The Deal

So, I told the internet that I was putting my dog to sleep and then I didn’t do it.  Internet, do you forgive me for lying to you?  I hope you will.  I still do need your good thoughts.

On Monday morning Scott made the dreaded phone call to our vet.  A phone call that only he could make.  I couldn’t make that call because if I had to say those words out loud it would sound exactly like this: “meep”.  And the person on the other end of the line would hang up on the mouse who keeps prank calling the office.  This is why we are perfect together, because he is my strength when I have none left.  He can do the things that I know I couldn’t do.  Sometimes I just feel like standing in the middle of the street in my pajamas and crying.  When I don’t think I can take one more beating from the universe he’s like, Of course you can, come on, put this mouth guard in and let’s get back in the ring. Together.  I’m sure I must lift him up in some way too, because he’s still here, I just can’t think of what that is right now.

Scott asked the vet to take a look at Oliver and told her he needed to schedule his euthanization.  The vet was all, “Well, would you like for your dog to live longer?”  And Scott was all, “Well of course  I want my dog to live longer.”  So,  he made arrangements for me to bring Oliver in later that afternoon. 

Now, before I talk about anything that happened at that appointment, I have to talk about something really dumb happened over the weekend.  I ran out of Oliver’s pain meds.  YES!  I let my terminally ill dog’s medicine run out and I did not re-fill it before the vet closed for the weekend.  Now, Ollie is taking a lot of meds.  I won’t bore you with the laundry list.  He happens to take this particular medicine twice a day and it happens to cost $45/oz.  Yes.  Forty-five dollars an OUNCE.  One ounce.  So we don’t exactly stock up on it at Sam’s Club.  Well, it was gone.  On Sunday afternoon I gave him the last of it which was about half of his normal dose.  Remember, Sunday morning is when he was doing bad, bad, bad and we finally decided that his time had come.  I told Scott I would get more medicine on Monday morning – just enough to get us through the few days we thought he had left.  Well Monday rolls around and, are you ready for this?  Oliver was doing better.  All morning long I was waiting for the other shoe to drop.  I was waiting for the pain to get debilitating because he had missed a dose (and a half) of his pain meds.  Instead, he wanted to play fetch.  Instead of laying on the floor like a lump, he wanted to chase Addie around the house and try to eat a banana out of her hand.  Seriously.  When I went to the vet that afternoon I told her about the lack of meds and how Oliver seemed to be feeling, because I didn’t think it was insignificant.  And neither did she.  So we scaled back to one dose of that liquid gold pain medicine. 

When Scott spoke to the vet earlier in the day she was telling him about a lymphoma treatment that they were doing at Gulf Coast Veterinary Specialists (GCVS).  You may remember them from all of my posts in January.  They treated Oliver after his stroke.  This cancer treatment is essentially one shot of chemotherapy that would shrink the lymph nodes and solve Oliver mobility issues, breathing issues and eating issues.  Of course, all temporarily.  We were wondering why she was just telling us this now  when she’s known for a month about Oliver’s Lymphoma.  Well, she had just learned about it that morning.  And I don’t even need to go into anything about how there are no coincidences.

That brings us to today.  Any if you’ve made it this far: BRAVO!  This morning, we packed up the kids and were out the door by 6:30 to see the oncologist.  I got a little teary walking into GCVS today, remembering all of those visits to hydrotherapy with Ollie riding on the stretcher, unable to walk.  And I was remembering the first time I didn’t have to call for a gurney to take him in.  Oliver walked in on his own and the staff cheered for him.  I also couldn’t help but think about how those were simpler times with Ollie. 

We met with Oliver’s oncologist (she’s lovely) and talked to her about his treatment options.  Today, we ended up getting that initial lymph node shrinking drug as well as a round of chemo.  Ollie hasn’t had any adverse reaction to them so far.  In fact, he came home hungry and wanted to play fetch.  Now, we wait to see how – or if – he responds.  We just wait.  So, are we doing chemo?   Have we committed to this treatment?  Honestly, I don’t know.  I don’t know how I feel about any of it.  We did today.  I don’t know if we’ll do it again.  I can’t think past today.  I can’t make plans for next month or even two weeks from now.  We’ll just enjoy the good days as they come and make the best of the bad ones.  But still, I’ll get to rub my dog’s belly tonight and two days ago, that wasn’t something I thought I would be able to do.  I’ll take it.

