Black and White, Grey and Pink

If he could, Tucker would thank everyone who has offered good wishes and support to him in his trying time right now. Instead, readers will have to settle for my expression of gratitude. Your kindness is greatly appreciated.

As for Renn, he is almost fully recovered from his surgery of more than three weeks ago. He is eating again – as much as he ever does – and is pretty much his old self. One effect that has left its mark is what I believe is a reaction to the buprenorphine. As one reader pointed out, there is a connection between the pain-killer and hair-loss. This seems to be the case with Renn, who, if you recall, lost handfuls of hair after his operation.

The loss has largely ceased. My big boy shed decently amounts prior to his hospital visit, so some of what continues may be natural. But his hair is thinner in a number of spots. A few days ago, I was stroking Renn’s back and sides and noticed how smooth his fur had become. Upon inspection, however, I noted that I could see his pink skin through the white hair on his back, and grey skin through the dark hair on his sides. What I was feeling was his skin smoothed by much less hair than normal.

I will watch to see if the affected patches re-grow their fur. In any case, simple and natural shedding does not account for this loss, and I can blame only the drug that Renn had not before received. Of course he will not receive it again.

Comfort and Discomfort

Yesterday, I was able to have a long discussion with Tucker’s veterinary about the roly poly’s condition. I will be collecting today several medicines to deal with the effects of Tucker’s renal failure, and I will start their application this afternoon. He is already receiving sub-cutaneous fluids.

I have been able to observe my boy more over the last few days, with an eye to his circumstances. He has been quite uncomfortable in the late evenings, restless, moving from one position to another; I take this as a sign of pain. This subsides into discomfort for the rest of the night, with excessive salivation in and from the mouth, and difficulty breathing, the latter, I suspect, due to an increase in mucous in the nose.

In the morning, after he is given food, Tucker is more restful, and even, I think, manages to sleep, which he hasn’t been doing during the night. Nutrition is being delivered through a syringe, by me. Tucker does have a small appetite, and will eat a few kernels of hard-food, or a small portion of soft, but he doesn’t try for long. It may be that he cannot taste it, or that the saliva in his mouth taints it. When put directly into his mouth by syringe, however, food seems a bit more enjoyable for him; he doesn’t fight against my efforts. I am sure he’s hungry and wants food; he just doesn’t like it right now. Though it may not be an effect of eating, his greater calmness after a syringe-delivered meal suggests to me that he should have food in the middle of the night, too. It can’t do him harm. So I will prepare some liquidy goodness for him before bed-time.

When he is experiencing discomfort, there is, in addition to the extra saliva, some gagging. This probably follows on the extra spit. The fact that it hasn’t brought up more than some sputum tells me that the problem isn’t in his stomach. Kidney failure can produce ulcers in the stomach, but also in the esophagus and mouth. The doctor saw, during his examination, nothing amiss in Tucker’s mouth, so a renally-induced difficulty in the esophagus may be a complication. It may, though, be no more than a build-up of saliva.

But help is on the way. Some kidney medicine will be tried today. Tucker will also receive some Cerenia to calm the stomach – though I don’t know that that is a great issue here – and has been given some Mirtazapine to increase the appetite. He is, of course, still being given his insulin (his blood-sugar numbers may be thrown off by this new issue and its medicine), and, as mentioned above, subcutaneous fluids. To keep him regular, he continues to be dosed with a mild laxative, though this is given at the end of his feeding, so there is little effort to it for either him or myself.

I and the doctor will confer further early in the coming week, and may adjust Tucker’s medicine then, though it will still be early days to see its effects. In any case, something is being done to ease his misery and, hopefully, increase the quality and length of his life.

Her Name was Josie

It took a while to set up Josie’s ashes and memorial photograph. I hope she’ll forgive the delay; those who remain here needed a bit of tending.

In fact, my Chubs’s ashes were ready within a couple of days. It’s astonishing to what one’s body is reduced after cremation. She once was a heavy girlcat. But she is not really here with me; I like to think that she is somewhere better. These are just reminders of what she had been.

