At times like this, words don’t come easy. Thank goodness for poets. For the full poem, “The cat’s song,” go here.
Junior was euthanized at about 5:15 PM on Thursday, September 14, 2023. A clinical exam revealed that what we thought was a stubborn case of chronic rhinitis, was in fact a huge mass pushing aggressively through his nasal cavity, causing not just congestion but also swelling along his nose and pain. All options except one promised more suffering without any guarantee of relief.
My big boy was suffering big time, and the best we could do for him was help him over the Rainbow Bridge. At least he’ll be in good company with Maxine, Luisa, Mikey, Elodea, Joshua, and Smokey.
I’m going to miss … I am missing his sweet, sweet face, and his utter dependence on us. I miss how he would sit in the kitchen, an hour or so before lunch time, and wait for his midday meal. He was often underfoot in the kitchen, pushing me to scold him and even chase him out. Except he always slipped back in, his stubborness always making me give in to him.
I miss how he would join us for our meals, knowing that my husband could be counted on to slip him a bit of meat or cheese. I miss how he would lounge with us on the loveseat while we enjoyed a stay-at-home Happy Hour. I miss how fickle he was about which lap to lie on when we were watching TV, sometimes switching laps a couple of times over the course of a movie.
He entered our lives as a fully grown “neighborhood cat” around early 2009, Greg patiently earning his trust with kibbles and shelter. Fourteen years sounds like a long time, but it went by too fast.
Here’s a few of my favorite photos of Junior.
Back in the day when Junior had at least one tooth.Junior toothless and showing off his long tongue.Junior wasn’t much of a reader, but he did enjoy lying on top of magazines.A winter routine was for Junior and Maxine to lie on my husband’s lap while he drank coffee and read. This particular morning, Junior decided my husband’s chest made a good perch.Junior posing for a centerfold.Keeping my toes warm on a cool March morning.
Junior loved heat, especially from the sun, to the point of trying to lick it.
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While I considered Junior to be my “big boy,” he was partial to Greg, inclined to go into full sleep mode while straddling his leg.
I couldn’t get an appointment on Wednesday with Maxine’s regular vet. It was important to us that Dr. C examine her. Continuity of care and all that.
Maxine in a box, just a little over a year ago.
I did make an appointment for Wednesday but the vet on duty was one that neither of us really cared for. My husband got upset. Things were a little tense. I called back and asked about Thursday, knowing Dr. C would be working that day. She was and I rescheduled for 3 pm Thursday.
I was miffed, and Max had created another urinary mess in the back room. While I cleaned up, my husband administered her now daily dose of fluids. When I finished, I found the both of them lying on the bed. My husband said, “We have to make a decision.”
Talk to the paw.
I was already thinking that. What were we going to do? Find out that she was constipated again, would need another enema, another overnight stay? How often were we going to put her through that? She had flinched and complained when I picked her up that morning, a sure sign that she was probably developing gas in her stomach and colon, that she felt pain, that she was likely miserable.
I texted the veterinary hospital because I knew I couldn’t talk. Yes, they could do the euthanasia instead. We can be with her if we want.
Indeed, we wanted to be with her.
Max expressing her displeasure at going to the vet again.
Again, she laid on my lap while we watched a movie last night. She slept in my husband’s room, two platforms with wee-wee pads on both sides of the bed. Still, she peed on the rug in front of my bathroom sometime during the night. And, yes, I stepped in it this morning.
Ah, the life of a southern cat in summer.
Today, we took turns sitting or lying with her, watching her sleep or slurp her broth, or watching her watching us. Many times I wondered if we were wrong, but it was obvious her body was shutting down. No one lives through that.
Maxine-First Contact 2009
It was good to have Dr. C attend to Max and to us. I’ll be forever grateful. In the past couple of years, and especially the last few months, Dr. C had spent a lot of time with Max. We could tell that she was sad, too.
Our other kitties are now running through the house with big, anxious eyes. A new dynamic will have to emerge. It’ll be interesting to see how the pecking order is reordered. Somehow I think Raji will reign. If anyone can herd cats, it’s him.
Maxine has the strongest spirit of any cat I’ve had the pleasure to serve. Every day is a new day with her. My husband and I are at the point of saying that we need to “set a date.” But we haven’t. Well, we did briefly. It would have been tomorrow, Wednesday, December 8. Thankfully, it’s not.
