42 Dreams of Arizona Bay

It’s hard to let go. And I’m not letting go yet.

But today, I took Stinky to the vet, and heard what I already knew. Yet I still cried.

Stinky Lessa Sweetness, who will be 17 by my best estimate in another week or so, has been drinking and peeing a lot more. When she first started her insulin, she responded really well. She was like her old self. But I’ve read of something like that being called a honeymoon. And it doesn’t last.

Stinky is old, tired, and frankly irritated at me every time I stick a needle in her back. It’s hard to get her to eat when she’s supposed to. And it’s hard fending off Merlin and Ziggy, who view her special canned catfood as their personal twice-daily treat.

She sometimes camps out by the water dish. It’s not uncommon to see both water dishes — one upstairs, one down — completely dry by the time I get up in the morning. These water dishes are replenished daily.

I started worrying about her drinking all the time. And she was starting to look sicker.

My aunt, who is a nurse for humans, told me that if she was drinking more and not eating much, it meant her dose probably needed to go up or down. But for Stinky, her dose couldn’t go down any more.

So I set an appointment for the vet, and hoped the vet would just tell me to up her dose of insulin. That I could go on and pretend that everything would be OK for a little longer.

The vet’s assistant was blunt yet kind. She’d already had to put down two other animals today.

I’d unwittingly seen one of them. A little dog cradled in the assistant’s arms, handed off to the owner. I smiled at the dog, and didn’t understand.
I heard the owner sob as she immediately left. I figured it was just bad news.

And I was still standing at the counter at this point, waiting. And saw one of those schlocky little poems I hate. Sentimental. Stupid.

“Four paws in heaven,” it said.

I read the first couple of lines and started tearing up. I tried to hide it. I tried to put my head down on the carrier, sometimes surreptitiously wipe my eyes. I thought I’d be OK. Get a grip on myself. That poem probably wasn’t any good, but I wasn’t able to stand against even trite sentiment today.

Then the woman with the dog came back in. She was cradling it in a bright colored piece of cloth. “Excuse me,” she finally has to shout out to an assistant. The assistant comes over and the woman says, but he just opened his eyes. “That’s normal. That happens sometimes as their bodies are shutting down.”

I cried some more. For that woman’s pain, and for my own . I kept thinking, some day, that’s going to be me. Some day soon. I don’t want to hold her. I do want to hold her. I want to be with her. But I hope she will go peacefully, without me being responsible for her death.

I got hold of myself again, and hoped nobody noticed. By this time, the clerk was trying to find my file, calling me Michelle and struggling to spell my last name. Wiped my face as her back was turned.

And then we’re in the exam room with the assistant. I tell her how the cat is doing, and that I needed to know if I needed to up her dose, and how I would know when it was her time. “I don’t think it’s today, but it will probably be soon,” I said, as my voice cracked.

And started crying again. But this time in full view.

“I know,” she said. “It’s really hard to let go. We had to put two animals to sleep today. It’s really hard.”
I look at her face and see she’s got control, but that it can’t be easy. It’s more like a grim, pinched determined look, so she doesn’t lose it. Now I somehow feel a little bit better about this vet clinic; this assistant has compassion and doesn’t call Stinky he, like the gruff male assistant. “It really takes a toll. You don’t know how hard it is,” she says.

And then the vet comes in. I tell her the same things and the vet asks it all depends on how much I want to spend. It’s probably time to send her to a referral center, she says. You’re looking at at least $1,000.

“I can’t afford that. She’s old. I know it’s not going to be much longer anyway…”

“Well, then, maybe it’s time to put her to sleep.”

I’m crying again, and the assistant moves to my side and pulls out a box of tissues. I eventually grab one as I blubber.

“Not yet,” I say. First of all, I’m not prepared to let her go today. I have been thinking about losing her for a couple of months now, but I’m not going to do it today. I’m a little panicky at the thought that the vet would do it right now. I can’t. “She’s not ready to go,” I say. “I need to know when I’ll know.”

The vet says well, I was just giving you the options. She says that she can up her dose, though it will be hard for me to administer it exactly because of the small dose involved. I think she’s just upping that dose enough to give me peace of mind; both of us know it won’t do any good.

The vet tells me the signs I can expect, when I know it will be time. She’ll stop eating even more. She’ll become dehydrated, which I will be able to tell by pulling up the scruff of her neck, where I normally give her injections. It should be stiff, and stand up, she says. She’s a little dehydrated now, but she’s OK.

I was just expecting another expensive vet visit. I figured they’d want to test her some more, but now I know I was in denial.

I was just charged for the office visit, for something I already knew. She doesn’t have a lot more time. And I could’ve taken the easy way out today. But I just wasn’t ready. I may never be ready.

But I know I have to do it, when the time comes.

So I went to go pay, and broke down again. The clerk asked what the doctor had said. I told her, and she said, oh, well, when the time comes, you’ll know. You wouldn’t let her suffer, she says, in the first compassionate moment I’d really seen out of her.

“Do I have to make an appointment?” I ask through sobbing.

“Well, do you want to stay with her?”

“Yes.” No thought about it. I want her to be in my arms. My dad made me hold my cat Kalamazoo as he died naturally at home. And though it hurt me so much to do at the time, I knew that I would be the last thing my beloved cat would see.

The clerk tells me yes, making an appointment would be best. And says they offer cremation services, which I jump on. “Oh, we can even do pictures too,” she said. “It’s really nice. Whatever you want.”

I’m glad that I don’t have to take her somewhere else myself. I don’t think I’ll be strong enough to do that.

And I want her to be with me always.

And for right now, she’s with me. Cranky, feeble, with a weak meow and a stiff step. She can move fast if she needs to, but mostly, she doesn’t. I watch her crawl slowly up the stairs. I sometimes take her to the water dish and see when she’s done, so she doesn’t have to jump back down.

I’m lucky we’ve been together for so long. I just hope that neither of us has to suffer too much longer.