23rd
The day the cat died
I’m not sure what to write here. Yesterday, Lex (full name Alexander van Salody), my cat, had to be euthanized. He was 13 years old. He had been struggling with health problems for a while. About two years ago, he was operated on a carcinoma, which went better than expected. He recovered well from that. Apart from the usual thyroid gland problems that happen as it grows when a cat ages, he also had problems with his heart. Last year, about the time of his birthday (he was born June 28, 1998), it turned out he had quite a lot of fluid around his lungs. It looked pretty bad, and there were talks about having him put to sleep then and there. But it was ultimately decided to give him another chance, with medication to support his heart. Perhaps he would live for a few days or weeks. He held out 8 months (and I have to emphasize he was still enjoying life and the little pleasures therein, such as eating, sleeping, and cuddling up to people).
Yesterday was to be his last day, and what a weird day it was. First I accompanied my mother to the hospital, to get a plaster splint for her thumb, which has given her some much-needed relief after a… well… botched up hand surgery a few years earlier in another hospital. That all took quite a while, and we decided to go to a museum while waiting for the X-ray and plaster appointments. It was all a bit tiring, especially since I haven’t been sleeping too well lately because of an aching elbow (I’m going to limit my PC time for a while to give it some rest).
When we got back, Lex was in pretty bad shape. He kept walking to and from the litter box, he was gasping for breath, saliva dripping from his mouth. The unsuccessful trips to the litter box were caused by the piling up of fluid, which had reached a critical, and really fatal point. He became rather apathetic, hardly reacting to external stimuli (meaning he hadn’t the strength to even listen to his name). In the end, there was only one option. I’m glad I was there in his last moments, knowing that at least he didn’t die in pain. And now the memories remain.
