(no subject)

[alonewiththemoon]

Walking through the snow over the past few days, with the extra leg strength and effort it takes just to stay upright and going in the direction you want to go, has made me realize why it was so much easier to keep weight off in Montreal, even though one is surrounded by more delicious food there.  Between the cold and the snow, you simply burn far more calories living life in the winter in Montreal.  And that's not even taking shovelling into account.

Last night the last CT2, the bus I count on to get me to dance class, never came.  I waited for about 40 minutes at the bus stop on Comm Ave at the BU Bridge, which is really not at all a warm place to be standing.  When the CT2 was 15 minutes late, I decided to take the 47 to Central and then walk to Inman, but then of course no 47s came.  At that point I was in stupid stubborn cold mode and even though I was qutie late for class already I wasn't going to give up, because I had the feeling that if I had given up, I would have burst into tears on the spot, and then my face would have frozen solid and fallen off, and that would have been no good.  A 47 finally came and took me to Central, and I took a cab to my dance class.  I only missed a little less than half the class, and my feet were almost thawed by the end of it.  Three point turns are interesting when you can't feel your toes.  This can't have done my lurking illness much good.

Things are not great for Pan right now.  He is showing signs of nausea and pain.  The "good" news would be that he has an ulcer, and we are starting ulcer medications today.  The bad news would be that his lymphoma has spread to his stomach and/or intestine and is eating a hole through the affected lining, which would result in acute sepsis.  I think I will schedule an ultrasound for next week.  If it is an ulcer, then we will see improvement by then and I can cancel the ultrasound.  If we don't see any improvement, we'll do the ultrasound and see what we can see.  If it is the lymphoma, then I think we will have to say goodbye before Pan has to suffer too much.  Lymphoma in the guts is extremely painful.  Even Joey Ramone said so.

This is very hard to think about.  How do you decide when it's right to take away what quality time might be left so that the later pain will not be all that there is at the end of his life?  Or I guess it's not the decision itself, since I objectively know what the right thing to do is.  It's the living with the decision afterwards.  My heart still fractures every time I remember Amelia looking up at me as she left.

Pan was very cute on Monday.  I put him up on the dining room table, ordinarily out-of-bounds for weasels, and he was very excited to explore all the strange things up there.  He also declared his love for tea.  He sniffed at my cup of tea, and I expected him to disregard it as not food.  To my surprise, he started lapping it up!  It was just plain Assam tea, no milk or sugar or anything.  I took the tea away from him and he did his little "I want that!" dance on his tippytoes.  I didn't want to let him have more since he's having stomach issues, but it was good to see him engaged and interested in stuff.

Comments

[kambriel.livejournal.com]

This could be completely ignorant of me, but sometimes intuition is very strong, and if Pan was wanting tea, maybe it would be a good thing for him? There could be something in there to help settle the ulcer, etc... You never know!

I know that I had some pains last night, and went straight for tea myself! Of course, that's often my mode of treatment since I have no health insurance, and Pan surely gets better medical care than me! ;)

[alonewiththemoon]

You know, there might be something to that since tea is an anti-oxidant, which would slow down the lymphoma, if there's any slowing it down at this point. We've been giving him big doses of vitamin C for that very reason. So his instinct might have been telling him that the tea was somehow helpful. I know that rabbits chew willow bark to get aspirin when they aren't feeling well, animals can figure some of these things out.

[kambriel.livejournal.com]

That's what I was thinking... If I had seen Pan doing this (as long as the tea wasn't too hot), I would have thought it was so smart and cute!

Poor Pan.

[cassel.livejournal.com]

I hope it's just an ulcer.

Re: Poor Pan.

[iterum.livejournal.com]

Ditto. :(

[silentq.livejournal.com]

I congratulate your perseverance in getting to dance class. :) I *almost* gave up when I was waiting for a bus to take me to work this week, it was miserable standing in one place and letting the wind bat at me. Walking to and from buses on Mon & Tues left me with an unfamiliar ache in my quads, I'd forgotten just how sucky it was to walk in slippery snow.
I also keep forgetting that I need to up my caloric intake when I'm working hard in cold weather, otherwise I get ragingly hungry.

*hugs* for you and Pan. My fingers are crossed for the best possible scenario.

Wow!

[dancer.livejournal.com]

That's some dedication for dance class! Only half of our students showed up for our class last night (most are drivers, but there were few places to put cars). We're lucky that our studio is always 105 degrees, so we never freeze (though, we sure sweat like mad)!

Keep us posted on Pan. Here's hoping its just something minor :) . Having dealt with my share of pets with health problems I know its tough to figure a good balance between treatment and comfort (wouldn't it be so much easier if they lived infinite healthy lives?). I know you guys will figure it out, once all of the info is available. In the meantime, give the little weasel some scritches for me.

[shnells.livejournal.com]

*squish* pan knows you love him and that's what counts. i hope he gets better.