The Gift of a Magi

Tags

betta fish, Christmas, pets, presents

This was the second Christmas we have spent at home, away from family. The first time was really difficult for me. This time was easier. We had done it before and we’re slowly working out our own traditions. For example, we had to have a big discussion about how Santa would deliver his presents.

As I’m sure you know, Santa doesn’t have a set technique. He tailors his deliver methods (and even delivery dates) according to the traditions of the local country and microtraditions of the family. In PH’s family, stocking stuffers were just… extras. The REAL presents, the big ones that had been requested in letters, were wrapped by Santa’s elves and put under the tree. In my family, on the other hand, everything was unwrapped, assembled, and sitting in or around the stocking.

After much discussion and some compromise, we asked Santa to wrap anything particularly asked for that was too big to fit inside the stocking. That was made easy by the fact that Owl only asked for two things this year – a crokinole board and a bow and arrow set.

So Owl got his gifts from Santa, as well as many gifts from doting relations, and it was a nice Christmas.

I wasn’t all that excited for Christmas this year, because there wasn’t much I wanted or expected. The only thing I really wanted (other than a book that was sold out) was something that PH had long vetoed – another pet.

I’m an animal lover. If I had my way we would own two dogs, the cat, a bird, a rodent of some kind, a tropical saltwater tank complete with coral, and a couple of farm animals. Unfortunately, time, money, space, and PH interfere with that.

PH is not a fan of buying pets that are going to die on you within a year or two of purchase. Nor is he a fan of taking up space in our already-cluttered 1000 square foot townhouse. I get all of that, but I haven’t had a new pet in eight years and I was itching for someone new.

So I asked for a fish for Christmas, and was told “absolutely not.” Not only does PH fail to see the charm of fish, but he didn’t think we have space, and no matter how much I pointed out that a 5 gallon fish tank would take up no more room than one of the MANY boxes of collectables he has sitting around awaiting sale, he held firm.

It got to the point that a friend of mine, who also loves animals, was starting to threaten to buy me a fish no matter what, and I worried that if she did, that PH would be mad.

But then guess what I pulled out from under the tree on Christmas morning, not from Santa but from PH himself?

A fish tank. And a heater. And a filter. And gravel. And decorations.

So on Boxing Day I dragged my family out to get a fish, and live plants. I spent nearly half an hour hanging over betta fish, trying to pick just the right one. PH preferred the blue ones, so I focused on those. I was torn between two – a pale blue one who was definitely the perkiest of the lot, and another one with a beautiful aqua glimmer that I loved. But this lovely one, whose scales had a gleam that reminded me of the Caribbean sea, spent most of his time at the bottom of his tiny cup, coming up to the surface only to breathe.

PH agreed with me that he was prettier, if more listless.

“I think he’s still healthy,” I said, scrutinizing him. “His colors are bright, and there’s no spots on him… and he DOES move around…”

“Take him then. If he’s not very active, oh well,” said PH.

So I bought him, and the live plants, and then I happily spent several hours setting up his tank on my book shelf. Then I floated his cup for a night, slowly adding more tank water to his sad little cup and measuring the pH occasionally. His tiny cup water was so full of ammonia that it was really acidic.

“Can’t you just put him in?” PH asked, “look at him, poor guy.”

The fish was showing much more animation than at the store, bonking his head on the side of the cup, trying to get to the watery paradise he could see around him. Even Perfect Husband, who doesn’t see the appeal of fish, could practically hear him yelling “LET ME OUT!”

But I was afraid to let him out. The pH of the two waters was so different, and a sudden pH change can kill a fish, even a hardy betta fish.

So I added some more tank water to his cup and by the next morning the pH was better. So I put him in the tank.

Oh, man, you never saw a fish so happy. Our previously listless fish is listless no more.

He spent the whole day zipping around like a mad thing, obviously revelling in his freedom. It was adorable.

We’ve named him Melchior, after one of the three wise men. My Christmas gift.

He was a great gift, and it was a good Christmas.

Miss Pepper

Tags

cats, death, grief, illness, kittens, loss, pets

When I was just 15, my parents surprised me with a kitten. I guess they were suffering from a combination of empty nest syndrome (I was away on a class trip to Quebec) and anticipatory loss, because our dog was dying of cancer.

I had wanted a cat for years, but my parents weren’t cat people. When I was 10, my friend’s cat had kittens and I fell in love with one of them but my parents resisted all my pleading, and he went to someone else (I recently saw a cat at my work who was a dead ringer for that kitten – I think part of me will always be looking for him). They had let me have mice, gerbils, birds, fish, and a dog, but they drew their line at cats.

So when I came home from Quebec and found this tiny ball of fluff waiting for me, it was a dream come true.

“She’s yours for the next 20 years,” my parents warned me. “When you go to university, THIS goes with you.”

“Of course!” I said reverently, fingering the wispy tail.

But it didn’t work out that way.

