...And today is one of them for sure.
To understand me, you have to understand that I am an animal lover. So much so that I decided that I would need to marry a veterinarian or a vet tech, because they are the only people who love animals as much and would understand my relationship with my furbabies. Amazingly, a vet tech found me, swept me off my feet, married me (twice) and is now in school to become a DVM. (I'm so proud of my Brain!) Ok, back on topic...My animals are not my children, but they are part of my family and are my furbabies. I love them with all my heart. Bessie and Tessa are mini rat terriers. Bessie is my trouble maker and she's tried to commit suicide several times. She has eaten a fallen medication and ended up in emergency seizing for hours. Her case was so interesting and difficult my roommate used it as a presentation for vet school. She has also jumped off a cliff at the beach, eaten most of a bag of dog food (twice) to the point where she had to hunch over to accommodate her stomach, vomited blood and turned blue after a routine dental which ended in a plasma transfusion and survived an attack by a German Shephard...just to name the memorable times. Her littermate Tessa has food intolerance and irritable bowel. I know this for sure because she's had an ultrasound, a colonoscopy and an endoscopy with biopsies. She's on two meds twice daily and a special diet. She also has a slew of "as needed" meds. Sometimes when she doesn't eat I have to hand feed her kibble by kibble. Boris and Vashti are our older cats and they tend to vomit up hair-balls, but what cat doesn't? Our new addition Beta had two eye surgeries to try and save her eye, and today a third surgery to remove her eye. Watson is our BIG dog and he's 80 pounds of gentile, lazy, foo-foo, loving. While I was in nursing school my roommate and I fostered kittens and found them homes at any expense. I even bought everything a kitten needs and left one in my parent's house when they called and said they were on their way home from the airport.
All this back story brings us to today and last night. Last night my friend calls and asks me to take four one day old kittens overnight and during Friday until around 6:00 p.m. I was off and agreed since it was only one night and one day. They needed to get the kittens out of the humane society because the policy is to euthanize all kittens and puppies if surrendered to them. Her colleague was going to get in trouble for taking them, but they wanted to save them. She brought these little kittens over that were so new that their umbilical cords were still attached. I stayed up the whole night trying to get them to feed, keeping them warm, and toileting them. I had two hours of sleep before having to drop off Beta for her surgery. When I returned to feed them, the strongest one from last night was now limp and cold. I warmed her up, tried to get some glucose into her, and stimulate her. I repeated this frequently for hours until she died. The other three were strong and feeding well. Around 12:30 p.m. my friend calls me and tells me that her employers are threatening to charge her colleague with theft if the kittens aren't returned by 5:00 p.m. I had to hand the kittens back over knowing they were going to be euthanized. We were stuck our backs up against a wall. If I kept the kittens this woman would be charged with theft and she could loose her license. If I gave them up my friend would probably be fired along with her colleague (she's quitting anyway) but more importantly these kittens will die.
So, on top of all my amped up hormones from this IVF cycle, and being sleep deprived, I'm upset about this kitten situation. I guess this is what I get...no good dead goes unpunished...
Today a red-eyed Pinky.
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