Thanks to all of you who left comments and have sent notes and messages to me about Oistrakh’s passing. It means so much to me to hear from you.

Things are getting easier, of course, but I am still full of sadness, and so many other emotions. Guilt, of course, guilt that I didn’t realize she was sick until it was too late, guilt that I didn’t give her enough attention the past few months because the other animals were having so many issues. But then sometimes I’m happy, thinking about funny things she would do, or relieved that she isn’t in pain anymore, and then guilt that I’m relieved that she isn’t hissing at Chloe anymore…it’s been a hard week. But things are getting a bit easier.

Chloe, the only cat now, is having a lot of issues. She’s been peeing inappropriately for nearly a year now, and we’d hoped that when she got diagnosed with diabetes and started getting shots that it would get better. We mostly have managed to get her to pee on puppy pads or occasionally in the litter box, but two nights ago we realized she had peed on the bed. And then Mackenzie escaped from the yard, over the fence I guess, two nights in the past week. She’s been on steroids for an issue and been really hungry, so we aren’t sure, did she go off looking for food, or did she go off looking for Oistrakh?

And we’re trying to decide what to do with Chloe, she is having all kinds of skin problems that we’d initially thought were overgrooming but instead seems to be fragile skin, and the vet wants to test her for Cushing’s Disease, but we’re just not sure if that matters, or if we just need to resign ourselves that she will be in the cone the rest of her life and try to make the best of it and give her the best life we can, and stop taking her to the vet. Or do the tests, and then we’d know, whether or not we pursued further treatment. Pet decisions are hard, and I’m glad, in a way, that the decisions for Fatness were easier. I chose to give her fluids on an IV, and while maybe it wasn’t the best that she had to spend two days at the vet, the chances were good that it could have extended her life. It didn’t, but I don’t look back and wonder what if. And then I took her home, and then we knew things weren’t good. For Chloe, she is in good spirits, though the cone makes things hard, and she’s got staples on her side from the latest wound, and I just don’t know. She’s Louie’s cat though, so luckily for me he has to make the important decisions, and I just get to support him.

This was during the fatness’s last night. She was curled up on her pillow and Chloe came to sit with her. (I’d put that ponytail there in the hopes that she’d be interested, because she had always loved them.)

This was from yesterday’s Timehop, which is a fun app. Things were different this time last year, it was pre-diabetes, and pre-kidney disease, and just two cats struggling to work out their issues.

This is Chloe’s good side. Her old cone was really beat up so we bought her a new one the other day.

And her bad side. You can see the staples holding her skin together as she heals from the latest wound.

I discovered there are definitely a few more pictures of Chloe on my camera roll these days. At least now there are two of us handling two pets with some issues (Mackenzie is mostly doing okay, but is having some fur loss and allergies, along with an ongoing thyroid problem which just requires a little pill twice a day…it’s no big deal, but these things add up) rather than three pets with issues. It does make life easier, which makes me feel guilty, and sad…I think, what if we’d caught Fatness’s kidney problems earlier, then what, would it have been months of subcutaneous fluids? How would we have managed? But I miss her, I miss how soft and squishy and warm she is, and I miss her the most in the mornings.

My mom sent some old pictures of Fatness—this is from when she was a few months old, maybe even just two months, and very playful. I had a cheap fishing pole toy that I recall she (or with Heifetz) destroyed. That’s my sister Carrie in the picture.

It looks like even as a kitten she didn’t really enjoy being petted. It was a trouble she had—she was very soft so everybody wanted to pet her.

And there she is, on top of kitchen cabinets in an old place of mine.

I suppose I won’t stop sharing pictures for awhile. I’d thought after my last post that that might be it for fatness pictures, but I doubt it. I’m not sorry either