We're Not Meant to Hide Under the Bed

My post for Feb. 16, "My Cat is a Phoenix," summarized yet another story of my calico Faith's triumph of her small cell lymphoma that should have claimed her life in 2022.

However, on February 20, I reached out to Dr. Beechler, who had provided end-of-life care and euthanasia to Frances and Midnight, to assess Faith. 

Dr. Beechler offered to come out the following morning, which she did.

You see, Faith was back to doing Faith things: eating, drinking, cuddling, sitting in my chair, looking out the window - except she was also spending more and more time hiding under my bed.

That behavior began around the holidays, when Faith started what I termed "sundowning" - retreating beneath my bed for a few hours starting around twilight.

But during her past week of life, she spent all of her time under the bed, except when performing the above-mentioned activities.

I was 50/50 on what to do.

And so was Dr. Beechler when she arrived that Saturday morning and assessed her. Faith was overall doing well, except she had now developed a heart murmur she didn't have the previous week.

So technically, Faith hit all the "quality of life" markers for a cat - except for hiding under the bed.

She was living life, but not living life, if that makes sense.

When I woke up that Saturday morning, even before I opened my eyes, I gave Faith a test she didn't know I'd given her.

As was her habit, Faith started off the night sleeping on her blanket on my bed.

By morning, she'd be sitting on top of my little cabinet near the bed, looking out the window, also her habit.

So that morning, I opened my eyes and looked at the cabinet. No Faith.

You guessed it. Faith was already hiding under the bed.

While people and animals need to slip into their comfort ones from time to time, we all know that true growth and the meaning of life is not found by hiding under the bed.

That repeated, persistent act from Faith told me her quality of life had lost that indefinable quality that made life quality for Faith, enough that she tried to find solace in retreat.

As we navigate through life, sometimes we need to find solace in retreat. But I believe we instinctively know that true life happens beyond our comfort zones. 

As uncomfortable life is beyond those comfort zones, life's elusive magic is really found there.

And as we and our loved ones journey through life, we, too, will need to discern when to fight, when to step back, when to stive for a cure, for palliative care, for hospice, for the afterlife.

None of these discernments come with easily defined markers and boxes to check.

Not for us. And apparently not for our pets either.

But on February 21, when I opened my eyes to Faith's empty spot at the window, I knew one thing for certain.

We didn't bring Faith back from the brink of death to hide under the bed.

And so, a few hours later, we let her go.

A Gift of Poppyseed

I have a longstanding love for poppyseed that extends deeply back into my youngest years.

Last week, someone gifted me with this poppyseed roll during Faith's last week.

Rebekah and I had bought a variety of tempting foods for Faith, and her interest in them increased as the week progressed.

Her favorite was a soup with minced chicken pieces. By Saturday morning, Faith only had one soup left. I save it, just in case she stayed with it and needed it later in the day.

Unfortunately, "staying" was not in Faith's best interests. Dr. Beechler came with tuna and chicken sticks and asked which Faith might prefer.

Faith, of course, preferred the soup. 

Fortunately, a bit of this roll still also remained on Saturday.

After Dr. Beechler left I had a slice of poppyseed roll in Faith's honor, completely a comforting culinary circle of life.

My Cat is a Phoenix

Anyone who's followed by Faith's nearly four-year cancer journey, knows this little kitty has defied the odds (and her eventual fate) more than nine lives should allow - including one dramatic turn for the better one hour before her euthansia more than two years ago.

Well, she's beat them again, at least for this moment.

Because of her longterm steriod use (anticipated to be a couple of months, not years), Faith drinks a lot but can't keep up with the fluid loss. So she was recently prescribed subcutaneous fluids twice a week at home.

Before Faith received Fluid Treatment No. 1, we had the carpet stretchers at opur house. My room and the hall had rather suddenly developed a large, long trail of  a hump that urgently needed repair due to its size, location, and hazard (large enough we kept tripping over it).

That means completely emptying my room, a many-hour task on Calkins Day, for which I took the day off work.

Well, the carpet stretchers arrived two hours early, and we were far from done. So they headed to some other jobs and came back at the end of the day. That means a panicked Faith hid somewhere all day and under my bed once they were gone.

