Staying abreast of health problems

Poor Henry was exhausted after a day at the clinic. He received a thorough teeth cleaning and a daring shave.


When I weather a spate of sick cats as I did recently, I begin to exhibit hypochondria where their health is concerned.

As I was cuddling Henry the other day, I felt a bump on his chest that seemed like some sort of cyst. He was bundled off to Northshore Veterinary Hospital in short order.

Dr. Kim Barron is a kind and patient woman, and always takes me seriously even when my suspicions have no basis in fact.

There was the time I thought Charlie was choking on a piece of salmon. It turned out he was just coughing on a hairball. The salmon I suspected and tried to pull out was actually his tongue. Thankfully it was slippery, so I didn’t get a firm grip.

Kim gave Henry a detailed once-over looking for cysts, even shaving him down in places for a closer examination.

When he was handed back to me with his nipples bare and boldly on display, I realized that must have been the cyst I thought I’d found.

Good thing it isn’t bikini season just yet.

Down to a Magnificent Seven

You might think that in a multi-cat household, I would barely notice when I lose one.

That's not true in the least.

When I come home from the veterinary clinic knowing one of my animals will never return, the missing piece of the puzzle is palpable.

It's not just me who feels it. The remaining cats jostle for pecking order, and there's a perceptible hole in the dynamic for a while until the animals adjust to the loss.

Last night I drove through a heavy snowstorm to get Felix to the veterinary hospital before it closed. Felix is an elderly grey tabby cat I rescued dumpster-diving outside a Jack in the Box fast food restaurant in San Diego 13 years ago, and he's currently the oldest cat in the house. Because of the familiar distress signs I noticed before we set off, I knew when I bundled him into the carrier that he might not return to my cat house.

His health had been deteriorating slowly but surely over the past several months, ebbing away his quality of life. The slow decline made the decision to take his life a difficult one.

Day by day, he began to withdraw from the cat clutch, and them away from him, leaving him to nap alone. He stopped playing and appeared to be in pain at times, even though his tests showed all systems normal. He grew thinner, and just recently the bones on his spinal cord felt more pronounced. The wide-faced tomcat cheeks began to hollow. And when he was sitting or lying down, I could tell he wasn't completely comfortable.

My old cat was simply fading away, a little bit at a time.

The surviving pride of cats -- now down to a Magnificent Seven cast of characters -- help ease the pain of loss. But there will never be another Felix, and the holidays will be dimmer without his friendly spirit in the house.

Goodbye to a survivor and a friend.

* * *

This will be a grief-tinged holiday season for me. I lost Opus in October, and now Felix is gone too. The house feels quiet and lonely without them.

To read about the battle to save Opus, click to And then there were eight.

Follow animal instincts to vet a vet

Dr. Kimberly Barron works on this Labrador's ears.


When people ask me how to choose a vet, I always tell them the same thing.

If the veterinary team in question is committed to assisting the animal rescue mission, then you’ve found a keeper.

It’s true, I admit it—I’m biased. But after two decades as an animal rescuer, this litmus test has served me well. Veterinarians and their assistants who support animal welfare are almost always knowledgeable and compassionate. And they have the animals’ best interests at heart. Plus they care about the well-being of all creatures in their community, not just the clinic’s bottom line.

When I moved to Bellingham, Washington in 2001, one of my first stops was a visit to Dr. Kimberly Barron, owner of Northshore Veterinary Hospital.

Kim has served on the Whatcom Humane Society board of directors. She’s donated her time and medical skills to rescue groups and supported initiatives such as spay-neuter days at her clinic. She understands the issues.

Eight years later, I’m proud to call Kim a friend.

When my cat Opus fell sick recently, the knowledge that I had Kim in the pocket was a source of great comfort. If the worst happened, Kim would be there to help me take Opus’ life as humanely and painlessly as possible.

Kim’s competence alone would have been enough to endear her to me. And her personality complements her skills. Kind but not gushy, matter-of-fact but nowhere near cold, Kim has a friendly, good-humored demeanor that inspires serenity and soothes grief.

But that doesn’t mean she isn’t affected by her work.

Those in veterinary medicine who truly care about their charges face the same risks of compassion fatigue and burnout that test shelter workers and other rescuers.

But there’s a difference. At a shelter or rescue group, the human guardian most often walks away, leaving the animal behind as the only creature in need.

In a vet clinic, a human being is the first patient to present in need, characterized by sorrow, heartbreak, or other personal problems such as divorce, illness, and job loss, even a need to give up an animal because of an unexpected move or other change in circumstances.