Because Maxine’s kidneys have pretty much failed, and she’s become pickier about what she eats, we’ve encountered a problem that we never had with any of the other ten cats that have (or continue to) grace our modest home: constipation. This is where it would be most helpful if she could talk, like in a language I could understand.
About a week ago, we noticed Maxine passed some hard, dry stools. Then, the next day, my husband saw her unsuccessfully straining to pass stool. (Well, she was successful but a few minutes later outside the litter box.) I called our vet, got a prescription for lactulose and started her on it right away. Unfortunately, right away was too late. We thought it was working but then a couple of days went by without any evidence that Maxine pooped.
With four cats, you’d think it would be hard to tell their stools apart. Nope. Not with our kitties. Particularly with Maxine. She never, ever covers her poop. Saturday morning I decided she needed to see a doctor. We had also noticed that she experienced pain when we picked her up, but thought it was her arthritis. Also, as much as she seemed to want to eat, she barely touched her meals. I assumed that while her steroids stimulate her appetite, her kidney disease probably makes the food unpalatable. I got tired of assuming and wanted an expert’s opinion.
I took her to our regular vet during emergency hours. A dog with a chest wound came in at the same time so they referred me to another ER veterinary hospital. I went there. Our regular veterinary hospital currently prohibits humans other than hospital staff from entering the building, but the ER hospital was different which was good for me psychologically. (It was also a mixed bag in terms who did and did not wear a mask. Sigh.)
They ushered me into an exam room right away, and a technician came in to get info within fifteen minutes. I explained our concern about Max being constipated, noting that she has late stage chronic kidney disease. The tech took her to the back to get her vitals and said a doctor would come in to talk to me shortly. I waited.
And waited.
And waited.
After an hour, I asked someone at the front desk for an update.
I waited.
And waited.
After another hour, I went the front desk again, eyes wet from the strain of worry and asked again for an update. The young man came back, said that Maxine was stable and that they were waiting to see if she would have a bowel movement. He explained that a bleeding dog had been brought in and that was why no one had updated me. I thought to myself, “well, I can just take her home if you’re just waiting to see if she’ll do something.”
Another hour goes by.
I ask for another update. Keep in mind, no one of authority has come by to explain what if anything they were doing to or for Max. And I’m sitting in an exam room for three hours, alternating between BBC World and a soccer game … on mute.
Almost another hour goes by and a technician comes in, startling me because by this point, I’m lying on the bench. He’s all smiles and has two estimates for me, depending on what procedures I approve. He asks if they can do an x-ray. Of course, they can. A few minutes later, an actual veterinary doctor walks in. She’s very nice, very calm, but very alarmed at Max’s condition.
She brought up the exams on the TV/computer. Max’s colon was packed full of stool. She pointed out three pockets of gas, places where she likely felt pain whenever I picked her up. I fell apart. I felt so guilty. I still feel guilty. I should have taken her in earlier, so much earlier. Her bowel movements had been changing over the last two weeks, but we thought it was because her diet was changing. By this point, we were giving her subQ fluids every other day, but the vet said that Max was very dehydrated. They wanted to put her on IV fluids, give her an enema, and observe her overnight. I agree to it all.
She felt compelled to discuss euthanasia. If they are successful and Max poops, it’s highly likely this will happen again. Could be a few months. Could be a couple of days. I understood that and asked that they proceed with trying to resolve the constipation. I and my husband will deal with the rest.
I went home, hoping I wouldn’t get in an accident because I was crying.
We got a call late that night letting us know that Max had pooped a little bit (yay!) and she was stable. They had her in a “tower kennel” so she had plenty of room to move around in and a nice, fleecy blanket to sleep on.
I called the next morning. They said she was stable, hadn’t pooped yet that morning (although later records showed she had), and to call back between three and four. I called around four and (yay!) got to talk with the vet on shift. She had had a good poop (yay!) and her constipation seemed to be resolved. BUT. They were alarmed about her anemia. They wanted to keep her longer, possibly do a blood transfusion.
Hell, no.
I explained that Max was already under care for her kidney disease and anemia. I said, “We know she’s failing. We just wanted to get the constipation taken care of.” To say that I know she’s failing was not an easy thing to do. In that case, I was told, I could pick her up any time.
We left immediately.
