Blog Move!

I've been double-posting here and at my newer blog, A Peach Crisp from Jesus, for awhile now, as I wasn't initially sure exactly what I was going to do with that blog. Since I've ended up just posting the same content at both blogs, which seems silly, I'm going to go ahead and stop posting here. Please update your links accordingly and come on over! There's a new post up!

Kerrigan

April 1999 ~ September 28, 2011



Like Niko, Kerrigan was born in my living room one morning in April of 1999. I remember how absolutely tiny she was as a newborn; she couldn't have been any bigger than a cigarette lighter. Her two brothers, Barney and Niko, were larger than she was, and at nursing time they tended to push her around and steal all the milk. Barney, in particular, was so bad about this that at first we called him Bruno because he was such a bully. Kerrigan would cry and cry, which is how she got her name. In a nod to a line from Southpark, I said, "You cry like Nancy Kerrigan!" I've named a lot of kitties, but Kerrigan stands out as my favorite kitty name ever, and it really suited her.



She also had more nicknames than any other kitty I've had, including but not limited to Care Bear, Bunny, Bun-Bun, Fluffleupagus, Fluff Muffin, Fluff Monster, and Bunny Bear. She was such a sweet girl, and was my constant snuggle buddy at night, always nestling into my shoulder and purring all night long. She had to be touching me in some way while we slept, usually resting one paw on my shoulder or face, and often poking me in the eye periodically with her sharp, sharp claws. I still have a minor poke-wound just under my right eyebrow from a few nights before she died, and I am sad that it is almost healed up now because every time I touch it and feel the itty-bitty scab, it reminds me of her. She also had a habit of chewing on my clothes while I slept, literally eating them as if she were a goat. I had to pull the covers all the way up to my neck if I didn't want my pajamas to be eaten. I have a couple of t-shirts with holes eaten in them, and I will keep them forever.



When Kerrigan was about five years old, one night I discovered an abscess on her hind quarters and remembered that I'd broken up a fight between Bucky and Kerrigan several days prior. Apparently Bucky had bitten her on the ass and, because of her long hair, I hadn't noticed anything amiss until it abscessed. I took her to the emergency animal hospital, as it was around ten p.m. and a holiday weekend, to boot. They had to perform some minor surgery and when I picked her up a few hours later, she was wearing an E-collar to prevent her from pulling out the drain tube and sutures. I carried her around the house with me for the next two or three days, putting her in my lap when I'd sit down, and snuggling up with her in bed at night. The morning after her surgery, she woke up and immediately freaked out about the E-collar. Before I could stop her, she jumped off the bed, ran down the hallway, and threw herself down the stairs, knocking off her E-collar when she hit the front door at the bottom. I picked her up, made sure she hadn't injured herself, and put the collar back on her. The next morning, the exact same thing happened. It was like she would forget overnight that she was wearing the collar, and then get scared when she woke up with it on. It was comical and sad at the same time.

She recovered just fine from her ass bite surgery, but after that she took up residence in the bedroom and rarely left it. I was so accustomed to seeing her upon walking into the bedroom that it seems completely empty without her.



Kerrigan never fully recovered from the epidemic intestinal infection that swept through my feline population last summer, taking Amos and Niko with it. She went through several rounds of antibiotics and had to take medication to control her frequent vomiting. Last fall she was also diagnosed with a collapsed lung. We never knew what caused it and there was no way to reinflate it. She also developed asthma, which required nebulizer treatments and scared me since I knew she had only one lung. I knew that it was going to shorten her lifespan, but I hoped she'd have at least a few years left.

Last Tuesday night, I went to bed shortly after midnight and Kerrigan snuggled up with me just like she always did. She was nestled into my shoulder when, fifteen or maybe thirty minutes later, she suddenly sat up, gasping for air. I thought she was having an asthma attack and hurried to grab her blanket and get her into her carrier for a nebulizer treatment. Everything happened very quickly and, as I'd taken an Ambien before bed, it felt like a dream sequence. I noticed as I picked her up to put her in her carrier that she seemed to have vomited on the bed and she seemed to have gone limp. I did the nebulizer treatment anyway, and when I took her out of her carrier afterwards, she was dead. I know now that she was already dead when I put her in the carrier. There was foam in her mouth and what I thought was vomit on the bed had actually been her bladder emptying as she died. Apparently, her other lung had collapsed.