Faith stayed there most of Saturday, and I don't think she slept much those two days.

By Saturday night, she'd lost half a pound, looked ghastly, and received her first treatment of at-home fluids.

I worked through the weekend, so she and I hung out together. She didn't eat or drink much, but she did rest her face in the water bowl.

We decided to cancel my PT for Monday, give Tiny's vaccination appointment to Faith, and do whatever we needed to do to address the issue.

That brings us to last night.

At ten o'clock, Faith suddently discovered water.

And kibbles.

And sticks of wet food (the lickable snacks, and she eats an average of ten per day as a supplement).

Well, she ate eight of them last night.

I dozed on the bed and refilled her bowl each time I heard her licking the empty bowl. Untill well past midnight, I was up and down refilling her bowl. I also gave her fresh water around four.

She's still a little dehydrated. But her veterinarian said no more subcutaneous fluids until her next scheduled one, since she's eating and drinking. She also doesn't need to be seen, hurray!

We get that Faith is on borrowed time, and her situation can change on a dime. Her four-year anniversary since diagnosis is less than two months away, and we'd be surprised if she makes that.

In the meantime...

Tiny is rescheduled for next week. I get to go to work and PT as if nothing happened. 

Faith is currently hanging out under the bed pecking and food and water.

Not bad for a Monday, right?

Three Faith-Filled Years

Three years ago today, our calico Faith was diagnosed with small cell lymphoma.

Side note: I took this photo of Faith (and the last two at the bottom) right before I posted this blog. The rest are from various times of her illness.

OK, now onto the blog!

At the time of her diagnosis, Faith was sick, weak, and recovering from nearly a weeklong hospital stay, aspiration pneumonia, the insertion of a feeding tube (which we never used, only flushed daily for several months), and rapid weight loss.

We were told she could live two years with cancer treatments if she tolerated them well. In the meantime, she went on palliative care: prednisolone, Vitamin B12, and Cerenia for nausea as needed, as well as two antibiotics.

Faith finished the antibiotics and then went back on a third when her feeding tube became infected.

As Faith recovered, we decided to forgo treatment and leave her on palliative care for several reasons.

1. All options of treatment were too expensive for us to consider - plus the cost of treating Faith for side effects. 

2. The recent illness had so traumatized Faith (who already had panic attacks during routine veterinarian check-ups) that we didn't want the rest of her life to be a cycle of chemotherapy, side effects, and trips to the vet for lots of blood draws and side effect treatments. So even if we had unlimited funds, we still would not have chosen cancer treatments.

3. Faith's quality of life was returning, and we wanted to keep it that way. We wanted good days (even if few in number) than lots of potentially miserable days.

I researched her cancer and learned a few things.

1. The range for life expectancy with treatment was one to three years.

2. The range for life expectancy with palliative care was two to three months.

3. I found one cat in the literature who lived a year on palliative care alone.

Naturally, we did not expect Faith to live through the summer.

But when she did, we did not expect Faith to see the holidays - or 2023. But she did.

We repeated these mantras in 2023, 2024, and at the beginning of 2025.

She's long lost the bloated steroid look and pounds.

Today, she's slightly 9.8 pounds.

We added Gabapentin for arthritis eighteen months ago. The Cerenia became a daily medication six months ago. Faith also gets an occasional Zofran. By upping her nausea medication, she really doesn't get dehydrated anymore.

Now she does look a little thin.

But she's also lost muscle mass because we have a corgi in the house, so she stays upstairs. It's been five months since she's ran up and down the stairs.

Faith also looks a little tired some days.

But she's now a seventeen-year-old cat with cancer. According to several cat sites. that makes Faith eight-four years old. Heck, if I were eighty-four with cancer, I'd look tired, too.

Faith's oncologist said Faith's case is unusual. They do have one cat in the practice that's lived seven years (so far) with small cell lymphoma. But he's a much younger cat, and he did have two years of chemotherapy, too.

How to celebrate?

Well, right now she's more interested in all the helicopters that have been flying overhead for the last few hours than in anything I can offer her.

What about treats?

She already gets all the treats she wants, so nothing special in that regard.

But maybe some extra hugs and pets today are in order - and gratefulness to God for three Faith-filled years.