At Kim’s clinic on Electric Avenue, any one of her clients might be losing a member of the family on any day. Or every day.

That means Kim and the rest in her veterinary ranks minister to the people just as much as they help the animals.

It takes its toll on her to support her clients’ emotions.

“Sometimes it comes out as being really irritable or depressed, and I don’t really know where it’s coming from,” Kim said. “And then I realize I’ve been doing a ton of euthanasias. Even if it’s for the good of the animals, it’s still really hard to do it.”

Before I arrived with Opus on her final day, Kim had decided she was going to take a break from euthanizing until the following week. She had already taken the lives of two cats and a dog in the previous 24 hours.

When the bodies start to pile up, Kim doesn’t sleep well.

“It’s not guilt or remorse,” she said. “I know it needs to be done. But it takes its toll.”

Another veterinarian at her clinic had offered to take over for a bit while Kim recuperated.

But in the end, Kim decided to perform the procedure. To follow the case through to its final conclusion.

It wasn’t an easy euthanasia. Opus doesn’t react well to leaving her home environment. Just like when she’s receiving a simple vaccination, Opus fought the injection that would shut her system down for good.

It’s the third cat Kim has euthanized for me in four years.

I know there will be more goodbyes in my future. But I’m comforted to think that Kim will be there, and not just for my animals.

For me, too.


To read the full story of Opus, go to "And then there were eight".

If you are interested in hearing more about Dr. Kim Barron and her animal rescue experiences, check out this story I wrote about animal hoarding. Kim's story is the lede.


Janet Erchinger-Davis rescued this pug from Craigslist to be a friend for her other four-year-old pug St. Coco. This one got an even loftier name: Basil the Great.


This woman brought a bird in for her daughter Korren, who has three rescued birds including one saved from a rodeo clown. This one, a sulfur-crested Cockatoo named Daphne, came by for a check-up.



The clinic had a record-setting day for number of teeth pulled: 42. Nine came from the mouth of eight-year-old Chunky B, a rescued Chihuahua who had been fed people food his whole life. He's been fixed up good as new, except for a new feature that's oddly endearing: his tongue has a tendency to stick out.


Licensed veterinary technician Rose Eastman does the Kennel Card Shuffle.

And then there were eight

At first, Opus rallied after receiving fluids, but her health soon began its steady decline again.


I don’t take vacations from writing. For me, stringing words together is like consuming food and water. It must be done within certain intervals or my well-being starts to weaken.

So when I go quiet for even a week, my close pals in rescue know exactly what that means.

Something has gone wrong.

Most likely I’ve been immersed in material that’s too torturous for my brain to process and I’ve shut down. But sometimes it’s more personal than that.

This week, my silence was as personal as it gets.

My mind was consumed with making one decision, that choice all animal guardians dread: to take the life of my beloved companion animal.

Opus was my oldest cat at 17. She had been with me since kittenhood, one of dozens of animals I fostered in the early 1990s for Winnipeg Humane Society (WHS) in my no-pets-allowed townhouse apartment.

I get attached to every animal I foster. But I was young and only felt ready for the commitment of adopting two cats. A pair, so they would have each other for company.

Opus stood out to me because of her feisty attitude. She also gave me my first bout of ringworm.

My dear friend Tamara Vukusic—a fellow Carleton journalism school graduate—had been working at WHS at the time handling public affairs and media relations. She called me to come and get Opus because the ringworm meant her time was up. She said she had a kitten sitting in her desk drawer who was “special.”

Was she ever special, as I would come to discover later.

Opus’ counterpart was a slightly younger and much sweeter black-and-white fluffy tuxedo kitten I named Magnum.

Together they formed magnum opus, a Latin phrase that refers to an artist’s greatest life work, her most monumental masterpiece.

Many other cats came my way over the years, but Magnum and Opus formed the heart of me. Through all the heartbreak, in rescue and otherwise, they were a constant source of strength and support.

Two years ago, I lost Magnum at age 15 to pancreatic cancer. He was the primary cat tasked with cheering me up when I was sad. I cried for nine days straight when he was no longer there to lick the tears away.

Because Magnum died at an age considered old for a cat, I couldn’t live in my denial bubble anymore. Opus’ body clock was ticking too.

I had a reprieve for two years plus a week after Magnum’s death. Then Opus looked sick all of a sudden. She became thin and listless almost overnight.