 

Teaching Moment

We wanted to prepare Addison for Oliver’s departure.  It’s wouldn’t be fair for her to walk into the house after a play date to find her best friend has disappeared.  Addie is a smart kid.  She picks up on nuances and knows something is amiss in our lives.  She came up to me yesterday while we were playing blocks on the living room floor, put her hand on my shoulder and said, “Mama sad.”  I thought that was a good opener to talk to her about why Mama is sad and what is going on with Oliver.

Things my 2-year-old does not understand:

• Death
• Euthanasia
• Cancer

Mercifully, she doesn’t understand all of those things.  I don’t want her to.  She doesn’t get that we don’t want to make this decision.  She also doesn’t understand that, if given the opportunity, we would move mountains to make it all better. 

What Addison can grasp is the concept of Oliver living somewhere else.  My goal in all of this is not to lie to my daughter, but to put things into terms that a two-year old can understand.  It’s not as easy as it sounds.  We sat down and told her that soon Oliver was not going to live with us anymore.  He was going to have to live with God in Heaven.  For once, in my life as a parent, I am glad I didn’t video tape this moment because the look on Addison’s face – the confusion, fear and disbelief that crossed over her - was one that I never want to see again.  Then she pointed to the door and said, “Oliver, car?”,  asking if he would be going for a ride somewhere.

Since God and Heaven are also concepts we haven’t yet covered in toddler teachings, we had to break it down even further.  We explained that Oliver is going to live in Heaven – up in the stars – where he will be happy and he’ll be able to chase his ball all day without getting tired.  The downside is that we won’t be able to see him anymore, but he will be up on a star looking down on us.  Anytime we miss him, we can go in the back yard and look up into the sky and wave to him on his star.  Addison was getting confused.  And a little upset.  I could tell she had questions but didn’t know how to articulate them.  I decided that was enough for the day.  Maybe I had gone too far.

Hours later as we were getting into our bedtime routine Addison pointed to the ceiling and said, “Mama, Oliver up high?  Star?”  And all I could do was tell her, ”Yes baby, Oliver will be up in the stars.  But for now, lets love him while he’s here with us.” 

 

Here We Are

A month later.  The fastest month in my recent memory.  It was a month ago that we were given Oliver’s diagnosis and, well, here we are.  Already.  We were told he’d have good days and bad.  We were told to give him medicine for his pain.  And now here we are, the bad days are outnumbering the good and the medicine is barely taking the edge off.

Oliver is not well.  We knew this.  We were told this, but now we’re seeing this.  Ollie’s lymph nodes are always swollen now, making it hard for him to eat.  He gags on his food during most meals.  It’s okay though, because I wet it down and mix it with canned food to make it easier for him to eat.  Ollie’s hind legs are very weak, undoubtedly a side effect of his stroke earlier this year.  He falls down a lot.  He slips on the tile floor.  It’s okay though, because I just pick him back up again.  I can pick him up all day.  We could go on like this for a long time.  The one thing I can’t help him do is breathe.  It’s hard for him to catch his breath and he is starting to wheeze.  I can’t breathe for him.  If I could, I would.  Believe me, if I could find a way to make this different - make this better - I would. 

So, here we are.  We’re having difficult conversations.  We’re trying to be objective, trying not to be selfish.  It’s impossible.  No matter how much I reason, no matter how many ways I look at it, I don’t ever feel like I am making the right decision.  He still wags his tail and greets me at the door when I walk in the house.  But is that enough?  Is it enough that when I pick up his ball he gets excited and wants to go outside?  He only has the energy for one or two laps around the yard.  Then we go in the house for 30 minutes of wheezing.  Is it enough to keep him here, to keep putting him through this, because of these snippets of his former life?  I don’t know that I will ever be at peace with this.  But in the end, it’s not about me at all, it’s about Oliver.  And right now Oliver is not well and he’s not going to get better.  This isn’t the flu.  There’s no pill, there’s no drug, there’s no procedure that will make him better. 

Here we are.  Today we went to the park as a family, maybe for the last time.  This week we will say goodbye to our best friend.  How do you do that when there is never enough time?