I’ll say this for the ER hospital. They gave us x-rays and detailed records on Max’s treatment. They could have done better on communication, but it is, after all, an ER hospital.
Max pooped twice for our pleasure soon after we got her home on Sunday evening. She has not pooped since. I have her back on lactulose and her other medications. She is preferring cat food that is mostly broth or gravy so she’s not getting much in the way of solid food right now. Greg is giving her fluids every day. You could say she’s kind of on a fast and that’s why she hasn’t pooped. Who knows. All I know is, if she hasn’t pooped at least a little bit by tomorrow morning, I’m calling her regular vet and see if they will do an x-ray, make sure she’s okay down there.
We had set a date while Max was at the ER and we thought this event would do her in. We’ve tabled the date. We’re back to “wait and see.” I don’t think Max is ready to let go yet. She laid in my lap last night as we watched a movie. It was nice.
Max wondering why she’s having to spend so much time at these veterinary hospitals.
No, I’m not done with all writing, just writing my perpetual WIP. After wallowing in one extreme for awhile (no writing), I went the other extreme in November and completed 50,977 words toward my novel. These were all new words (although the majority can be found in the dictionary). I know some people would say NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) is crazy but there’s method to the madness, at least for me.
The commitment to write 50,000 words in a month means I have to put butt in chair and just do it. Although I know I don’t have to write 50k, the challenge is there and so I try to meet it. At times it was grueling. I took a day off now and then which meant that I really had to crank out the words on the other days. Here’s me after one long day of writing.
After a long day of writing, I am consoled (sort of) by Maxine (on my lap), Junior (on pillow next to me) and Raji (above me; with our temps getting chillier, he’s getting friendlier).
I finished on November 27 so I could have a couple of day to just zone out. Plus November 30 was my husband’s birthday so I didn’t want to spend that day writing.
I’m going to take December “off” from working on my novel, but I’ll recommit myself to writing daily. I don’t know what I’ll write but anything is better than nothing at this point. Who knows? Maybe I’ll try poetry! I bought Diane Lockward’s The Strategic Poet, thanks to Luanne Castle’s review of it. You can read her review by clicking here.
In other news …
MY SISTER IS HOME! Sorry for shouting, but you understand why. Yup, she came home on November 24, the day before Thanksgiving. That’s what my brother-in-law (and the rest of us) had been hoping and praying for. I’ve talked to her twice so far, and I cannot tell you how good it was to talk with her. She’s sounds like herself: lucid, ready with a laugh, positive, strong. Her sons boast about how hard she worked at physical therapy, knowing that the better she got, the sooner she’d go home. Now we can all breathe.
Maxine is still hanging in there, but she’s more or less getting hospice care now. At the last vet visit a couple of weeks ago, we learned that her kidney enzymes have shot up again. We could hear the disappointment in our vet’s voice. We all knew we couldn’t stop the kidney disease from progressing but we had been hopeful we could slow it down. Oh, well. To keep her hydrated, we’re giving her subcutaneous fluids every other day. To keep nausea at bay, we’re also giving her Cerenia every day. Mealtime is a challenge because she’s become “picky.” She’s a slow eater so we put her in a closed room by herself. She’s gets distracted by the boys trying to break the door down (sigh), but if she’s given enough time, she’ll eat most of her food. She seems to like leaving some behind for the boys.
So, good news about my sister; not good news about Maxine. Meanwhile, we’ve made a couple of trips to St. Marks Refuge to ride our bikes. I did not fall once.
Here’s a few scenes from our last bike ride, timed so we would be out on the dikes at sunset.
This is my favorite section of what is called the Deep Creek trail. The bayou is usually full of waterfowl: ducks, wood storks, spoonbills, herons, etc.
My husband riding away.
Opposite the sunset.
It was a fun bike ride that almost didn’t happen. About a mile and a half out, my rear tire went flat. Fortunately, my husband was carrying a new tube so we didn’t have to spend time trying to find and repair the leak. He saved the day again.
Now I have a lot of catching up to do and that means reading your blogs!
You know I had to read my last post to see where I left off. Lol.
Apologies for my absence from the blogosphere, not so much for not writing as for not reading. Whoa, I am so behind that I might not bother to try and catch up.