Faith and Midnight

We never expected to wind up with two cats with cancer.

We're grateful to everyone's whose prayed, thought good thoughts, and sent out healing energy their way.

Today's blog seems the best way to update everyone, since both cats had some medical stuff these past few weeks.

Yes, they are both alive and stable. It's not that kind of update.

Midnight

Midnight came to us at four months of age. Someone had thrown Midnight away along with her siblings. Christopher discovered them, rescued them, cared for them, and found homes for all except Midnight because she was "skittish" and no one wanted her.

So I named her Midnight and picked her up from his house when she was sixteen weeks (that's the short story).

Well, Midnight was skittish because she was sick, underweight, and fighting amongst the bigger cats at Christopher's house for her food. She had ear mites and tape worms, and I didn't expect her to live.

Our veterinarian would not spay her until she was free of heartworm segments. For months, Midnight had regular deworming treatments and we regularly submitted stool samples for testing. Midnight could not be spayed until she was tapeworm-free.

Well, one night she was nine months old and the temperature was eighteen degrees below zero, Midnight dashed out of the house at one in the morning as we were leaving to deliver newspapers. We circled back several times, calling out, "Midnight" all around the yard in the middle of the night.

Around four in the morning, Midnight crawled out from under the deck with three cats and she was not cold at all. I'm sure you know where this story is going.

Ron wouldn't hear of breaking up the family. He named the kittens Faith, Hope, and Charity, and we now had five cats instead of just our rescue cat Frances.

Charity used all all nine lives in three years.

Hope died in July two days before my birthday.

Fast forward to the last couple of years: Midnight's had three surgeries in two years to remove aggressive spindle cell sarcoma tumors from her back. Each time, they've regrown more quickly than the last. She'd barely recovered from the last surgery when the growths reappeared. They grow larger every day. I now call them "Tina Tumors."

The insidiousness of spindle cell sarcomas is that the part you see is not the evil part. These sarcomas finger out and and out, typically with the lungs as their destination.

After consulting with Midnight's primary, oncologist, and surgeon, we learned that, even at eighteen, Midnight is a great candidate for additional surgery. All her bloodwork is perfect. She does have a grade one heart murmur that isn't always detectable. The heart murmur is not a barrier to more surgery.

However.

The next surgery would need extremely wide margins with the goal of removing all the tumors, going into muscle and part of her spine. She would need radiation five days a week and spend most of her days for eight weeks waiting in a cage for those treatments.

None of this will cure her, although it may buy her time. But what kind of time?

Midnight is terrified of all of it and she was shaking hard when Timothy had to leave her for her CT scan.

Oh, and she also has feline gastrointestinal eosinophilic sclerosing fibroplasia with two lymph nodes involvements.

Midnight can't decide for herself, so we decided for her.

We decided no more surgery for Midnight unless one of her tumors rupture or become necrotic. The surgeon said he could still remove the affected section should it happen as a palliative care option.

The heartbreaking part is that Midnight, at eighteen and dealing with all of this, is still Midnight in personality and activity level. And she may still be her regular Midnight self when it comes time for euthanasia if the reason for euthanasia is this cancer.

The good news is that these tumors have not traveled to her lungs so far. They do seem located despite their rapid growths. Both Midnight's primary and her surgeon feel confident she may die from something else.

So Midnight has joined her daughter Faith in palliative care.

Faith

Faith, as you know, was diagnosed with small cell lymphoma in early April 2022. After much soul searching and multiple opinions, we chose palliative care (for many reasons), which her oncologist said would buy her two to three months.

Chemotherapy treatment, if Faith responded to it, could have theoretically bought her two to three years. 

Well, Faith has lived two and half on palliative alone. At the time of this writing, she is sitting next to me on my desk chair, chin on my arm, and meowing at me when I look at her.

But.

Faith is slowly losing weight.

She needs her anti-nausea medicine daily now - and has Zofran as a backup should she vomit or start eating and drinking less again. Fortunately, we haven't needed it yet.

She was treated for dehydration again a couple of weeks ago.

She is hiding more.

And she looks like an older cat.

Well, Faith is now an older cat.

Faith is a sixteen-year-old cat with cancer.

Some days, she just looks tired, like a clock that's winding down.