 

Friday Flotsam

• We had a rough week last week.  Addison’s fever lasted the entire week, we had to miss our friend’s birthday party and Addie went on a hunger strike agreeing to eat only popsicles and drink milk for SIX DAYS.  Oh, and she’s getting a molar.  Seven down, one to go.  We were finally able to venture out after a week-long (self-imposed) quarantine.  Which is good because if I had to watch Ratatouille (“Rat-ta-too!” Rat-ta-too!”) one more time I was going to take Addie to restaurant kitchen with real rats and let her see how that all works out in the end.

• This site has taught me two things:  1. there are truly disturbed people in this world and 2. they all shop at Wal-Mart.  I also never realized just how many people think it’s okay to leave the house wearing undergarments.  I have this blog in my google reader and I can’t stop reading it.   One More.  Wow!

• When your dog is dying manners fall by the wayside.  We don’t make Oliver work for his treats anymore.  There’s no holding it over his head until he sits or rolls over.  In fact, all he has to do is look at me with those huge brown eyes and I’m throwing him a chicken breast.  This has some negative side effects though because he’s starting to steal food right out of Addie’s hand.  He’ll just walk by her and grab the cracker, or apple slice or piece of cheese that she’s holding.  This sends Addie into hysterics because she apparently believes that he ate the last graham cracker on the face of the earth.  I used to get upset about that type of behavior from Oliver and reprimand him for it.  Now I just laugh and think, ‘Wow, I’m really going to miss you.’ 

  

• For the first time in FOREVER I actually started my Christmas shopping early.  I found some sales back in August that were too good to pass up.  The rest I’ll be doing largely online because facing a mall with a toddler in December is not my idea of a good time.  If you haven’t checked out Amazon.com’s wishlist feature lately, do.  Not only can you make multiple lists to organize everyone on your own shopping list, you can download a little button to your favorites bar that let’s you add an item from any shopping site right to your amazon wish list.  It’s amazing!  I love that it let’s me save my shopping finds without having to search through the cluster of bookmarks on my computer.

• Addison loves to read.  I read to her every day and I’ve been encouraging her to read on her own too.  This morning she grabbed a book and said, “Mama, Oliver read?” then she hopped in his bed and started reading to him. She even held up the book so he could see the pictures. No, this doesn’t break my heart at all!

 

Who’s training who?

I always go back and forth about whether or not to blog about the potty.  Mainly because I can’t imagine who would want to read about that crap (ha!).  I feel like this deserves a blog post though because, are you ready?  Addie is potty trained!  My 2 year, 2 week, 6 day old is 100% potty trained.  Potty trained as in we leave the house without a diaper.  Potty trained as in I haven’t purchased a package of diapers in over a month!  Sorry Luvs.  Potty trained as in it’s been 13 days since her last accident.  I feel like we should have one of those signs in the bathroom like they have in factories and warehouses.

We introduced the potty early.  At Addie’s 15 month appointment her  doctor said we should start thinking about the potty soon.  I was glad to hear that because we already bought a potty and had it set up in the half bath.  I tend to be a bit overzealous when it comes to shopping for new gadgets.  Can a potty be considered a gadget?

Addie was all into it for a while and then nothing.  She didn’t want to do anything on the potty, not even sit on it.  She would throw herself on the floor whining at the mere mention of the potty.  And then came the M&M’s.  I bought a bag of M&M’s thinking I would give her one as a reward if it would get her bum on the potty again.  Well, it worked and not only was she sitting on it, she was using it as intended.  I couldn’t believe that actually worked.  I laughed to myself a bit that she fell for it.  I mean, she had been fighting me for weeks and then she suddenly gives in over a piece of chocolate? 

Now there are critics who will tell you not to use candy as a reward.  There are critics who will tell you not to do just about anything.  I say, find what works for you and do it!  Sticker chart?  Elmo undies?  Special song and potty dance?  Letting them flush the toilet?

A few days after introducing the M&Ms Addie started running into the bathroom to pee a teeny tiny bit and then she would run out asking for an M&M.  Then she would run back in the bathroom and pee a teeny tiny bit more and run out asking for yet another M&M.  She was working the system and in two days she had me trained to give her candy whenever she wanted.  That’s cool.  It beats changing diapers.