As I was home alone and all doped up on Ambien, I called my dad, who is a night owl and was still up at around 1:15 a.m. when I called, thank goodness. He came over and drove us to the emergency animal hospital, where we dropped Kerrigan off to be sent for cremation, and then took me home and helped me change the bed linens.



Since we lost Niko a year ago, Barney was Kerrigan's sole remaining littermate and was also her best buddy. He spent much of his time hanging out on the bed with her and usually snuggled up with us at night. He'd been snuggling with us on the bed when she died and was inconsolable after I got home from the animal hospital. He spent the rest of the night walking in circles around the bedroom, crying. Fortunately, there are plenty of other kitties in the house to keep him company, and Oliver seems to have stepped up to fill the snuggle void. I can tell Barney still misses his sister, though, and so do I.

I take comfort in the fact that she went quickly, and up until the moment she died, she was happy. She died doing what she loved most in the world -- snuggling into my shoulder while I drifted off to sleep.



Rest in peace, sweet Kerrigan. We will miss you forever. You were loved so very much.

30 Things About My Illness You May Not Know

The week of September 12-18th is Invisible Chronic Illness Awareness Week. The following is a list of questions posted by http://invisibleillnessweek.com/ to generate awareness.

1. The illness I live with is: rheumatoid arthritis, fibromyalgia, and migraines.

2. I was diagnosed with it in the year: I was officially diagnosed in February 2003.

3. But I had symptoms since: I had symptoms as early as 1995.

4. The biggest adjustment I’ve had to make is: Slowing down. I can still do most of the things I could do before, but I have to do them more carefully, and it takes me longer to do them and longer to rest and recover afterwards.

5. Most people assume: That it's not that bad, because I don't look sick or disabled most of the time. That RA is comparable to osteoarthritis ("Oh, I know how you feel. I have a little arthritis in my knee.").

6. The hardest part about mornings is: The headaches when I haven't gotten enough sleep.

7. My favorite medical TV show is: House.

8. A gadget I couldn’t live without is: My Pampered Chef jar opener.

9. The hardest part about nights is: Lying in bed awake for hours at a time despite being completely exhausted.

10. Each day I take: medication for pain, medication for insomnia, medication for asthma, medication for allergies. I go to my doctor's office every four weeks for an intravenous infusion of my RA medication.

11. Regarding alternative treatments: I have tried various vitamins and supplements and I get a massage as often as I can. I've also seen a chiropractor. Unfortunately, none of these made a dent.

12. If I had to choose between an invisible illness or visible I would choose: The point is that we don't get to choose. One thing I appreciate about having a (mostly) invisible illness is that I don't get pitying looks everywhere I go. On the other hand, it also means that people often don't understand the severity of my illness because I don't look sick or disabled.

13. Regarding working and career: I continued to work full time for six years after my diagnosis. I now work part time. It would be extremely difficult, but probably not impossible, for me to go back to full-time work. I'm very fortunate that I don't have to.

14. People would be surprised to know: How much pain I live with. How many surgeries I've had (in fact, even I've lost count, but it's either 13 or 14 now).

15. The hardest thing to accept about my new reality has been: I never had any trouble accepting it. It is not in my nature to dwell on the bad things in life or engage in self-pity. My attitude has always been more along the lines of, "All right, this is how things are now. How do I best manage it?"

16. Something I never thought I could do with my illness that I did was: As I said above, I can still do pretty much everything I could do before. I just need to figure out new ways of doing some things, and some things take longer to do, or are more painful to do. I've learned to be very resourceful.

17. The commercials about my illness: Are ridiculous. There's one for either Enbrel or Humira that says something like, "I knew rheumatoid arthritis was painful, but I didn't know it could damage my joints!" Um. That's what rheumatoid arthritis is. It's a condition in which your body's immune system attacks and destroys your joints.

