Good Bye

I'm sorry this has taken me so long to update but Rumble passed on Sunday, October 23rd, 2011. 

Now all I can do is miss him and second guess every decision I ever made.  Was the surgery and 6 extra months we got worth it?  He hated the dr. visits and the chemo made him so sick and I swear I wouldn't have put him through it if I didn't honestly believe that he would make it.  He was so young; I feel cheated.  He was my heartbeat on four legs.  I get mad and sad every day.  I have a hole in my heart and it hurts. 

I thought the two of us were special enough that he would make it.  Someone has to make up those 5% odds, right?  Why not us?  God has all these miracles in His pocket, why didn't He use one on us? 

I don't know if anyone, anywhere has even read this, but I hope it helped a little. 

If love could have healed, Rumble would have lived forever!

Update

Well, Rumble has been on his "drug holiday" for over 6 weeks now and I am very disappointed to say that he hasn't gained any weight.  In fact, he has lost some weight.  Because of this we are going to hold off on starting another round of chemo until we get some meat on his bones. 

We are going to try two different things for about 6 to 8 weeks and then see how he is doing.  One, we are going to be giving him B12 shots once a week for atleast 4 weeks.  B12 is a great energy booster.  It works through the red blood cells by enabling them to carry oxygen more efficiently.  B12 shots are also highly recommended as mood boosters.  All I know is Rumble feels great for a few days afterwards.  Trouble is, I hate taking him into the vet every week for a shot.  He is easily distracted with the kitty treats I bring so it's not the shot that I'm concerned about, but the stressful trip up there in his traveling box.  So, my vet gave me a syringe to practice with and I now do the injections once a week at home.  Rumble has plenty of extra skin hanging loose so right after I put his breakfast in his bowl, I pull out some extra skin, push the needle into the skin until I feel a pop, and inject the liquid.  He barely notices since he's busy eating. 

Second step is changing his food from the low calorie Hills Prescription I/D to a higher calorie Hills Prescription A/D described as, "For the nutritional support of pets recovering from serious illness, accident and surgery.  Cats and dogs can undergo significant metabolic changes when recovering from a serious illness, injury or surgery. During these stressful conditions the body is challenged to maintain strong natural defenses and spare lean body mass, which makes it is even more important to feed the right food. Cats and dogs need extra energy and nutrients, in an appetizing form, to encourage the recovery process."

When talking to our vet contact at OSU about his weight loss, she said "the cancer is hungry and he needs more calories to maintain his body plus the cancer."  Not what I wanted to hear.  I still don't understand if they were able to cut all of the cancer out and if it hadn't spread to any other parts of his body, then why do they still refer to him as "having cancer"?  Can't people recover from cancer?  I hear about it all the time, animals too.  Why aren't they considering Rumble as having survived his cancer? 

I broke down the other day; haven't done that in awhile.  It was my own fault.  I read an article on msnbc called "The Perfect Day."  It was about a guy learning his dog was having heart failure and he decided his dog needed the perfect day before he passed.  He took the day off work, they slept late, he gave him a hambuger patty and bacon for breakfast, sat on the floor and hugged his dog for awhile and broke down and cried, they chased red balls in his backyard until he grew tired, they went for a swim in a local lake, came home and napped together on the bed, went for a slow hike on their favorite trail and spent time sitting on a rock and listening to nature, went home for sirloin steak cut into small pieces, and they went to bed.  That really does sound like the perfect day.  His dog passed a few weeks later.  What would the perfect day for Rumble include?  Would I be able to recognize the end of his journey and provide him with "the perfect day".  I'm crying all over again.  This whole thing still sucks.  I expected him to be fat and happy by now.  Instead, he's still way to thin, but I guess still seems happy.  Our vet says as long as he's eating and he's still happy, then things are ok.  Still sucks though. 

Chemo Increase

After our scare last time with the free floating liquid in Rumble's abdomen, my vet decided to up his chemo by 10%.  That sounded ok to me.  He wants to find the balance between the most medicine possible with the least amount of side effects.  Well, I think there were side effects. 

As you know anyone on chemo vomits; so does Rumble.  We like giving him the Mirtazepine pill for nausea because it also has an appetite stimulant.  Well, this last week Rumble vomited so often that we had to combine both the pill and the liquid anti-nausea medicine (Metaclopramide).  It still didn't work all the time.  He puked probably twice as much as he normally does and I think the vomit changed.  It is usually pretty clear because I think it's mostly made of drool and few bits of food.  This time it was dark brown and smelled horrible.  I was not happy.

So, after vomiting both weeks during his drug holiday, I asked for the chemo to be taken back down by 10%.  They agreed.  This is week one of round five of his chemo treatments.  We are only doing five rounds this time, so I'm really looking forward to this all being over for awhile. 

They have changed how they are administering the chemo.  It was originally 2 chemos, 4 hours apart, but that meant putting him under anesthesia twice and Rumble was really beginning to fight the second anesthesia.  So, now they are giving one, waiting 20 minutes, and giving the second.  You all know there is no set guideline to follow with this disease.  I asked if this would hinder Rumble and my vet explained the first chemo breaks down the cancer cell walls and defenses.  The second chemo kills the cells.  So, is 20 minutes enough time for the first chemo to act before putting in the second chemo, he really doesn't know.  But, that's what he has decided is best for Rumble at this time. 

Rumble did not gain any weight, which I was really disappointed to hear, but he also did not lose any weight.  With the change in his vomit over the past two weeks, I was ok with that.  We have his second week of round five chemo this Friday.  I'm really looking forward to it all being over.  We will have a 6 to 8 week break before we bring him back in for an ultrasound and decide on our next plan of attack. 