I already knew what that meant as I bundled her into the carrier to bring her to my veterinarian. She had been healthy for 17 years, but she was old now, and it was likely her time.

Still, everything reasonable that could be done had to be done. Just in case I was wrong.

Taking Opus to the clinic —or anywhere for that matter—hadn’t ever been easy. She fought doing anything she didn’t want to do, and like most cats, being removed from her home environment was one of those things she really didn’t want to do.

Northshore Veterinary Hospital already had warnings in the computer system about Opus when I arrived, so they knew not to handle her like the average housecat.

Veterinary assistant Tonya Teetz came in wearing thick gloves up to the elbows. After a cursory look, it was determined Opus would be less stressed out if she was lightly sedated for testing.

Tests were run on her blood and urine. Results began rolling in showing normal. Unusually normal in fact, for such an old cat. Opus was set up on IV fluids because she was dehydrated, and she spent the night at Northshore for observation.

On Facebook, I recorded her progress. People on my Friends list cheered Opus on as she started showing lively signs over the next 24 hours. She was eating healthy portions again, standing up, swiping at us, and trying to rip out her IV needle.

The next evening, she was discharged to me looking much better. But the apparent miracle recovery wasn’t to be.

A day later, X-rays revealed a cancer tumor in her colon that was large for a cat’s small system, at 9 centimeters by 4.5 centimeters.

Hope had evaporated.

The night I heard the fateful news, I posted the question I was posing to myself on Facebook as I was pondering it: When to do it?

Support came pouring in. Animal lovers messaged me their stories. How long their pets’ illnesses had lasted before they made the decision, all the life-saving measures they had tried. The guilt they had felt when they waited too long.

But it was veterinarian Kim Barron’s advice in a story I wrote about Magnum two years earlier that came back to me again and again (Grieving guardians seek peace and understanding). Kim's words echoed in my mind as I paced through the night beside Opus’ bed.

“If there’s nothing that can be done and the animal is not completely comfortable, and if the owners are ready, it’s time,” she had told me in our interview.

As the night wore on, Opus’ condition didn’t get any better. In fact, she got worse. She started changing body positions every 15 minutes or so trying to get comfortable. Cats tend to get settled into the same position for hours. And she moved very slowly. She seemed to grow more listless.

When morning dawned, I had my decision. I called Kim and made an appointment for 2 p.m. to give me the morning to say goodbye. But as I watched Opus, her eyes seemed to plead with me.

Within half an hour, I had moved the time up. To right now. As soon as I could get her there.

Of course I wasn’t ready. Who is ever ready to say goodbye to a cherished friend?

But then I realized I was ready in a way. Ready for her to stop suffering. Ready to ease her pain as she had eased mine for 17 years.

And that—the gift of a humane goodbye—is eternal.

* * *

Note added Dec. 15:
Just two months passed, and I experienced another grave loss. Read about Felix in Down to a Magnificent Seven.



Katie Sinclair and Rose Eastman work expertly to sedate Opus. Notice the gloves.


Dr. Kim Barron supervises a battery of tests for Opus.


Opus is extremely fractious, so she is sedated for tests that some cats could handle wide awake.


Despite Opus' cantankerous nature, veterinary assistant Tonya Teetz formed a bond with her while she was at the clinic. When Opus had to be euthanized, I was going to request Tonya, but I didn't have to. She asked to be with Opus before I asked for her, and appeared in the room as if by magic.


Opus' fighting spirit came back briefly.


I made the same request to Kim when Opus died as I had for Magnum two years before: that she would autopsy her so I could look inside and find closure, to see that there truly was no hope. Veterinary assistant Deirdre Kettlestrings prepared the room.


In addition to the autopsy I requested, Kim elected to do an ultrasound for educational purposes, because she had never seen a cancer tumor inside the ascending colon before.


Opus chose to spend her last night at home looking out over the forest she loved so much from the comfort of her warming bed.


Sam sat by Opus saying his quiet goodbyes. They spent 7 years together.






Opus Maloney
1992 - Oct. 8, 2009

Rest in peace
my angel

He can run but he can't hide

Last week, I told you about Sugar Paw's penchant for snuggling into the blankets on my bed. Well, he was at it again today. As soon as I pulled the sheets off, he was already raring to get himself buried into his nest.

The velvet paw rules with an iron fist

Sweeter than sheet cake

Yesterday I posted a photo of my cat Sugar Paw, formally known as Henry Pissinger because of his compelling duality: a zest for spraying urine coupled with a knack for negotiating spats between cats.

