Reminder to self

More on Joey

Today will be day 4 of our new routine.
4:30am wake-up, give Joey 2ml of anti-nausea medicine, feed Maggie
4:50 start preparing Joey's medicine, water, and antibiotic syringes. (We have to heat up the food)
5:00-5:20ish Feed Joey. We have to take our time when feeding him, or he will get sick.
5:20-5:25 shower. quickly.
5:25-5:35 get dressed and get ready.
5:35-5:45 eat breakfast, if time.
5:45-shoes and socks and a kiss for B (who has hit the snooze button twice by this time)
5:50/6:00 out the door for school.

(Then B takes over the home routine)

School ends at 2:30. Most days I have a meeting/tutoring/homework club until at least 3:30.
After all of that, I head to the vet to pick the little man up. Usually we get home around 6pm. At that point, this is the schedule.

6pm Get Joey in the spare room, open his carrier and run out the room without him following. Shut the back door to the basement and let the dogs outside. Feed Maggie. Get the mail, answering machine messages, and go to the bathroom.
6:15-6:30 Check email/journals while eating some sort of snack
6:30 Joey gets 2 ml anti-nausea, dogs back inside and fed
6:40-7:00 Computer time with dogs in office
7:00 Dogs back outside, feed Joey and give him antibiotics
(Then hopefully by now, B is home.-It is so much easier with two of us here, especially since the dogs make Joey nervous.)

If we are lucky, we get an hour together in the living room. I'm usually checking papers, or falling asleep though...B falls asleep in her recliner until its time for more medicine and food for out little guy, then joins me upstairs for a few hours before we repeat.

Status on Joey

(copied from my LJ)

Joey had his check-up yesterday with the vet. She seemed to be pleased with his progress, but told me that his road to recovery is likely to be a long one. Here's a rundown of what we discussed, good and not so good:

• He's not dehydrated any more
• He lost an ounce from his discharge weight (ugh!). He's currently 7lbs, 9oz. Normally he ranges anywhere from 10-12lbs.
  
• His energy is up a little
• He's still not eating on his own yet
• They call him "polite Joey" because the other Joey cat they were watching is apparently a jerk. You know your animal spends too much time at the vet when they start giving it nicknames. Although it's very sweet that they all love him so much (it's kind of hard not to).
• His "girlfriends" all came in to see us while we were there - I told you this cat is a ladies man!
• The vet gave him an orange bandage and a pumpkin sticker for Halloween. Cute!
• The vet also told me that we can drop him off for kitty daycare to help out with his feedings during the day. This will help us immensely.
  

As for us, we are both exhausted. I might win the least amount of sleep award though, because I've been the one waking up for his midnight feedings for the past 5 nights. That has meant a total of about 4 hours of sleep per night on the days I work. I'm off today, and J took the early morning feeding (God bless her) so I could catch up a little. She's also taking over the midnight feeding tonight because I work tomorrow and she is off. She's so wonderful.

In other news, Maggie, Jake and Gracie all realize there is a shift in the house - Maggie especially. She's been so antsy without her buddy to play with, so I've been trying to go out of my way to give her a little more attention and playtime when the rest are asleep. I think she appreciates it, especially when she climbs onto my lap at the end of the night to thank me with her big warm belly spread across my legs. Jake & Grace just want to know what's up with the weird smell coming out of the spare room (Joey's still not quite bathing himself completely, but he's getting better at it).

In other news, election day in the US is just around the corner and things are getting down to the wire. I really hope that two things happen on November 4th. First, I don't think it's any secret that we are big time Obama fans in this house. We need him to win and start turning this country around. (And I'm not just saying this because Sarah Palin makes me want to stick hot pokers into my ears everytime I hear her speak.) Secondly, we need California to maintain their equality so that other states can follow suit and eventually we may all be protected. Our families deserve protection everywhere, but it has to start somewhere. So, here's my plea to you, dear interets, to please Barack The Vote on November 4th. Or I will Rick-roll your comment sections. Heh.

/soapbox.

Mom is home; Joey is not doing so great...

Starting with the good news: My mom came home from the hospital yesterday.

The not-so-good news (copied and pasted from B's other journal):

Feline Hepatic Lipidosis. Joey's disease. Google it, I dare you. The internet is full of info. Tonight I googled variations of "feline tube feeding" to see how long it generally takes for cats to respond to the forced calories. Because our little guy is not doing well at all. Our poor little Joey.