Thanks for keeping Rumble in your thoughts and prayers.

Weight Gain

We found out Rumble gained 0.25 pounds this week.  That's great; a fourth of a pound in a week is awesome.  He now weighs 0.1 MORE than he did when he went in for surgery back in April.  We are on an upward slope and climbing steadily. 

Chemo was good.  "Unremarkable" is always the term you want to hear.  That means his blood was within normal parameters and chemo went just fine.  I always enjoy it when my checkout papers say "unremarkable" at the top. 

Two weeks off and we start round 5.  Then our vet thinks Rumble will get a month to 6 weeks off, we will bring him in for his ultrasound sometime, and decide after all that, what to do.  Maybe chemo once a month?  Who knows?  Let's all just cross our fingers that he has another great two weeks off during his drug holiday and gains at least another 0.6 pounds like he did last time. 

Good News

Well, my vet called around 4pm Saturday and said after having everyone in the pathology department take a look at Rumble's slides....they decided they were NOT cancer cells.  Prayers answered! 

He said they were not the normal cells that they were looking for so they had a hard time identifying them.  What they were looking for, I don't know, but he said they were the cells that line the inside of your abdomen, kind of like your skin on the inside.  He didn't expect them to be loose and free floating in this liquid so that's why it took so long to identify them. 

Soooo, YAY!  Not cancer cells like he thought but he said the liquid is still a concern because no one should have extra liquid just floating around in their abdomen.  We have another ultrasound scheduled in 6 weeks. 

We have week 2 of round 4 of chemo on Friday so I guess it will be back to business as usual.  Thanks for your thoughts and prayers. 

Good news - Bad news

Good news - Rumble had a great two weeks and gained weight.  0.6 pounds YIPEE!  That's great for a cat at his current weight.  We must have found the correct balance between the enzymes on his food and the enzymes we mix into a slurry and shoot down his throat after each meal. 

Bad news - They did an ultrasound of Rumble's abdomen to see how things were looking and our vet saw some free floating liquid that's not supposed to be there.  He thinks it's coming from the pancreas and the cells do not look normal.  There in the waiting room, in front of other people, he told me he thinks it is most likely cancer cells because they didn't look normal to him.  They drained the liquid (about 5ccs) and are testing it for carcinoma cells and they will give me a call tonight or tomorrow. 

Apparently, when the pancreas is diseased with cancer, it just crumbles and pieces dissolve and break off and just float around.  So our vet thinks he has some cancer cells just floating around in his abdomen looking for an organ or wall to attach to.  That's why pancreatic cancer is so bad and usually involves other organs.  This sounds horrible and our vet said it is not good news. 

He will increase Rumble's chemo by 10% since his body/blood seems to be tolerating it so well.  We just started round 4 of 5.  I was hoping to be done soon.  He said we might also add another oral drug to be administered at home, but didn't explain any further. 

He considers Rumble a success story, but I'm just not feeling it today.  I went in with such high hopes because I knew he had a great two weeks and had put on weight.  I watched a family of four today in the waiting room learn that their dog has some sort of pancreatic lymphoma and I broke down watching them break down.  It hurts so much and I'm so tired of bad news. 

Please send Rumble prayers and energy that these cells are anything in the world besides cancerous or that they respond well to the uppage of chemo.  Thanks for thinking of us!

A Good Week

FINALLY, Rumble has had a good week.  We seem to have had two bad weeks in a row and I was really worried about having to put in that feeding tube, but Rumble has just been great this week so I'm hoping we don't have to. 

I almost don't want to post because I don't want to jinx him. 

We've changed two things recently so I'm not sure which one to attribute it to.  One, Rumble is on a new canned cat food from Hill's Prescription Diet called i/d Feline Gastrointestinal Health.  This is a description from their website:  "Dietary indiscretion, food allergies, or lack of digestive enzymes can affect your cat's digestive health. Efficient digestion is essential for your cat to be able to build and repair tissues and obtain energy, and for these reasons it is important to feed a food that is formulated to help support digestive health.

At Hill's, nutritionists and veterinarians have developed clinical nutrition especially formulated to help manage cats with digestive health problems. Due to its easily digestible ingredients, Prescription Diet® i/d® may also be helpful for cat recovering from gastrointestinal upset and routine surgery."

Rumble loves it.  He is eating it just as well as he ate the Whiskas Wet Food Packets.  I'm really excited.  I will shop around to find the lowest price, but our vet carries it all the time for around $30 a case and each case holds 24 cans, I'm guessing.  Rumble started eating about a can a day but the last few days, he's eaten 2 cans a day and I'm loving it!  EAT, BABY, EAT!

Second, we have started giving Rumble half of his digestive enzymes through a syringe, mixed with tuna juice that I like to call his "slurry".  The other half is sprinkled on his food and mixed in; hopefully the smaller amount allows the food to smell and taste a little better.  As I've said before, it's not the easiest giving a cat a liquid medicine, but some combination of the new food and the slurry mix have worked because Rumble has had the best, solid poop he has had in months.  And, he's only going once, maybe twice a day so the food is staying in his system longer and getting more properly absorbed.  YAY!  Before this, he was going 4 times a day or more and it was pure liquid. 

In my opinion, he has put on weight this week and my husband even commented last night that his coat looks richer and more like it used to.  His mouth ulcers haven't bled since my last post.  This was a drug holiday week for him so I think that probably helped.  He has chemo again on Friday of next week, but that's still another 7 days for him to recover and put on more weight.