Update on my sister: Last week she was moved to a new, better and closer-to-home facility. She even has a private room. She is still on schedule to see the surgeon and (hopefully) get her cast removed on October 7. Still, we’re all taking things one day at a time. She has good days and bad days which means her husband and sons have good days and bad days. My brother-in-law met with a doctor at the facility who explained that given the trauma my sister experienced (breaking her leg) as well the subsequent surgery, anesthesia, changes in environment, etc., it’s expected that she would have good days and bad days. Maybe her Parkinson’s is getting worse, but maybe also she is still recovering from her fall. Right now we’re all just grateful that she’s in a better facility getting better attention and that her husband, sons, extended family and friends can visit more often. Everyone is staying positive.
Update on Maxine: Two weeks of twice daily injections of antibiotics have cleared her UTI (good news!), but our vet wants us to do another two-week round (ugh!) and then a recheck to be sure. Her kidney enzyme values (creatine) have decreased by one point (from 6.9 to 5.9 for those well-versed in feline kidney disease) (also good news). We will continue to give her subcutaneous fluids every three days which is a nerve-wracking experience for both of us (more for Greg because he has to insert the needle while I hold onto Max and close my eyes) … but it helps her so it’s worth it. Plus, today we tried out a “harness” for the first time, and Maxine just relaxed on the couch while she got the fluids. I didn’t have to hold her. The harness is simply a velcro belt that fits around her hips and keeps the IV line in place so she can move around if she wants. Today she just laid on the couch and enjoyed having her head scratched while Greg administered the fluids. Max isn’t “out of the woods.” Previously our vet had said that if the antibiotics worked and the fluids helped, we’d be looking at another several months to a year with Max. I’m inclined to think that’s optimistic, but I’ve been rather pessimistic of late. I hope to be proved wrong.
So the beat goes on. You know, I loved the Sonny and Cher show way back when. Good times.
Here’s recent photo of Max, looking wide-eyed and alert and as willful as ever, living up to her nickname, “She Who Must Be Obeyed.”
Comments are closed because I am SO far behind in writing and reading. I’m retired but there’s still not enough hours in the day. Go figure.
Earlier this week my brother-in-law called to give me an update on his wife, my sister. (If you’re reading my blog for the first time, here’s links to my two earlier posts about her: Waiting, but not for Godot and Waiting for Good News Sometimes Pays Off.) He had just come home from visiting her and said that she was very confused that day. Then he dropped the bomb: someone at the rehabilitation facility tested positive for COVID so now all visitations are off.
Because of her current condition, my sister cannot advocate for herself, and now her husband and sons can’t see her and advocate for her. I am so angry that my brother-in-law and nephews can’t see her. They are all vaccinated and they wear masks. I understand that, for liability reasons, the facility has to shut down visitations if they have a case of COVID, but I can’t help but wonder if that case was brought in by an unvaccinated person. I can’t help but wonder and be enraged.
We are very worried about my sister. A couple of weeks ago she had to be moved to a real hospital and fitted with an IV for a few days. She had become so dehydrated that she needed IV fluids, y’all! When she was returned to the rehab facility, she was perky and talkative and upbeat. Since then, she has progressively worsen, becoming confused, slurring her speech. Her urine is dark, prompting a urinalysis (for which we don’t know the results yet). I don’t know why the rehab facility is allowing her to deteriorate. My brother-in-law mentions that they are short-staffed and when the social worker told him not to worry, saying “we’ll take care of her,” he assured her that he will worry.
I struggle with being positive, with believing that although my sister is in an apparently substandard facility, she will get through this. She is scheduled for a re-examination of her broken leg at the end of this month. I’m hoping that she can be released after that.
My 97-year-old mother keeps saying my sister “has so much against her” and “won’t be the same after this.” I bite my tongue because she has to deal with her fears and worries in her own way. My mom’s comments have provided some illumination, though: now I know where I get my propensity to always imagine the worst scenario.
Meanwhile, our oldest cat Maxine has a drug-resistant UTI. Rather than put her on a regimen of twice daily injections that could last months without a guarantee of effectiveness, our vet recommends monitoring her kidney enzymes for now. Maxine is currently at Stage 3 kidney disease, but she has a good appetite, drinks water, and pees and poops normally. She sleeps a lot but when she’s awake, she’s alert. Still, at times there’s a sense of her health careening out of control.
Meanwhile, the Atlantic continues to churn up hurricanes.
I want to be positive. Maxine acts like she still rules the household and that gives me joy.