He's been home since yesterday and is still struggling, even just to lift his little head. We feed him 4-5x a day, 15ml at a time through his feeding tube. He gets meds every 12 hours, also through the tube. After he eats he gets very uncomfortable and
lethargic. All he wants to do is sleep. He's not bathing himself either, which means J and I have been wiping him down with a warm washcloth every so often.The worst part is that he can't purr because of the tube down his throat. It is incredibly heartbreaking to hear him try.

The mortality rate for a cat in Joey's condition is high. We didn't notice a significant change in his health until it was nearly too late. Thank God we have an amazing vet who sprung into action immediately.

Right now he's asleep in his favorite spot downstairs, on top of one of the dog's blankets we have folded and stored. I am scared to let him sleep alone, and will probably bring him back upstairs before I go to bed.

I'll have to take a partial day tomorrow, and probably again throughout the week so that I can come home to check and feed him. I'll probably do quite a bit of working from home, if not going back to work in the evenings so that I can maintain my hours.
Hopefully I can work out an arrangement for the next couple of weeks or at least until he starts eating on his own again. Unfortunately because I live so far from my work, it's not as simple as taking a longer lunch. It takes me at least 45 minutes to drive to work, most of the time it takes an hour.

I knew the first few days home for him were going to be hard, but this is unbelievably difficult. He is not himself and I keep praying that we've made the right decision. Seeing him in this state - it's awful. I can't even describe it. The one animal we own who has the most spunk and love in his heart is the one hit with this awful, shiteous disease.

Joey

Our little man is home. He has a feeding tube and bandages and has lost lots of weight.
He's not back to normal, nor would I consider him "better," but if Dr. Bonnie said it was ok for him to come home, then I believe her. She said he was grooming himself and being a little frisky and was doing much better than before.
He's still slow moving and sometimes sits in an uncomfortable looking crouch, but other times he sprawls out or curls up in our laps. We have to feed him through the tube every 4-6 hours.
I never knew that animals could become anorexic. =(

In related news, my mom is still in the hospital. She passed out when her blood sugar level dropped to 40. Luckily my dad was there and he was able to get the nurses. She was all dressed and ready for discharge. So now she is not in for her leg, but to stabilize her blood sugar. They took blood at 2pm yesterday afternoon to run further tests, and it can take anywhere from 24-48 hours to get results, so I am not confident that she is coming home today either, perhaps tomorrow though.

Quick Update

• My mom's in the hospital. She had an angioplasty on Tuesday and had some complications. She is in a lot of pain and cannot walk, but is doing much better everyday.
• Our little man, Joey, is at the kitty hospital. He stopped eating, got a liver infection, jaundiced, and then was hospitalized. He will be there until tomorrow at least. My sister, God love her, offered to help us cover the $650+ vet bill that is expected and we can pay her back weekly.
• I'm on CD43 and I started temping again this week.
• Next week will we most likely sign a new donor agreement with PNKD.
• After the agreement is signed, if I haven't started yet, I will hit up the RE for a not-needed-why-am-i-paying-for-this pregnancy test and a prescription for pro.vera to jump start my cycle.
• Then CD3 ultrasound, clo.mid, and trigger.
• Then home insems. =)
• I'm sure we will be in the TWW before we know it...

Happy October!

I can't believe its been almost a year since we started this blog and the ride on the TTC train. We had actually started before October 2007 with research and charting, but we got our donor on board in October and did our first insem in November 2007. Wow. A year. I know that many of you have done way more than that, but still, a year. Hmm.
Somehow, with the grace of God, we were able to pay the $501 to have B's car fixed. I had been tucking some money away in the credit union and I guess it adds up quicker than I thought. Plus we both had uncashed checks in our respective purses, so it worked out. Thank God.
Another positive note is we have been talking to a possible new known donor. (PNKD?) We have been emailing back and forth and he seems great, so now we wait for references. He's pretty local and already has 3 kids from his marriage and 3 pregnancies on the way. Sounds good to me. =)
B was off today and put up all of our fall decorations. I. Love. It. Fall is my favorite season and to come home to the house smelling like autumn was fantabulous. What a great start to the weekend!
I'm also kind of itching to get back to temping...crazy, I tell ya!