18. Something I really miss doing since I was diagnosed is: I had symptoms for years before I was diagnosed, so my diagnosis date does not coincide with me giving up anything. However, something I miss being able to do, that I could do before my symptoms began, is cramming multiple activities into one day. I read my journals from when I was younger and it just amazes me how many different things I could do in one day. I was like the Energizer Bunny. Now I'm good for pretty much one thing. If I work, that's it. I can't go anywhere after work -- not out to dinner, not out for happy hour, not shopping. On my day off, if I do my grocery shopping and other errands, that's it. I can't go out to dinner or a movie or anything else that evening. I mean, I could, but I would be miserable and exhausted and it would sap my energy for a week afterwards.

19. It was really hard to have to give up: I can't think of anything I've had to give up entirely. I've just had to become more rigid in my scheduling. I stick to a set routine and make sure to schedule downtime.

ETA: I thought of something I had to give up -- wearing high heels. Since my foot surgery in 2005, in which the joints in my big toe were fused together, I can no longer physically get my feet into heels higher than 3 inches, and that's pushing it. I miss my high heels.

20. A new hobby I have taken up since my diagnosis is: N/A

21. If I could have one day of feeling normal again I would: Eh. I do feel normal. It's a different kind of normal than I felt before, but it's been my reality for over 15 years now.

22. My illness has taught me: That I am stronger than I ever knew I could be.

23. Want to know a secret? One thing people say that gets under my skin is: "But you look fine!"

24. But I love it when people: Respect my boundaries and my need to take care of myself.

25. My favorite motto, scripture, quote that gets me through tough times is: I don't really have one.

26. When someone is diagnosed I’d like to tell them: It's not the end of the world. It's scary at first, and it's not fun, but you will learn to live with it and you can still live quite well and happily.

27. Something that has surprised me about living with an illness is: The fact that we can become used to living with almost anything.

28. The nicest thing someone did for me when I wasn’t feeling well was: I can't think of one particular kindness that stands out, but people have done very kind things for me, such as giving me rides to and from doctor appointments or surgeries, giving me rides to or from work when I've been unable to drive due to migraines, bringing me soup or sending me flowers or thoughtful gifts when I've been recovering from surgery, and picking up my medication for me.

29. I’m involved with Invisible Illness Week because: Well, frankly, because I learned about it from one of my Twitter friends who retweeted someone else's blog of this list.

30. The fact that you read this list makes me feel: Like writing it wasn't a waste of time.

Conversation with a child

I stopped at PetCo on my way home from work this afternoon to buy an E-collar and some hot spot remedy for Achilles. The following conversation took place in the check-out line:

Adorable curly-haired girl of about five years old, sitting in the cart ahead of me: *points at E-collar* Why are you buying that?

Me: My dog has a sore on his tail, so he's going to have to wear this so that he can't bite it and make it worse.

Little girl: My dog doesn't need one of those.

Me: Well, that's a good thing. You don't want your dog to need one of these.

Little girl: *points at cutest Shih Tzu EVER standing next to her cart* That's my dog.

Me: That is a very cute dog!

Little girl: *points to a red spot on her arm* I got cat-scratched!

Me: Really? So did I! *holding up my arm so she can see*

Little girl: *looks impressed* My dad can kill a rat and a snake!

Me: He can? Well, I wouldn't kill a rat, but killing a snake might be a valuable skill to have.

Little girl: He can kill a wolf, too!

Little girl's mom: *laughing* Your dad has never killed a wolf. Her dad has never killed a wolf.

Little girl: But he can! Everyone needs to kill wolves!

*Her mom and I explain to her that there is no need to kill wolves because they don't bother people and are a valuable part of our ecosystem.*

Little girl: *points at her arm again* This is the first time I ever got cat-scratched!

Me: Really? I get cat-scratched a lot. I have a lot of cats.

Little girl: Well... you should... *pondering* ... you should never go near your cats.

Me: *laughing* I should never go near my cats?

Little girl: It's just too dangerous.

Me: You know, some days I might agree with you on that.

Quote of the Day

"I'd like to refocus everyone's attention away from the Kardashians and onto Doctors Without Borders or aid workers. Let's redefine scandal. Scandal is not who so-and-so is dating; scandal is the fact that 1.2 million people are still living in tents in Haiti, and cholera is rampant because the Nepalese UN soldiers dumped shit from their Porta-Potties into the river. That's a fucking scandal. If the average 15-year-old was hearing about that instead of so-and-so's plastic surgery or cheating in Hollywood, I'd feel better about our future."
~Olivia Wilde in the August 2011 issue of Marie Claire

Finally! 20 more facts about me!