Dear History: Please Don’t Repeat Yourself, For The Love Of Beloved Dog

Tags

animals, bloodwork, cancer, cpl, dogs, health, limping, pancreatitis, pets, symptoms, tests, veterinarian

I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I love my dog.

I love dogs, period.

When I was little I begged my parents for a dog. First they gave me goldfish, and when I managed to kill them off thoroughly they decided our family was ready for a pet that couldn’t be forgotten about.

His name was Shadow, and I adored him.

I mauled him about constantly and he tolerated my excessive affection with great forebearance. When I was 10 I trained him to walk nicely on a leash, and I worked very hard to teach him to play dead. He eventually would topple over from a “down” position with a big long-suffering sigh.

He adored my father, and when Shadow passed away, it was one of the only times ever saw my father cry.

As a child I spent a lot of time worrying that my parents would euthanize Shadow while I was off at University. Unfortunately, when he was 8 years old he had several large fatty tumors removed.

Shortly after, he began to limp.

The vets couldn’t find a thing wrong with his feet. After a lot of medications on his paws had failed, a biopsy revealed that his liver was excreting toxins through his sweat glands in his paws, causing the discomfort.

Within a few more months he had wasted away.

He died on the same day as Princess Diana.

His loss hit me hard. I loved him deeply, and I grieved his loss in a way that I have never grieved the loss of a human being. 8 years after he died, I woke up from a bad dream about him, and when I realized that it was a dream, I burst into tears – because my dog was dead.

When I graduated university, I got a new dog. I specifically picked a sheltie who was a different colour than Shadow, so I wouldn’t feel like I was “replacing” him.

That dog healed eight years of pain in a few short weeks. I no longer cry for Shadow. I love him in memory, but memories of him no longer cause me pain.

They’re nice memories.

Beloved Dog is now 8 years old, and I don’t know where the time went. It seems like the 8 years between Shadow’s arrival in our family and his painful exit were very, very long. But Beloved Dog was a puppy mere minutes ago.

Beloved Dog has started to limp.

This, combined with a couple of other nebulous symptoms that my friend The Farm Fairy clubs under the heading of “Ain’t Doin’ Right”, led me to take him to work with me and say,

My dog is limping. I need you to tell me that he doesn’t have cancer.

I got a laugh from people, but not when the vet looked at my dog.

My boss found that he looks anemic, but his bloodwork says he’s not anemic. She found that his abdomen seems painful, but he isn’t vomiting or having any diarrhea. His blood chemistries indicate normally functioning organs.

Except for one.

The spec cpl test is specifically designed to test dogs for pancreatitis. Normally panreatitis is an insanely painful condition brought about by fatty diet and not enough exercise, and is indicated by vomiting, diarrhea, and sheer misery.

My boss suggested it because it was all she could think of to explain the discomfort in his tummy, and because if there was inflammation in his organs, it might explain why he looks so pale.

It came back indicating pancreatitis.

So I fasted him for 24 hours, fed him on white rice for three days, and kept Owl and his fistfuls of cheese well away from Beloved Dog. I retested him for pancreatitis and it came back abnormal AGAIN.

So I changed his already low-fat diet to a corn-free diet, feeding him dehydrated fish with fruits and vegetables. I added digestive enzymes to his food.

He doesn’t look old, does he?

His paws began to show sores from his constant licking and chewing.

I took him in again yesterday, and the other vet, who has a very good ear, identified a mild heart murmur. Is that new, or is it so mild than no other vet has ever spotted it before?

The other vet, who reminds me of a Hank Azaria character, also thinks Beloved Dog looks anemic. He insisted on rechecking the red blood cell count.

Normal.

We rechecked him for pancreatitis.

Abnormal.

WHAT IS GOING ON?

I’ve sent his blood to the lab to get a more detailed report. They’ll be able to tell me whether my dog’s pancreas are just a LITTLE funky or a LOT FUNKY.

I’m trying to tell myself that just because Beloved Dog is the same age, and showing some of the same symptoms, does NOT mean the Beloved Dog has cancer.

It doesn’t help that my Aunt is dying of cancer. I’m flying home on an emergency visit to see her again, because apparently she’s wasting away fast.

It doesn’t help that today is Shadow’s birthday, or would have been, if he had lived to be 24 years old.

I just need Beloved Dog to be okay.

He says he just needs me to take off this damn cone.

Feed Your Pet Vet Food, Or You Will Pay… Literally.

Tags

animal health, animal nutrition, bladder infections, cats, dogs, Feline Lower Urinary Tract Disease, FLUTD, health, nutrition, pet health, pet nutrition, pets, uroliths, veterinarian, veterinary diets

After reading about poor KellyKel’s cat on the DoCo, I feel the need to make this post.

Please feed your pet veterinary diets.

Especially if you own a boy cat.

There is startlingly little regulation of pet foods, and some of the ingredients in pet store and grocery store pet foods are frankly harmful to your pet. Cats especially are at risk because their health is very delicately balanced on their diet. Cats eat a very high protein diet, and this is rough on the urinary tract system. If a cat lives to be 20, one day its kidneys will wear out and that will be that.