She does not look tired now. In this moment, she's now standing on the arm of my chair, nuzzling me for attention.

She tends to look down or away from the camera when I point it at her. Just six months ago, she was such a ham for the camera.

As sad as we'll be when the time to say goodbye arrives, we are so thankful.

We could have lost Midnight all those years ago when she was just a sick little kitten.

We could have only gotten two or three months with Faith after her diagnosis.

And we also almost euthanized Faith eleven months ago. We never dreamed she'd still be with us.

Last November she'd stopped eating and drinking. She was assessed by her primary and a doctor who euthanizes in the home. No one found a reason for Faith's decline. Her bloodwork was good. Her heart and lungs were normal. She had no palpable masses.

So Faith received a modified care plan and had two days to respond. Otherwise, humane euthanasia on the third day was recommended. Daniel was out of town for business for a couple of weeks at the time, and we did a "goodbye" video visit with him, since he and Faith are close.

One hour before Faith's scheduled euthanasia, she jumped off the bed and ran to her food bowl. I took a video and sent it to the doctor. She canceled the euthanasia.

Then we scheduled another euthanasia appointment for two days later, a Saturday, with her primary, just in case. If Faith declined again, we didn't want to drive her an hour away, with her suffering, just to end it all.

We canceled that one, too.

Later that Saturday, Faith left the ugliest, largest hair ball by her food ball I ever saw. That likely caused a blockage that could have killed her. Seriously, this thing was as wide as a sausage and half as long, with long spiky hair sticking out of it.

YUCK!

So now our daily routine looks like we're running an animal hospital, with medication rounds twice a day for both cats and regular weigh-ins. Midnight is taking two, Faith is taking three, and both have additional "as needed" medications, too.

So that's the "tail end" of our update. 

We are thankful.

We are grateful.

We are in awe.

Thank you for taking this journey with us. 

Happy Monday!

The Cat on the Back of the Desk Chair

Timothy snapped this photo one day of Faith and me one night when he popped up to my room while I was still working.

It's typical Faith and me, since Faith has shared my desk chair since she was a kitten.

Sometimes she sits behind me, which is why I almost always sit perched at the end of the chair, even when I worked in an office before the COVID-19 pandemic.

In fact, during hose first few weeks in January 2014 when I became an actual Herald-News employee after being a freelancer for fifteen years felt strange without Faith sitting behind me, so I'd placed Snip there instead.

But if I leave my room for even a minute, I take any open drinks with me.

I learned my lesson years ago when I still worked in my attic office in Channahon.

One time, I ran downstairs to heat up my coffee, and then, when I returned,  my story was filled with random letters and lines and my keyboard was filled with water droplets and an ice cube.

Now if I could only train Faith to copyedit...

The Blog I Didn't Write This Morning

 Good morning!

Last week I posted "The Blogs I Didn't Finish This Week" (which you can read here, since Blogger isn't letting me link to it).

And I am now following that up with "The Blog I Didn't Write This Morning."

I finished up an extremely busy month with six straight extremely busy work days, which also followed two family emergencies and other challenges thrown into the mix.

But June is behind us, July is before us, and a new set of opportunities is laid out ahead of us, including the opportunities to finish those drafts. 

Will one of those opportunities include a jump in the lake? We shall see! (Summer is not summer top me with lakes and swimming pools).

This morning, I'm enjoying the cooler weather before the temperatures soar upward again.

I'm thankful Faith is looking alert and relaxed after a few difficult days for her.

I'm excited for BryonySeries to be part of the Billie Limacher Bicentennial Park Theatre's Independence Celebration (details are here). 

I'm grateful to The Book Market in Crest Hill for our summer display and sale (again, details are here).

And I'm so appreciative to you, dear reader, for popping into this blog this morning. Wish me luck that I'm able to finish at least one of those drafts tonight.

Let's make this day an amazing day!

Happy Monday!

The Unprepared Blog

So I've been sick this past week and slept in every day. 

I'm REALLY behind this particular morning and don't have much time to write a blog. 

However, I've missed very few days since we began this blog on August 1, 2010. So what's an unprepared writer to do?