I know you've been waiting with bated breath while I've been struggling to finish this 100 Facts About Me meme. 60 down, 40 to go!

41. I have a really big head. I can't wear hats unless I get them custom-made. I discovered this in high school after I made the drill team. None of the hats the team had on hand fit on my head. For the first couple of football games, I wore one perched jauntily atop my head and tied tightly down with the chin strap. My coach had to take me to get a hat specially made, which seemed to really annoy her. She asked why I didn't warn her in advance that I had an unusually large head, and I replied that I didn't know it was so large. She glared at me and asked, "Don't you have a mirror?" Classy!

42. I have watched two people die: my great aunt in a car wreck when I was ten, and my brother in the ICU when I was 29.

43. If I hear or read details about a spinal injury, I will pass out. I do not know why this is, but I will feel nauseated, the color will drain from my face, my lips will turn blue, and I will faint dead away if I don't sit down. I've never had a spinal injury, and yet they freak me out all the way.

44. I don't know how to drive a stick shift. I was so terrified of learning to drive at all that I put it off til I was 17 and would have put it off longer than that if my parents hadn't forced me to go to driver's ed when they got tired of acting as my chauffeurs.

45. I much prefer action and thriller-type movies to "chick flicks" and comedies. And I won't watch horror flicks.

46. I hate the term "meatspace" with the flaming passion of ten thousand fiery suns. Every time I read it, it makes me cringe.

47. I will kick anybody's ass in Pictionary or Taboo.

48. Having to drive to an unfamiliar place by myself gives me major anxiety. If at all possible, I will find someone to ride with me, and barring that I will cancel my plans if they're not mandatory.

49. I'm very, very bad at making small talk.

50. I cannot stand to be called "Cathy." It is not my name. Cat is fine, Catherine is fine, even Cath is fine, but not Cathy.

51. I have a freakishly good memory for most details, but I'm horrible with faces and names.

52. Before I preheat the oven, I always peek inside to make sure there's nothing in there that shouldn't be.

53. Seafood gives me the creeps. So do photos of seafood. And the smell of seafood. Blech.

54. If I find an article of clothing or pair of shoes I like, I'll return to buy multiple back-ups. I'm kind of a hoarder.

55. I will almost always turn down a spur-of-the-moment invitation. I hate to switch gears if I'm relaxing at home.

56. If you put on the movie Real Genius, I can say all of the dialog along with the characters from start to finish.

57. I love seeing my friends and family, but I also really, truly enjoy my own company and my alone time.

58. I hate being in an elevator with someone I know, but don't know very well. It feels so awkward.

59. I have never seen a Harry Potter film or read a Harry Potter book.

60. My favorite season is autumn. I love everything about it. Autumn weather makes me so, so happy. The thought that it will be autumn again in another three months is the only thing keeping me going through this brutally hot, utterly rain-free summer.

Dueling doggie cuteness

Crusoe and me on June 4th

Crusoe is adjusting well to his new home and has become very attached to my mom. My dad says that whenever my mom leaves the house, Crusoe whines and howls for a bit, then flops down by the front door and waits for her to return. Except for one incident in which he chewed through a new harness my mom had bought for him, he's been perfectly well-behaved and is just the perfect dog for my parents.

Achilles on May 29th

Achilles is officially on a diet. He had his annual exam about two and a half weeks ago. At last year's exam, he was already considered obese. He weighed 84 lbs. at the time and is supposed to weigh closer to 70. For the past year, I've been careful to measure his food and cut back on his treats, and yet he gained 6 lbs! Yes, my dog weighs 90 lbs. now, which is really dangerous for him since he has joint problems as it is. I have cut his kibble rations back to just a cup and a half per day on the vet's orders, which seems like a really tiny amount, but she says it's plenty for him. He also gets a third of a can of wet food every evening, down from half a can. For treats, he gets only banana chips and chicken jerky -- no more biscuits. Fortunately, aside from his weight he is perfectly healthy, and the vet remarked on how far he's come in his socialization. He even ran right up to her to be petted when she walked into the exam room, which is great progress for him. He used to be afraid of everyone who wasn't me. With any luck, after a few months on his diet he'll be as trim and fit as Crusoe up there.