I want to be positive, but there’s still too many anti-vaxxers out there ruining it for everyone else.
I want to be positive, but when it comes to my sister, I won’t be until she’s out of that place.
***
If you’ve read this far, thank you. Again I hesitated about writing an unhappy post, but I need to write and I need to be honest. Meanwhile, I take my joy where I can find it, like with these two:
Well, I can’t quit just yet. For those who read my post last week (click here if you need a refresher), let me assure you that all is now well in the Bailey & Brown household. Still, it was a rough week. Now, here are the reasons why I have to keep my day job (for now).
Reason #1: Wendy
What? Who? Me? Whadda I do?
Reason #2: Maxine
“Why should I lie in a fancy fleece bed when there’s a purrfectly good box here?”
Reason #3: Junior
“In solidarity with the girls, I went on a hunger strike too. Plus I wanted a new safe place to eat.”
La Historia de los Tres Gatos
A week ago Thursday, Wendy got the ball rolling with a diagnosis of bladder stones. She hadn’t been showing any symptoms of blockage or pain. No, she was just in for her annual physical when the results her urinalysis suggested something was amiss. We left with a case of prescription cat food and a long waiting period for the stones to (hopefully) dissolve on their own.
The following Friday, Wendy decided she didn’t like the new food and went on strike. She refused to eat anything. Given that she was overweight, we figured she could fast for awhile and eventually get hungry enough to start eating again. By Sunday, not only did she continue to refuse any food, but it was obvious that the smell of cat food nauseated her.
That refusal resulted in a trip to to the vet on Monday afternoon. Our mistake was in giving her the prescription food right away and not transitioning her by mixing a bit with her regular food over time. Over the weekend she had lost two pounds.
A crash diet is not good for people or animals, so my husband brought home an assortment of prescription foods (dry and wet) for tummy troubles along with a few doses of Cerenia, anti-nausea medication. Wendy took to the dry food right away, but still turned away from wet food, even her old favorites. In desperation, I bought an assortment of “gourmet” cat foods that came in pouches: shredded chicken in broth; chicken and tuna bisque.
While all this was going on with Wendy, by that same Sunday, Maxine and Junior also decided to go on a hunger strike.
Imagine: Three cats all refusing to eat!
Thank goodness my husband is retired and could keep an eye on the kids. Even though Wendy had gone off her food two days before the other two, we suspected there was some common reason all three were now off it.
Heat
That week the heat index in Tallahassee was well into the three digits with high humidity. Up until Monday evening, the kids had free access to the back porch during the day. We had been marveling at how all three couldn’t wait to go out onto the porch only to drape themselves on the chairs and table like Dali’s kitties. When my husband ushered them in for a break late Monday afternoon, he noticed that Maxine was wobbly, like she was drunk.
He promptly locked the cat door to the porch. No salir!
Our cats love heat. They’re southern kitties and when temps dip below 90 degrees, they act like the ice age is settling in, burrowing into blankets and seeking out our body heat.
But, in hindsight, the heat this weekend was way past the boundaries of what they should be exposed to. So my husband kept them in, and they didn’t complain. Maxine found a nice box to curl up in, Wendy decided to settle in on my bed, and Junior played sentry on a desk in our living room.
Still, they didn’t eat anything but the dry food and only nibbles at that. Wendy, though, was getting better. After a couple of days on Cerenia, she started to eat her dry food with gusto. A call to the vet, and by Thursday evening, all three were taking Cerenia.
At this point in my writing (Sunday afternoon), they are finally back to eating wet food. We’re being cautious though, trying small portions of different over-the-counter varieties. Today, for the first time, I mixed a little of prescription food in with some Fancy Feast Gourmet Naturals beef pate and crossed my fingers.
They licked their bowls clean. Can you say “Hallelujah”? (And I don’t mean “Hello Julia“!)
So what’s all this got to do with my day job?
Well, just this week:
Two vet visits.
Prescription food for Wendy to (hopefully) dissolve the bladder stones.
Possible surgery if Wendy’s bladder stones don’t dissolve.
Teeth-cleaning for Wendy once the bladder stones dissolve or she has surgery.
Three weeks of antibiotics for Maxine because she has E. Coli in her urine again (oh, did I ever tell you that I now have to wipe her butt after she does #2 because the vet suspects poor hygiene?)
Prescription food for Maxine because she also is in early stages of kidney disease.
