I suppose I’d better write a little post about what’s been happening this week, although maintaining some level of denial is necessary.
On Monday Mum called me to tell me Fee was breathing with more effort. Unfortunately I’d been consuming cheap white wine at a party then entire evening (been looking forward for some time to the first party on campus where I was actually on site AND not on call) and was rather impressed I’d even managed to answer my phone.
So fast forward to Tuesday morning, where I was more concious. After speaking to parentals about Fee again – breathing hard, bit fussy with food, a little lethargic but generally ok in self – I had to go to work, but went to collect her in the afternoon (was on equine this week – intermittent work). Brought her to work, where she was examined and my colleague found a mass in her abdomen. Now – this was news to me as I have a mental block when it comes to checking my own animals – I find it very hard to do in case I find something. I know this is not rational, but there you go. I didn’t take this news very well, and while they worked her up I was sent to go and have a cup of tea. Preliminary examinations found fluid around her lungs, heart and in her abdomen. The fluid around her lungs was causing her slight difficulties in breathing, so that was drained. She was started on pain relief, fed, and allowed to settle. Naturally, Fee takes all of this in her stride, and settles down happily in her first floor apartment.
The rest of the week was spent trying to get samples of the mass, and various other organs to try and find out what it was. Currently we suspect it to be an unusually large lymph node, though it is also unusually firm. Small samples were unproductive so we took a bigger sample today, but that’ll take a few days to come back. Top of the list is a tumour, specifically lymphoma, which is a tumour of the white blood cells. If this is the case, surgery isn’t possible, as it’s within the blood and lymph systems (if it is lymphoma the big lymph node is a sign of the disease, not the cause, so removing it doesn’t particularly help), but chemotherapy animal-style is possible. Animals-style means it’s used at lower doses than humans so that it doesn’t affect quality of life – though this also means that although we can put them into remission we rarely cure cancer in animals. We can’t treat her until we have the diagnosis, as the treatment renders any further diagnostics untrustworthy – however, she is coping well currently.
Fee herself has been a star – she has amazed people at work by knowing her own name, staying still for xrays and ultrasounds and for completely trusting people, and for purring whenever anyone talks to her (although this is slightly inconvenient when trying to listen to her chest). She had her chest drained again Thursday and may need it done over the weekend but other than that she’s been chilling out on pain relief (I don’t think she’s in pain, she just gets very happy while on it so we thought we’d continue). Everyone at work has likewise been amazing – she’s received random visits from people whom I haven’t even directly spoken to – word spreads it seems.
She’s home for the weekend. She’s obviously not 100% – very thin, breathing more heavily, shaved for her scans, a bit weak and wobbly and spaced out, and needs more time to sleep – but she’s wandering around, eating acceptably well for a poorly cat and asking to go out.
So – until we have the results and (assuming it is lymphoma) until we see how she responds to therapy, we’re in a holding pattern. This too is a coping mechanism – can’t do anything until then, so no sense worrying about what might be. As Mum says Nan says – don’t worry your worries until your worries worry you.
