Today was the day... you know it is coming when you have a pet, but you pretend it isn't and keep going with every day life. Just before I went into the hospital, Stanley was having a rough time of it... constantly whining and just so unhappy. I checked him for fleas, but the weather had been so cold especially for Florida I thought there was no way. I could not find any on him so I wasn't sure what was wrong. The day I got discharged from the hospital, while Lee was picking me up, poor Stan must have hit his breaking point. He chewed a good bit on his tail. Lee got him in to see Dr. Collins that afternoon. She said, with his age and other health issues the best we could do is clean it up and hope it heals... it might, but not likely. She, in a round-a-bout way, said it was about his time. We gave his tail a bit over a week and it did seem to be doing much better, but the tip was not healing and it had gotten infected, even though we kept it clean and wrapped. He was miserable. He had a cone to wear, but neither Lee nor I could stand to see him in it, he was just so uncomfortable, but at times it was the only way we could get him to leave his tail alone. On Thursday he had 3 seizures in less then 24 hours, which is a VERY bad sign. The last seizure he had it took him almost 3 hours to finally catch his breath :( For the most part, I had stopped sleeping at night for fear he would get ahold of his tail. So, I was up constantly checking on him and the tail. Between Stan's seizures, which were getting progressively worse, his breathing which just going out back to potty would wear him out and he would be completely wiped out after just a few minutes outside, and the mass on his rump which the doctor was pretty sure was cancer we talked to the doctor. We could try to amputate the tail. She said it would be a 50/50 shot that he would come out from the anesthesia which would be the same case for the biopsy for the rump bump. Lee and I talked and talked and decided over the weekend what needed to be done. Sunday evening, I was going upstairs to the office and click clack Stan (we called him that because of his toe nails on the floor) was following me) came up a few of the stair sideways and then was totally confused, he didn't know if he was going up or down and had a slight panic attack. It made me sad....When Stanley was a young 'un he would ride with that big old head out the window. It was the cutest thing, sometimes he would even put his paws on the rearview mirror (which did make me a bit nervous.) He hadn't done that in quite a while, but on our way to the vet on Monday morning he put his head out the window just for a minute to catch a cool breeze... one more time.
He is better off now... I know he is, but I miss him. It would have been selfish to keep him here with me, I have to remind myself of that.
...But...
The house is quiet... to quiet...
Stanley August 2004
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