Well, I can thank anyone who's read this blog right now for actually reading it. In this era of information overload and buried posts, I'm humbled anyone is still checking in fourteen years later. I'm truly humbled. So THANK YOU very, very much. As with my BryonySeries and other books, this blog is for you, the reader.

And I could give another "shameless plug" for WriteOn Joliet's upcoming radio play, since everyone is working very hard at delivering an entertaining performance for all those brave enough (ahem!) supportive enough to come out.

Of course, I could easily default to a cat photo, like this one of Faith, who is stressed by my coughing and refusing to look at the camera.

But, mostly, I want to wish you a beautiful day filled with every good blessing a beautiful day can bring.

And I wish that blessing for each and everyone person (and animal) that you love.

Six Cat Photos

We received the results of Faith's bloodwork yesterday, and she is, overall, doing really well, especially for a cat with cancer. A few numbers are a little off, either from the cancer or taking steroids for two years.

The lab did say she has a 95 percent chance of developing kidney failure in twenty-fourth months. We are not worried. She will be seventeen in April and was diagnosed with small cell lymphoma two years ago, which we opted to treat with palliative care only. Faith will most likely not be here in twenty-four months where kidney failure is a concern.

However, Faith gets concerned whenever I leave my room and will check up on me. I caught his photo at her eye level before she darted away (as if I didn't see her).

Here are a few photos I snapped of our cats: Faith (calico), Senna (tabby), and Midnight (black cat and Faith's mom).

All three cats are rescue cats.

Faces of Faith: Part One

Faith is six weeks away from her two-year anniversary of her diagnosis of small cell lymphoma.

Many cats with diagnosis live two to three years when treated with chemotherapy, prednisolone, and vitamin B12.

For many reasons, we opted for palliative care only, understanding we would get two to three months instead. But except for the scare in November (when we actually scheduled her at-home euthanasia only to have her pull through an hour before the veterinarian arrived), Faith has continued to do well.

Here's half a dozen photos of Faith for you to enjoy today. Hope at least one makes you smile.

Happy Thursday!

A Faith-Filled Christmas

 In early October, the health of our fifteen-year-old calico Faith started declining.

After a short, intense, and very expensive health crisis, Faith was diagnosed with small cell lymphoma in early April 2022.

We opted for palliative care instead of treatment after she stabilized and after we had consulted with experts and our finances.

But Faith has continued to do well - until October. It was strange since her bloodwork was perfect. But we adjusted to the mindset she would not be with us for Thanksgiving and Christmas this year.

Her treatment was modified. But that didn't help. So we made a decision for humane euthanasia in the home.

An hour before the veterinarian arrived, Faith responded to her new care plan, and the euthanasia was canceled.

She has continued to do well and her weight had continued to climb, 10.9 when Rebekah weighed Faith a week ago. In fact, Faith is chomping away at her food bowl as I write these words.

Faith was with us for Thanksgiving. And she was with us for Christmas, too.

For that reason, I asked Rebekah to take a photo of us by the Christmas tree last night. 

Faith hates being held, although she will tolerate it for brief moments.

You'll see a much more relaxed photo of her beneath this one.

May your own holiday season be filled with faith, whatever "holiday" and "faith" mean to you.

She's such a ham for the camera!

A Paw on the Rainbow Bridge

I've coined a saying in our family that helps us make end-of-life decisions: does so-and-so have a paw on the Rainbow Bridge?

That term is actually based on a poem and is considered a euphemism for a pet heaven.

If the animal hasn't placed a paw on the Rainbow Bridge, we should continue supporting life. But if the animal has, our job is to make the passage as smooth as possible.

Well, Faith has placed a paw on the Rainbow Bridge.

And we are guiding her gently over the bridge later this morning.

She's a great cat who has lived up to her name, especially since she lived nearly twenty times longer than doctors predicted when we chose palliative care in the spring of 2022 over chemotherapy.

Cats with small cell lymphoma live just two to three months on prednisolone alone (I actually found one in the literature that lived twelve). We received nineteen and a half months, and she amazed those veterinarians involved in her care.

So please wish her safe and peaceful journey to the other side.

And finally...

Thank you for all the good thoughts you've sent up for her more than a year and a half.

I know they made a difference in extending her life to the miracle that she was...

...a beautiful calico named Faith.