The Great White was a kind of anchor in the Cosy Apartment. While the loss of Raleigh and Cammie last year, and Parker, Tungsten and Bear-Bear before them, were grievous and great, they didn’t change the feel of things the way Josie’s departure has. I feel as though I have lost a support. I don’t know why: she complained much of the time and was selfish, really. But she was my friend, and it seems as though she had always been with me. Now, she is not, and the world feels less steady.

She was my old lady, my friend. Her name was Josie, and I will remember her.

And Now, It's Tucker's Turn

Tucker had to be taken to the veterinary hospital yesterday. Monday evening, he started continually swallowing, an action punctuated by gagging. He was a little better the next morning, but I brought him to the doctor anyway. Nothing was stuck in his throat - at least nothing that could be seen; there was no apparent cause of his problem. He had not had blood exams in a couple of years, so, considering his age, I decided to have blood and urine tested. Tucker is in stage three kidney failure.

My boy may be feeling nauseous from the effects of his kidney ailments, though the swallowing and gagging have abated this morning. They have been replaced by a reluctance to eat anything but Temptation treats; this, in spite of the injection of Cerenia given yesterday afternoon. He ate a small amount of food after coming home from the hospital, but very little since then. He has been drinking much more water than of late.

Renal failure may explain his swallowing, as such a condition can make a cat feel nauseous. This morning, however, he was not swallowing repeatedly. He seemed to be suffering from an excess of saliva and, certainly, from inappetence. I will be trying to give him subcutaneous fluids tonight - his diabetes and kidney failure must be combining to give him a dreadful thirst right now - and experimenting with some new foods and combinations thereof.

My poor roly poly - who has been neither roly nor poly for some time - has suffered a great deal of physical trouble in his life, from urinary blockages to the removal of all his teeth to diabetes. Now, he has this with which to contend. He has usually maintained a cheerful demeanour through it all but, this morning, I couldn’t get him to purr. I hope to bring back that happy sound this evening.

News From Far and Near

The news isn’t startling but some of it concerns young Xanadu.

He is doing well in his new foster-home and is getting to know the other two cats there. The challenge was not so much for Xan but for the others. After all, it was their home that was being invaded. Ellie, while not taking to the newcomer as we had hoped, is interested in him, and Claude isn’t much bothered by him. As may be seen in one photograph, all three are in the same room. If Ellie and Claude didn’t want to be near Xanadu, they would leave. Ellie is on a table in the picture, but watches the younger cat.

In the meantime, there have been several new inquiries about Xanadu. He may not be in his new foster-home for long, but then, we are very careful in our selection of adopters. And in the interval, he will be happy and safe.

The other bit of news, from closer to hand, is that, thanks to Ann from Zoolatry, I have been able to make my blogs available for subscription. This applies to both I Have Three Cats and to my movie-review blog, Movie Night at the Cosy Apartment (it is in the blog-roll in the side-bar). One need only type in an email address in the blank at the top of the side-bar to receive notification of new postings. (At least I think that’s how it works; I am on the transmission end and not the reception end. In any case, it does work.) Feel free to subscribe.

My Day of Remembering III

Today is, once more, my Day of Remembering. Rather than commemorate my lost cats on the separate anniversaries of their deaths, I do so on this day, which is the day I lost Bear-Bear. And instead of recalling everything about them, I will write of one aspect of their wonderful characters that I remember, and which says something about them.

Bear-Bear was the first cat I lost. He died on February 25th, 2014. He was a long, slender fellow and loved people. One wouldn’t think that such a wiry animal would do well on laps, but he did, and he enjoyed being on them very much. The day he died, his cancer having advanced too far to keep him from pain, he struggled out of his cat-bed and walked slowly over to where I sat. He couldn’t jump anymore, so I lifted him up. Then, at the veterinary hospital, just before he died, he indicated that he wanted to be on my lap. And that’s where he was when he left me. He and I had been friends for less than a year.

