amount of money to keep him this way.

Our Dishwasher breaks we don't fix it because we know things aren't done with Miso.

We bring him in for some tests when he starts wetting the bed in his sleep. Nothing is found out of the ordinary.

May happens I turn 40. I expected to be upset at this but my cat is sick and I'm more upset about that.

Late June: Miso is hospitalized at our vet with blockage number 3. PU surgery is mentioned as something to save up for. He comes home after the now sadly routine catheter and observation treatment. He comes home husband goes to work and that afternoon at around lunchtime I call Ian because something is wrong. Our son is incredibly lethargic and not moving. He's alive but something isn't right with him. So I call the vet's office tell him what I'm seeing and he has me check a few things at home.

It's blockage number four so we are sent the links to several animal hospitals because now the PU surgery isn't something to save up for it's something to happen right now. So I call Ian back crying because our son has to go not just the ER but to the serious serious expensive ER's and my experiences with hospitals such as Blue Pearl have not had positive outcomes. Ariel was diagnosed with Poly cystic Kidney Disease at one and died two months later died. And my Joey cat went in for pancreatitis but died after having seizures from a brain tumor we didn't know about at age 17.

So he begins the commute home and I took a deep breath and called animal hospitals. We find one that does the procedure and do the long drive two hours south to them. The surgery which would essentially make him a girl kitty down below with a wider urethra than a male kitty is expected to cost 7 grand.

We scrape together that much money, barely and tell them we can't afford more than that. His kidneys have issues so it takes a few days to do the surgery and then afterwards his Buns and Creatine levels don't go downwards as much as they'd like and he's not eating afterwards and the surgeon didn't want him coming home because of his fever. So they give him two days free (hospital was lovely). Throughout this the staff fall in love with my sweetest child. Seriously, Miso was the sweetest most chill dude in the existence of this planet.

I'd love to say when we got him back on the third of July everything went well and things were okay but it wasn't that type of year. We get him back we follow the instructions on his meds, his appetite stimulant etc.
We call for more instructions because he's not eating. We give him babyfood but he barely touches it.

Fourth of July is spent tending the cat and listening to our other cats complain we won't let them near our boy and getting whatever food we can into him. We are using a syringe and giving him food because our big eater won't touch it

Fifth of July he has his post op check with our vet. a few levels are high and we're told if we can't get him to eat he'll die but his kidneys seem okay. We get a new appetite stimulant and use it.

Sixth of July: We spend day begging him to eat as he's begun to just drip the food out of his mouth. We know what's coming....

Seventh of July: We bring him into the ER because he's not doing well at all and we need to know whats going on. We tell them how much money we have which isn't much. Turns out there's yellow fluid in every part of his body. On the way there he started being unable to breathe well so he's on oxygen. They tell us there's nothing that can be done. Luckily it costs just what we had to pay. And we have him put to sleep.

So my five year old died. It's been months and I'm still crying. It doesn't help the music just switched from whiter shade of pale to I will always love you...

So Miso is dead and I'm reeling from that. A few months later we notice Jasper's eye doesn't look right. So off we go to the vet.

His eye issue isn't a big deal, his nerve is broken and it's going blind but the important problem is we did blood work and caught Kidney disease early. Jasper was found three years ago but is an old boy of unknown old boy age. We buy Kidney diet but he refuses to eat it. So we don't know how long we'll have him.

Then in another not cat related disaster our bathroom wall tiles start falling off the wall. It needs repair. We don't have money so we hang a plastic shower curtain on the wall.

December 6: Mushi vomits and I don't hear it or see it,at five oclock I'm headed to the bathroom before I call Ian and end up doing an involuntary split as I slip on cat sick. I sprain my knee and still can't walk on it. Just got some new meds after a check up yesterday that should help with that.

December 13: Mushi (14, we've had him for 13 years) and Nori (4 we've had him since he was a kitten) head to the vet. Nori is fine. A healthy black cat. Mushi is two pounds lighter (he's a chonker) and the vet doesn't like his urine consistency. Thinks he's diabetic.