Good Thoughts for Faith

When we opted not to treat Faith's small cell lymphoma with palliative care only, we did not expect her to live another nineteen months.

But Faith has lived up to her name, living a good kitty life for sixteen months more than anyone, including her veterinarians, expected. We were told two to three months, so we are more than grateful at the time we've had with her.

She's declined over the last month, although her bloodwork a few weeks ago was perfect. And she's had a rough few days. I took these photos last night, while I can still take photos of her.

She's still doing some kitty things.

In fact, she's cleaning herself as I write this.

She still wants to cuddle, but for more often and for shorter periods.

She still head butts on command, but those are weak.

She used to pose as soon as she saw the camera. Now she looks away and needs coaxing.

Now, she can still skedaddle when the vacuum cleaner turns on.

Still, just when we got her weight stable again, she's lost half a pound in a few days.

She's not eating, drinking, or sleeping much. She's hiding under the bed a lot.

We have a call into her oncologist. And I'll also be calling the veterinarian who did Frances' at-home euthanasia for an assessment.

We're not planning any extraordinary measures. But we want her comfortable for as many days as she has left and a gentle passage over the rainbow bridge.

Please send good thoughts for Faith.

Our Cats Went "Batty" Last Night

So this advertisement appeared in our BryonySeries email (bryonyseries@gmail.com) a few days ago.

After Rebekah and I had a little giggle over the pet cat bat wings, she ordered them.

I didn't know until they arrived yesterday.

So last night, after a family movie and pizza, we tried the bat wings on our cats.

The cats weren't thrilled.

They kept hanging their heads and refused to look at the camera - no matter how much we coaxed them.

We snapped their photos anyway.

Keep scrolling for Bat Midnight, Bat Senna, and Bat Faith!

BAT MIDNIGHT

BAT SENNA

BAT FAITH

The New Desk Chair

I had just started moving bedding into the washing machine on the last Saturday morning in July, when Timothy strolled into my room with a large box and said, "This is your new desk chair."

And he proceeded to put it together.

"There's nothing wrong with my old desk chair," I protested, thinking of of the extra cost, although it was too late now. "It's comfortable and works just fine."

"No, it doesn't," Timothy said. 

Timothy said he sat in that chair the other day to update my computer and noticed all the stuffing was flat.

"You can't sit in that chair all day," he said.

"But I do. And the cats will destroy the leather."

"Rebekah ordered a chair cover," Timothy said. "It will be here tomorrow."

I took a closer look at the old desk chair. It was not quite four years old. Timothy was right. The chair was down to the wood.

I had to admit, the new chair was very attractive.

And comfortable.

Timothy pointed out the high back. "So you can rest your head when you take a break."

When I "take a break." He's hilarious.

"When you need to rest your eyes a minute," he said.

"I don't lean back in the chair. And I don't rest my eyes."

Well, I made a liar out of myself.

On Wednesday, I felt a little tired, a little gassy, a little achy, and a little "off." Twice, for less than two minutes each time, I lay my head back wondering where my pep went. Nothing screamed, "Go to the ER" to me.

I say "less than two minutes" because I was in the middle of a busy work day with a meeting that night to finish WriteOn Joliet's radio play editing. So each time I sat back up and buckled down.

However, not twelve hours later than the last mini rest, in the early hours before dawn, I weas heading off the ER for my first (and hopefully last) attack of diverticulitis.

But in those four divided minutes, I was sure glad for that new desk chair.

And on that Saturday, when the chair was ready to go, Timothy pushed it to my desk so I could work on my novel in comfort.

It really is a nice chair.

Surprisingly, the cats did leave the chair alone. The chair cover arrived the next day, as Timothy promised.

But Faith didn't need the chair. She had claimed the bubble wrap.

Have a great Monday!

We Walk With Faith (And Faith Walks With Us)

In just two weeks, it will be the one-year anniversary of Faith, my almost 15-year-old calico, suddenly becoming very will.

Over the first few weeks of 2022, we had noticed that she was spitting up more hairballs than usual and wondered if she'd lost a little weight, although her weight had inched up a little and she had a little to lose.

But the hairballs slightly concerned us. At the time, we were battling a series of family emergencies. Faith had to wait her turn on the list.

