Snow!

We gots about a foot of snow if not more yesterday. Luckily we had power but we lost da internets all day long and it just came back up. Mommy wanted to post some pictures of the snow to show you all what a winter wonderland we have here.


Mommy says sorry about the screen being in the way. The screen door was frozen shut and she couldn't open it for the pictures.

Baby It's Cold Outside...

Chloe: Mom will you turn on the heat. It's cold in here.

Mom: The heat is on.

Chloe: No it's not. The walls didn't make the gurgly sounds so that means you haven't turned the heat on yet.

Mom: Yes I did. It's just not cold enough for the heat to kick in yet.

Chloe: But it's supposed to snow today. A LOT! That means it's cold enough for the heat.

Mom: Sweetie, it's 72 degrees in here which means that it's warm enough.

Chloe: No it's not! If it got any colder in here I'd be forced to curl up with the other kitties for warmth and you know how much I hate them.

Mom: Suck it up.

Chloe: Bah.

Phoebe Passed This Morning

She took a turn for the worst last night and we knew she wasn't going to make it through the night. So Bear and I stayed up with her the entire night until she passed early this morning. At least she isn't in any more pain and can now play with her old buddies who passed before her.

We will miss you Phoebe. You were such a special cat.

Phoebe (2000-2011)

Some Good, Some Bad

We did talk to the vet last night about Phoebe and got some good news. She hasn't developed hepatic lipidosis which in my mind is a Good Thing. However, we're still waiting to hear the results of the EPI test which probably won't be available until Tuesday. Personally I hate waiting but I guess it is all we can do for the time being. The vet did recommend some Hill's A/D to help her get eating again so we picked some of that up today. The only problem is finding Phoebe at the moment because she has managed to hide herself pretty well.

For the bad news, if the EPI test comes out negative, we won't be able to afford exploratory surgery or biopsies. The vet said it would run about $4,000 which we just don't have. The damage from the flooding in September wiped out our savings account plus we're not sure if it's worth it. If they do find cancer, the chemo treatments would run about $5,000 and we just don't have that kind of money. At least the vet understood this and didn't make us feel guilty for not going with the surgery. All we can do is try what we can with what we have and hopefully it'll be something as simple as the EPI which we can treat. I'll keep you all posted with news as we get it.

OK...

...so Phoebe may not have cancer. It's been a roller coaster day so please bear with me.

After I read some of the comments from the last post I realized that a second opinion was a good idea. After talking things over with Bear we decided to go to the Oradell Animal Hospital. It's a good distance away from us but it is a top of the notch facility and they have specialists who could examine Phoebe and give us a diagnosis of something other than "it might be lymphoma."

So anyways, this evening we went to Oradell and saw an internist. She did another ultrasound. Guess what? She did not find a mass in Phoebe's intestine! There were a couple of things a bit suspicious in the ultrasound but none of them screamed "cancer." The internist thinks it might be something called Exocrine Pancreatic Insufficiency (EPI). This is easily treated with supplements. We'll know more tomorrow when the blood work comes in. If it's not that then we'll have to discuss other options like biopsies to see if it is cancer. I'm hoping it is as something as simple as EPI.

Phoebe Has Lymphoma

We got some sad news today from the vet. After doing some tests, the vet confirmed that Phoebe most likely has lymphoma and that is what has been causing her health issues over the past few months. As you can guess, we are distraught over this and are trying to make Phoebe as comfortable as possible. She still has the leaky diarrhea so we're giving her meds for that and we're also giving her predisone to help ease some of the symptoms of the lymphoma. Unfortunately, it's just a matter of time. She has a large tumor in her intestine and we honestly don't know how much longer she'll be with us. From what I gather, lymphoma is not a very forgiving cancer.

Phoebe is the first cat Bear and I got together so she holds a special place in our hearts. We went to an animal shelter about six months into our relationship because Bear wanted a cat that wasn't "my" cat but "our" cat. After searching through so many kitties, I came across Phoebe at a shelter about an hour away from us. She was six months old at the time. Nobody had adopted her because of a scar on her eye from an old ulcer which was a shame as she was the sweetest kitten I had ever met. It took three days to finally bring her home. The shelter folks were a bit leery about someone from so far away adopting one of their cats but we showed up everyday for three days to prove that we wanted this cat and we're willing to do whatever was necessary to bring her home. She has been a blessing ever since.

Phoebe is one of the most happy and affectionate cats I've ever met. She is the kind of cat that dogs are jealous of because her love knows no bounds. Everyone from the UPS man to the pizza delivery guy is greeted by her as she rubs in between their legs asking for pets. She literally loves everyone and everything. I remember when we were living in an apartment and the super came to fix the stove. Phoebe would not leave his side and kept on demanding attention from him. The poor guy was finally forced to stop what he was doing and pet her.

Phoebe has also been the "go to" cat whenever my depression acts up or we've had a bad day. Like most cats, she has a good intuition in knowing when we are down or need some "pets" of our own. She would be the first cat to be with us and would plop down on her back. All it takes is a few rubs of the precious Phoebe belly and all worries or sads slowly disappear. Once she was done with her work, she would simple curl up around us all content, purring away.

Phoebe is definitely a special cat. I just hope that she holds on as long as she can but I know that her quality of life is the most important. I just never thought I would have to make this decision so soon in her life as she is only eleven years old.

I'm Sick Again

This morning I woke up Mommy and Daddy with some really bad poopies. Well, I wouldn't describe them as poopies as it was mostly water and mucus. Gross, I know. Mommy called up the V-E-T to make an emergency appointment today so I got packed up in the PTU. The V-E-T is a really nice guy (Mommy calls him a "kid" as he's really young) but he was flabbergasted with what happened and how it occurred all of a sudden. He thinks it might be my toxoplasmosis acting up so he put me back on the antibiotics I hate so much. I still have the bad poopies and have had to endure two baths already today. Hopefully tomorrow will be a better day.

We Did It Again...

...we missed yet another important day on the cat blogosphere. Fighting cancer is a big thing to our whole entire family. Our mommy's parents both survived skin cancer and our great aunt Marion survived breast cancer not just once but twice! We've also lost some dear dear friends of ours: Ayla, the grumpy old girl whose life was cut short by squamous cell carcinoma, and Bomber, who passed away at the young age of 11 from intestinal cancer. Mommy is upset that she lost the photos of Bomber when her last hard drive crashed but she did find a beautiful picture of Ayla when she was just a youngin' over on her blog:

Ayla the Grump
(1990-2007)

P.S. We really can't blame the humans for missing this day because they've been so busy with the repairs to the living room. On Saturday, a nice guy from the Small Business Administration stopped by to do an estimate for a disaster loan. Mommy and Daddy cannot afford all the repairs that will be needed so a loan will help out a lot. We found out that there is a crack in the concrete slab that our house sits on and that was probably where all of the water came in. That is fixable but will be really expensive. Plus a huge chunk of the drywall needs to come out as well. We're hoping the loan will be able to cover all of the stuff that needs fixing.