December 16: Vet calls. Mushi isn't diabetic. Mushi has kidney disease. Best case is we get another two years.

I wasn't ready to acknowledge that my son is getting old especially in a year that I lost my Ginger son.

Can the universe give me a fucking break? Miso has to go back to the ER probably another blockage. Waiting for news.

My graphics card on my old computer died. I can't make pretty things or play the sims 2 until tomorrow sometime when the new card gets delivered. I can't play sims 2 on the computer I got for my birthday last year because my graphics card is too good lol. The fix for it involves messing around with files Ian's not comfortable messing with since it was an expensive rig.

I'm fighting a sinus infection and I'm whiny today.

I am so tired. On Monday Ian asked me if I'd stay up with Miso Soupy all night because Soupy has been a temperamental brat cat and Ian is a light sleeper. So even though I'd finally gotten back on a schedule to maximize the time I can spend with Ian I stayed up.

And slept much of the day away. But I'm tired. Ian's already said I can switch if it's too much for me but I don't have a schedule that requires specific times. Besides that Ian takes hours to go back to sleep if he's woken up. I don't. He drives almost an hour each way to work in Tampa traffic, thankfully avoiding downtown and I4 and I'm a housewife.

If groceries don't get shopped or things are chaotic. We order takeout or do it later. All that matters is that the cat children get fed. I'm tapping this out on my phone because I'm cold and two of my brats want cuddles. I made a stay warm nest for my little black cat with the blanket hanging off the edge he loves to burrow in things.

Miso is currently refusing to eat his prescription diet and kicked me hard in the throat while we were giving him his pill. The vet said we could feed him boiled chicken instead. They were fine eating that earlier today but now Nori and Mushi are throwing a temper tantrum because that's not their real food. I'm sorry your brother can't eat normal food right now kids and is refusing to eat the expensive food designed to eliminate urinary tract crystals.

We have spent 3k on the brat cat who is also my boy, my darling, my precious little ginger done snapped if course he doesn't want to do what he needs to.

I'll try and stay up a bit longer.

The good news is I've made many beautiful icons. At least one of my muses has come out to play.

It's 3:30 in the morning and I can't sleep. I may just stay up and make the best of it. I've been reading tutorials about icon making on my phone because my skills are a little rusty and I want to create things.

All the cats have given up on me joining them on the air mattress and have found their own sleeping spots. Maybe I'll put on some true crime or a documentary for background noise and create.

I do have to finish menu planning we're out of coffee. I know I want to make a crockpot meal and I want some sort of curry. Maybe a chicken soup... Hmm

Nori's check up went well. His vomiting isn't frequent enough for it to be investigated despite feeling like it happens all the damn time. He had a full blood panel done last time as well as a tummy exam and that was three or four months ago that found nothing. Unless it starts happening more often in a week, which I hope not it's just his annoying quirk. Apparently this time he didn't complain to our vet and actually allowed pets. Ian went because I was so deeply asleep he let me sleep.

I completely missed using my planner last week. I made a pretty layout I didn't use because Miso got sick and that killed my groove.

I responded to comments and commented on things so I'm happy that I'm being better about being social. Normally I read things say I'll respond and then I just don't.

Miso got to hang out here for a bit while we made sure he couldn't access any food that would make him worse. Our vet emphasized not even a treat. It's tough not treating him. Especially since the ridiculously expensive litter is the first time he's gone poo inside the box rather than just outside of it. We praised him and gave him extra tummy rubs. But seriously it's been four years a variety of boxes and the one time he goes it's a litter that costs thirty bucks a bag! And I can't use treats to reinforce good behavior.

He's driving us crazy trying to escape our bedroom or open the door. Last night he sang a song from 3:00 am to 4:00.

I just realized this post mentions both vomit and poo have I become one of those people that over shares about my cats? Maybe.

I meant to babble about something else but these entries are stream of consciousness and Jasper cat has started tapping on my leg.