Cat’s bladders tend to develop crystals when the pH balance of a food is even slightly off. The crystals scratch the bladder wall and bacteria begin to grow. This is called Feline Lower Urinary Tract Disease. Vets refer to it as FLUTD (“Flutey”). It can happen to dogs, too, although it is rarer. Still, I have seen it! The crystals end up getting stuck together in that mass of crystals and blood and bacteria and white blood cells and they end up making a little stone. Sometimes (particularly with neutered male cats because their urethras are narrow) that stone gets lodged in the urethra and blocks the passage of urine.

From that moment on your cat has maybe 24 hours to live. Unable to pass urine, the toxins back up in the animal’s system and begin to kill your pet. Your pet will die either from the poisons that they can’t get rid of, or their bladder will BURST inside them. It’s painful. It’s deadly. It’s COMMON.

This isn’t something that is fairly rare. It’s something that actually fairly likely. If you walked into your local vet clinic and said “do you have a blocked cat in the back?” chances are they would say “yes,” and if it’s a big clinic, chances are they will say “yes, which one are you looking for?”  You want to scare a vet clinic? Call them and say “my cat isn’t peeing”.

There are a million reasons why a cat will get crystals. Stress is a factor. Dehydration is another (it is more common in cats who are eating dry food and don’t like drinking water)… and diet is yet another.

Many diets are poorly pH balanced. Not just your cheap grocery store foods (although they are the worst offenders) but expensive pet store foods, too. Being pricey doesn’t make it good, or safe. I have seen several pets come in with crystals caused by food, and they were eating a (WET!) high-end pet store product, boasting all-natural ingredients.

Pet owners look for phrases like “all natural!” “grain free!” “No additives!” “with fibre!” “with real chicken!” and so on.

They never think to look for “with a balanced pH for your pet’s urinary tract health.”

But if you have a male neutered cat, that is exactly what you should look for, because when your cat blocks, you have a choice. A vet bill totalling nearly $1000 or more… or a dead cat. If you choose “dead cat” you still have to choose between your cat dying in extreme agony or paying for a euthanasia.

It’s a bad scene.

Why does it cost so much to unblock a cat?

First you have to sedate the cat, because sticking a catheter up a blocked urethra into a bladder that is as turgid as an over-filled balloon is hideously painful AND difficult.

Then you have to keep it sedated until waking it up is no longer a cruel thing to do.

Then you have to give it antibiotics for the infection, and blood tests to see how badly poisoned the cat is.

Then you have to keep that catheter in its urethra for several days, draining the bladder of its brown or red infected pee.

You also have to keep the cat on drugs to relax the bladder so it won’t go into excruciating spasms.

…and that’s if the case isn’t too bad.

You may have to operate to get a larger stone from inside. This is more common with dogs. Check it out (yes, this is from my OWN experience, these aren’t pics off of the web):

Yeah, that big white thing? That's a stone. IN A DOG. A female bearded collie if I remember right.

IT WAS IN A DOG'S BLADDER

Sometimes they can’t unblock it. Then they have to cut off the cat’s penis. This is not a choppy-chop operation, because you’ll screw up the urethra if you do that. It’s delicate surgery, and often one that vets don’t like to do – they’d rather call in a specialist or at least a vet who has experience with them. You basically do a sex change operation on the damn cat, so it pees like a girl. That’s REALLY frigging expensive. It’s a long operation, so there are sedation drugs and anesthetics and veterinary time (I’ve seen three vets all pending over one of these surgeries). There’s the long recovery, too.

It sucks.

So… you can feed your pet a diet from the pet store and hope for the best… or you can buy a veterinary diet because all veterinary lines are pH balanced to prevent such problems.

A veterinary diet for a healthy animal isn’t even that expensive. They have high quality ingredients (my favourite brand, Medi-Cal, is all naturally preserved, too) and research-driven formulas and they never change the recipe without warning you (which other brands do all the time).

Your pet will poop less on a veterinary diet because there aren’t any fillers (unless, of course, you buy a high fibre formula designed to make your pet poop more!) and you end up needing to feed a lot less because they are so highly concentrated. Veterinary diets often end up being CHEAPER than the cheap grocery store stuff, and that’s before the $1000 operation to save your cat.

Oh, and veterinary diets are 100% guaranteed.

Remember those pet food recalls? I know someone whose cats were eating the cheap stuff. One died, the other has permanent kidney damage. It took thousands of dollars to save it. The owner has never seen a dime from that company.

But the veterinary diets called our clinic and told us which formulas were tainted (and there weren’t many, because only a few specialty formulas had gluten in them at all). Then they told us to phone every client who bought those food in the last three months, and they would refund the money spent on food over that time frame. Then they paid to test each animal who ate those foods for signs of poisoning. Then they paid to fix the poisoned animals.

Next time you’re in your pet store, ask the clerk if your pet’s current brand of food guarantees their food that way.

Just in case.