Wednesday, May 08, 2013

Circles

A moment ago it occurred to me that had I taken Bonnie's weight loss more critically when I noticed it, I guess in February sometime, and taken her in while she was still eating well, I probably could have gotten her thyroid diagnosed and treated before it set her liver off... I have a feeling that's what actually put her into the spiral she couldn't come out of. I waited too long. But it honestly just didn't occur to me till it was too late. I think it was because in the back of my mind, she'd had cancer, and I was probably too scared to go in and hear that's why she was losing weight. Damn it, that was irresponsible, but I just was not thinking clearly about it. I'm amazed by it now.

Of course, I tell myself that yes, her cancer was back; it just wasn't the cause of the weight loss. And the reality is, even if they'd caught that at the same time, the odds are it was elsewhere if it managed to come back from the tiny tumor they caught in October. So the reality is, I might have spared her the awful weight loss of the past couple of months, only to have her body spider webbed with tumors by the summer or fall, and God only knows what kind of torture that would have been. She was an elderly cat, though I was always loathe to admit it, looking at that perfect, sweet pelt. Her body was giving out, and it would have been one thing or another.

But I'll spend the rest of my life second-guessing this.

2 comments:

Jim Grey said...

Don't. It's not worth it. I hereby grant you license not to be perfect.

When Sugar died in 2008 of AIHA, I though I had zero warning -- one day, her legs just quit working, and that was that.

But then a week after she passed I had a roll of film developed. One of the photos was of her, from about a week before she died. And she looked like hell. She had death written all over her. She needed to have been seen by a vet. And I didn't even remotely see it.

I felt terrible for a while. I had been so distracted by everything that I didn't see my dog suffering. But in time I came to know that I had done the best that I *could*. Now I can do better, and for my old girl Gracie I will.

Anonymous said...

Thank you, Jim. With a few well-chosen words and understanding, you've brought tears to my eyes and a lump to my throat.