Tungsten was my first cat, and the second to leave. What I recall about her at this moment was her activity. She was estimated to be about seven when she came to live with me, but she was still quite lively. She astounded me by jumping five feet straight up, when she wanted to reach the top of a cabinet from the floor. She would leap from the bed without hesitation, and liked to zoom through the nylon tunnel. She would time her run for when I walked past the tunnel so that she would shoot out the other end as I reached it. Tungsten grew old before her time, and died on March 26th, 2015. But she was young once, and vital.

Parker, my sturdy-boy, was a foster-cat, like Bear-Bear and, also like the BB and Tungsten, orange and white. I can’t mention my friend Puck without writing about how he was an outdoorsman. He loved going outside on his harness and leash. He would start purring whenever I brought it out, and scratch at the door with impatience. His joy at being outside was expressed in his words: he talked while walking along a sidewalk, sniffing the air; he liked to tell everyone that he was outside, having fun. He died on June 2nd, 2019. But If any cat would appreciate the fields of Elysium, it is Parker.

Since this day last year, I have lost three of my roommates, half of my feline population, two of them on the same day. May 15th, 2020, was a hard day for me.

Raleigh was dying, and I had scheduled his final appointment with the veterinary for that morning. Raleigh was a sweet-natured fellow. He had no animosity or hostility in him. But something else about him I remember is what he did when he was hungry, or when food was in the offing. He would scratch at the corner of wooden furniture. I thought it a very specific gesture: never on plastic, never on the face of something; wooden corners only. His big polydactyl mittens scratching away in eager anticipation will always stay with me.

Cammie had had a stroke a year before, and had gone blind. She adapted astonishingly well to her handicap and was living decently. I think she enjoyed her purry times lying on my chest, and sniffing the outside air through the window screens, and snoozing in her heated bed. But on May 14th, 2020, my princess had another stroke. There was no swift recovery from this one; for a cat, already advanced in years, a slow, painful recovery is hardly recovery at all. I said good-bye to her the next day. What I remember about Cammie was how sudden she was to end an activity. Whether it was eating or receiving pets on her fuzzy head, it would end abruptly, often with a scratchy grunt of “runh”. She enjoyed her moments, but when she was done, she was done, and there was no continuing. She was indeed my princess.

On February 17th, 2021, my Chubs, Josie, died. I have already written at length, and recently, about my old lady. What stands out when I think about her right now is how she grew increasingly deaf with time, so that whenever she saw me, it struck her as a surprise, and she would give a little jump. I tried to warn her that I was approaching or already near, but how does one warn a practically deaf cat without startling her? If I touched her, it would produce the same reaction. She could even know I was in the room and be surprised when she saw me again. It may have taken a slight toll on her, but I couldn’t help smiling at it. It was like a running gag in a tv situation comedy. Despite her departure, the Great White makes me smile.

These are the cats I have cared for and lost. They have gone on ahead and, I hope, are waiting for me. I hope too that they remember me, because I will always remember them.

Improving, Again.

This is just a short entry to let everyone know that Renn has improved a little. He ate a good amount of food last night, which was my main concern, and is drinking water. So far as I can tell, he has not deposited anything of substance in the litter-boxes for several days, but I will continue his laxative treatment indefinitely, on the same schedule as Tucker’s.

Another complication that my big boy is suffering at the moment is a cold; he has had them before but this one is worse than the previous and, for the first time, seems to be interfering with his appetite. Despite colds often negating a cat’s sense of smell, my beasts have not ceased eating when they’ve contracted a cold. (Tucker too has a cold right now, and is eating his usual, small amount.) With the cold, his constipation, the anaesthetic and pain-killer from the surgery - and the accompanying stress - it’s no wonder Renn has been feeling low. (Undine found an interesting and concerning correlation between buprenorphine and hair-loss; I thank her for bringing it to my notice.)

But hopefully, Renn is now on his way up. I am grateful for all the good wishes and thoughts directed toward my big boy by readers. The positive feelings were most appreciated.