Then on day, she started vomiting repeatedly and she went to the top of the list. She wound up with fluids, special food to get her over the hump, and medication to stop the vomiting. Her bloodwork was normal.

Two days later she was in the hospital with severe dehydration, weight loss, and aspiration pneumonia. This time, she received a feeding tube, oxygen, endoscopic biopsy, and a diagnosis of small cell lymphoma.

She was one sick little kitty. As the medical bills escalated over that horrible week, we discussed all options, including humane euthanasia.

Then the miraculous occurred.

When Faith improved enough for visitors, the hospital wanted to train us to tube feed her. The training failed because Faith struggled to breathe without oxygen, especially after getting so excited to see me. She was whisked away, and we received a verbal lesson on tube feeding.

The next day, Faith had done a nearly complete turnaround.

Hospital staff said her oxygen levels improved dramatically after my visit and they were weaning her off oxygen. We went back up to the hospital and saw a very different, much more like Faith kitty.

The new plan was to wean her completely off oxygen over the next twenty-four hours and release her in a few days.

Faith actually never went back on the oxygen after my second visit and came home the very next day with two antibiotics, steroids for life, and anti-nausea medication. Vitamin B12 was added later, also for life.

We never tube-fed her either.

She was scrawny and still battling pneumonia. But we were told that if she ate and drank on her own, not to tube-feed her.

She did. So we didn't.

We did have to flush the tube every day and give one antibiotic by tube, a two-person job handled by Rebekah and me. When the tube became infected, another antibiotic was added.

And Faith kept improving.

The vet left the feeding tube in place because cats sometimes need it when they start chemotherapy. Over the next two months, we sought a couple of opinions, discussed ways to finance Faith's treatment, and debated the most humane plan for her.

In the meantime, Faith kept gaining weight and regaining her energy.

We eventually decided against chemotherapy and asked for a palliative care plan. We understood what that meant for Faith. It meant we would get two to three months with her. That's the best cats typically do on a steroids-only regime.

But Faith's health had normalized a bit. And that is what we wanted for the rest of her life, even if that life was shorter than we wanted. Faith is an extremely anxious cat when it comes to medical procedures. And we didn't want to fill what was left of her life with trauma and recovering from trauma.

However, it was Frances, our tabby, who wound up unexpectedly euthanized in August, not Faith. But we also understood Faith's time would come shortly afterward.

But it didn't.

We also understood Faith would not see the holidays.

She did.

We also understood Faith would not see 2023.

But she did.

Now Faith took a slight downturn when I flew out to North Carolina in mid-January to say goodbye to my father, who took a dramatic downturn one Tuesday morning when I was recovering from COVID. 

But with one vet trip and some extra fluids, Faith bounced back. We also learned her bloodwork was normal and that she needed to lose a pound.

Normal. Can you believe it?

Now, her ultrasound, when we schedule another one just to see the cancer progression, will not be normal. She has small small cell lymphoma and that is not going away.

But Faith, as one person commented on social media, is living up to her name.

And we hope she continues to live a good kitty life, however much life Faith has left in her journey.

Have Some Faith

In April, my very healthy senior cat Faith suddenly became deathly ill, was hospitalized and then was subsequently diagnosed with small cell lymphoma.

After lots of consultations and for plenty of reasons, we opted for palliative care only. This means, instead of treating Faith with chemotherapy, we opted to continue steroids only, understanding we might only get a couple months benefit from them.

Well, Faith is nearly eight months on the steroids and has done really well, only needing anti-nausea medicine once a week. She's even regained all of her lost weight and then some.

This past week she has vomited three times instead of once, so the fact her cancer might be heading in the other direction is on our radar.

She's still eating and running around like a kitten, so she's not in any danger yet as we can see.

But we are keeping an eye on her weight and, if the more frequent vomiting continues, will get her tummy scanned.

In the meantime, here are half a dozen recent photos of my very photogenic cat, who poses for the camera when she sees it pointed in her direction (sometimes even if she's sleeping).

Also, if you're wondering what's up with Woodstock, that's Faith's "support animal." It was a gift inside my stocking a few years back that Faith instantly claimed. She drops him all over the house (when he's not with her).