In the picture, he was peeking out from between the sheets. But I failed to tell you the whole story. On several occasions, Sugar Paw has found himself mid-flight, snatched from his warm nest when I've decided to change the sheets. Keep in mind I do this task every couple of days. When you have nine cats, the bed quickly turns into a fur-infested litter box.

Today he came rushing out as soon as he felt the covers rustling, so he didn't take a trip on the flying carpet.

The eyes belie

Who would believe this sweet face could cause so much destruction?

Ménage à meow

There's always some cuddling going on in my nine-cat household. The biggest cat bundle I've ever seen is five. Here's a threesome that gets together on a regular basis.

New meaning to the words "cat box"

Little Carreen and Sam recline in the makeshift furniture they dreamed up.

Fuzzbag

Clearly the cats don't like me to travel, and will do anything in their itty-bitty power to come along for the ride.

Love is...a summer kiss

What a strange way to sit

Sometimes I've seen cats lying this way, and it always stops me dead in my tracks. I feel compelled to watch -- they usually don't do it long -- until they change position. In my experience, very few cats seem to be flexible enough to attempt this.

A bored meeting

When it's hot, the cats don't want to do much except lay around. The record heat wave in the Pacific Northwest leaves them pretty lazy. I can't blame them.

Safety in numbers

Coyotes prowl the perimeter of the property. I keep my cats safe with an enclosure that screens in the porch facing the forest. All day, they go in and out to lounge around, cuddle up together, or just watch the creatures moving in the forest -- birds, mice, grasshoppers. It's all TV to them.

Cat (bird) on a wire

Little C is still searching for the purr-fect sleeping spot. This cord doesn't look like a comfortable pillow to me, but she tucked herself in neatly.


Little C is wired with energy most of the time, so her new bedding is fitting.

Cat on a computer

In my last post, I told you about Little C's penchant for finding sky-high perches, causing me to bite my nails to the quick.

I get nervous every time she picks a new spot. On the crisp Pacific Northwest evenings and early mornings, she's started settling in for a nap on my warm laptop keyboard. I tried to foil her efforts by placing the laptop on my desktop tower when unattended. Obviously she's outsmarted me.

Fortunately, her latest sleeping spot isn't death-defying. At least not for her -- just for my laptop.

Cat on a ledge

I never dreamed any of the cats would sit on this skinny ledge when I built the house. If I had, I would have re-designed to thwart their craving for high perches.


When you live with cats, you don’t get to decide where they’ll be taking their naps.

They choose. And the places they pick aren't always where you want them to be.

You’ll think it’s all been squared away, that you found the perfect comfortable and appropriate place for your cats to sleep, and then they decide to seek change.

Take Little C, for example. As the newest cat to join the clan, she’s been moving her napping place every couple of days, trying to figure out where she feels most comfortable.

A few days ago, she finally settled on a favorite place, and I'm not happy about it.

This isn't over.


Clearly Little C doesn't share my concerns, and is quite content with her birds-eye view.

An animal’s eyes will follow you more closely than the Mona Lisa

Felix offers his paw and comes in for a closer look.

Have you ever noticed that human beings don’t pay much attention to the nonverbal signals we give each other? We get so wrapped up in our own personal dramas that we don’t evaluate clues offered by people around us.

Animals are smarter than that.

Like the wise gaze of an old magnum opus, an animal’s eyes follow their people around the room whenever they make a move. Their survival instincts are honed to gauge mood and behavior. And danger.

There are some human beings who have learned that it’s in their best interest to watch others more closely. Criminals in prison, for example. And victims of violent crime.

But in the case of animals who find a safe home to live out their time, it’s pure love that drives them. They can’t wait to see what we’re going to do next. Perhaps that’s why animal lovers find the riveted attention of their pets so intoxicating. Who doesn’t want to be the center of someone’s world?

Little C tumbles into the rabbit hole

A search for Little C is conducted in the crawl space.

I got one of the worst frights of my life last night.

The evening had started off peacefully. I’d fallen asleep on the couch watching Law & Order. When I awoke, I decided to check on Little C in the master bathroom, where she had been napping.

I pushed the door open, but the room was still. Deathly quiet. Little C wasn’t on her bed. I ripped apart the pillows and blankets, calling out for her in vain while I searched the small space.

Moments later, a sickening reality crept in. There was only one plausible explanation. Little C had gone exploring, and had gotten herself stuck. She had to be lodged somewhere in the house’s innards.