Not on this list is the teeth cleaning (and removal) that Maxine had last month, and the removal of Junior’s last few remaining teeth earlier this year.
Am I complaining? Nope.
Times like this we are reminded not to take our furred babies for granted. I never felt so much joy as when they gobbled down their wet food today.
This week my husband and I will celebrate our 30th wedding anniversary. We had plans to go out of town for a couple of days, to enjoy a getaway in a favorite place, to bike a favorite trail, and to eat out at a favorite restaurant.
We canceled.
At the time we decided to cancel, the kids were getting better but we were still on edge about them. We also decided, that after going through such a rough time, we just wanted to be with them.
Pray, tell me, what “sacrifices” have you made for your furred babies?
I know some people think we’re crazy, but then, we are crazy about our kids.
Dear Reader, you see this lovely specimen of a feline in repose. Reading is hard work, you know, especially of The New Yorker (such long articles!).
Luisa sleeping on a copy of The New Yorker and my husband’s stargazing log.
The girl does love to sleep. And she deserves to sleep as much as she wants because she is at least 20 years old.
Luisa asleep on the porch
What Luisa doesn’t like is going to the vet.
Luisa at the vet’s
Unfortunately, we’ve had to take her in twice in less than a week. Last week, she started throwing up her food. Nothing terribly unusual. She often had these spells of puking up food and then begging for more, and then she would be fine for awhile. But last week was different. The frequency of her throwing up increased until the point where all she could throw up was frothy liquid because there was no longer food in her stomach. And of course this was in the wee hours of the morning. So I laid in bed and told myself that “if she has one more episode, I’m taking her to the emergency vet.” And of course all was quiet after I made that decision, as if she had read my mind.
Of course, I was in denial and, to a degree, I still am. I wanted only for the vet to prescribe over the phone some anti-nausea medicine and an appetite stimulant. Oh, yes, I forgot to mention: Luisa had stopped eating.
So the first visit to the vet involved Luisa getting subcutaneous fluids to hydrate her, an anti-nausea shot, and an antibiotics shot (her white blood cell count was elevated). We took her home and observed her, tried to feed her, watched her every movement. Oh, did I mention that she was also constipated?
By Monday, she had only eaten a spoonful of food that I held in front of her. She would have no more. So back to the vet we went. I saw a different doctor this time, one that I was more comfortable with since she had treated a few of our other cats as well. It’s very simple: we can try a few non-invasive procedures and if they fail, well, there’s euthanasia. We can try invasive procedures and if they fail, well, there’s euthanasia. Luisa is at least 20 years old.
We found her in a local park almost 18 years ago. My husband fell in love with her and as days past and she seemed to always be on the top of the restrooms whenever he came to the park to run, he grew more anxious. There were student apartments nearby so we suspected the usual. When the nighttime temperatures started to fall, my husband grew even more anxious. So one day I drove out to the park, coaxed her off the roof of the restrooms, and cajoled her into a pet taxi, and off to the vet we went. I left behind info on the vet … just in case, but of course, no one ever called. So. She was ours. We named her Luisa because we found her in San Luis Mission Park.
It hasn’t been all roses with Luisa. She is a “crazy tortie.” Until recently, she wouldn’t tolerate being petted. She always wanted to be in the same room with us, but we were to look and not touch. It was hard not to laugh when I would go to pet her and she would hiss and slap my hand.
But in the last couple of years, perhaps you could say now that’s she is in her dotage, she seems to enjoy being petted. In fact, she sleeps with me, often curled up on the inside of my left arm. Or on my pillow where her whiskers tickle my face. She is still with us, as of this writing. We are trying the non-invasive treatments: anti-nausea medicine, appetite stimulant, another round of subcutaneous fluids. But if this regimen fails, we can do no more. We will do no “heroics” for our aging queen. All we want to hear her purr and know that she does not suffer.
So, if I seem to be absent from blogging or distracted when I am here, she is my cause. I don’t want to let her go. Of course, it’s inevitable. She’s not getting any younger, and keeping her beyond her comfort zone would not be fair to her. But right now, she does not seem to be in distress. She still seems alert. But she still won’t eat.
For now, dear Reader, understand that I am rather preoccupied because Luisa is still here and I need every minute with her that I can get. Even if she spends most of those minutes sleeping.
Marie at 1 Write Way 