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Rest in Peace, my handsome little man.
Feb. 2nd, 2012 02:27 pm
Some of you probably already saw this on Facebook, but here is the sad news:
I came home on Tuesday night to find Calvin having trouble breathing. We brought him to the veterinary hospital emergency room and x-rays showed cancer all throughout his lungs. We left him there overnight so that he could stay on oxygen and oncology could look at him first thing.
The oncologist called around 7:30 Wednesday morning and confirmed that Calvin's prognosis was very bad - he had extensive and systematic cancer, did not recommend chemotherapy, and believed he would only live a week, at best. She did not even recommend him coming home for a bit because being off oxygen caused him distress. Nick and I spent some time with him and said goodbye around 12:30PM. He lived a long, full, and adorable life.
We are both very sad, but it is a small consolation that it happened so fast and there was such certainty about his prognosis. His last blood panel had just been 9 months ago, which means this all happened since then. In fact, if we'd caught it earlier we probably would have tried treatment, despite the fact that it was clearly an aggressive and deadly cancer, which would have just caused more suffering.
Everyone has been so wonderful - Calvin clearly meant a lot to a lot of people and that helps tremendously. It was a wonderful 15 years with my handsome man.
The first week I got Calvin, back in 1997:
Some of you may remember his litter mate, Kool Thing, who passed from renal failure when she was 7:
Nick and I took some pictures before we said goodbye. Calvin's breathing was a little labored and he wasn't too active, but otherwise he seemed ok and happy to see us, purring the whole time - right up until the end.
I came home on Tuesday night to find Calvin having trouble breathing. We brought him to the veterinary hospital emergency room and x-rays showed cancer all throughout his lungs. We left him there overnight so that he could stay on oxygen and oncology could look at him first thing.
The oncologist called around 7:30 Wednesday morning and confirmed that Calvin's prognosis was very bad - he had extensive and systematic cancer, did not recommend chemotherapy, and believed he would only live a week, at best. She did not even recommend him coming home for a bit because being off oxygen caused him distress. Nick and I spent some time with him and said goodbye around 12:30PM. He lived a long, full, and adorable life.
We are both very sad, but it is a small consolation that it happened so fast and there was such certainty about his prognosis. His last blood panel had just been 9 months ago, which means this all happened since then. In fact, if we'd caught it earlier we probably would have tried treatment, despite the fact that it was clearly an aggressive and deadly cancer, which would have just caused more suffering.
Everyone has been so wonderful - Calvin clearly meant a lot to a lot of people and that helps tremendously. It was a wonderful 15 years with my handsome man.
The first week I got Calvin, back in 1997:
Some of you may remember his litter mate, Kool Thing, who passed from renal failure when she was 7:
Nick and I took some pictures before we said goodbye. Calvin's breathing was a little labored and he wasn't too active, but otherwise he seemed ok and happy to see us, purring the whole time - right up until the end.