It wasn’t a stretch for me to reach this conclusion. Many times I had seen and heard of rescues that began like this. Cats trapped in tub enclosures, walls, crawl spaces. Their curious natures draw them to the tiny dark tunnels. Sometimes they can’t make their way back into the living space. Or if the house is under construction, they might be accidentally bricked in by workers.

If they are fortunate and someone responds to their cries, they are pulled out skinny and dehydrated, sometimes weeks later. I always encourage people who have lost their cats to search outbuildings recently locked up for the winter, such as garages and sheds, as well as new construction sites.

And now it had happened to Little C.

As a responsible pet guardian, I should have known better. Dangers lurk in my house. It’s relatively new -- cosmetically unfinished -- with many nooks and crannies. Round holes where speakers are supposed to fit. Square holes for control panel hook-ups. Wires protrude from the cut-outs, ready to be put into service on the day when I finally decide. Scattered throughout the house are rectangular holes on the floor that connect to the heating system. Metal grates were intended to sit in them. But all of the grates have been removed.

Cats with territorial tendencies mark ground with their urine. A common spot for cats everywhere to frequent is in the heating grates. They treat them like those third-world toilets in the floor.

In my cat house, the vents have been closed off with flat pieces of rubber to protect them. But the only way to get a tight seal against the wood floor was to remove the metal grates. When it gets so cold that the heat has to be on, I push the rubber panels back a bit to let warm air pump through the house.

I was certain Little C had squeezed herself through the small hole the heat was coming through, perhaps looking for extra warmth as cats tend to do. She’s a small cat. But still I had my doubts. She has gained a bit of weight lately. It would have been a tight squeeze.

I lay down on the floor, put my face to the opening and started calling, “Little C! Little C!”

Silence. Little C is normally a chatty cat. If she was conscious, she likely would have meowed back. I stuck my hand into the metal duct as far as it would fit, groping around for her warm, furry body. My fingers touched a body, but it wasn’t Little C. Wrapping around something familiar, I pulled the object out. It was Doll Favorite!

Now panic started surging through my body. I was electrified with dread. My mind had put the puzzle together. Little C must have dropped Doll Favorite into the duct, and gone after her in the hopes of retrieving her best toy. She had tumbled into the rabbit hole like Alice in Wonderland, and now she couldn’t claw her way back out. I pushed my arm in deeper and found a foam ball, and a hard-shelled plastic one I had filled with catnip for her.

I tore out of the room and headed for the basement. That’s where I could access the crawl space. I climbed a pallet rack and pried off the makeshift wood trap door, hoisting myself into the dark, dank space that runs under the house. The ducts that snake under the foundation carry warm or cool air to each room. I calculated where Little C would have fallen into the hole. It was the furthest point from me. I would have to crawl along like a worm until I made it to the opposite end.

I am intensely claustrophobic. To me, the crawl space wasn’t just a dirty, cobwebbed inconvenience. It felt like being buried alive. But after three seconds of hesitation, my maternal instincts kicked in and buried my fears.

If Little C was in there, I wanted to be in there with her.

I crawled along, feeling the plastic-wrapped insulation with my hands until I detected a heavy spot. That had to be her body, I thought. I called and called out to her, putting my face against the plastic, but I couldn’t hear her respond. I couldn’t risk slicing through the plastic with a utility knife -- she would be badly cut if I missed.

It took some time to pry the ducts apart. Luckily Little C had some help from her Hero. When the tube was finally opened, the source of the extra weight was revealed. A bunch of Little C’s toys fell out, including another doll from her trio. But Little C was nowhere to be found.

I decided to patrol the house and see if she had made her way back through another opening into the living area. I was searching the main floor when it hit me.

It wasn’t Little C who had fallen into the rabbit hole -- it was me.

My brief catnap had snatched my memory of the present momentarily. I had completely forgotten that I had put Little C in the holding cage, just like I had recommended to readers in an earlier post (Cats love the velvet paw treatment, February 9, 2009.) After I placed her in there, I dozed off as the sun went down. When I woke up it was dark. Her black coat blended in with the plastic carrier’s dark color. She’s usually vocal about getting out after a few minutes, but decided to stay silent last night.

When I got to the cage and peered in, there she was, right where I had left her. My embarrassment over my over-reaction was overwhelmed by another feeling. Pure relief to find her safe.

And the jolt of pet parent panic wasn’t a waste. It was a wake-up call. From now on I’m going to do better at cat-proofing my house. And myself.

Little C is notorious for her playful, mischievous personality.