Wednesday, 14 April 2010

A Day Tinged With Sadness

As well as having 2 lapphunds, and looking after many others, we have also spent the past 7 years in the company of 2 cats. Brother and sister Sam and Lucky came to us from the RSPCA as three year old cats that had never been outdoors. They quickly settled themselves in and have been part of the furniture for 7 years. Their noses were put out of joint a little by the arrival, back in 2006, of Mylo, but since then have become dog tolerant.

Four weeks ago we discovered a lump on Sam's shoulder and around his chest - a visit to the vet saw us informed that he had cancer. We discussed the options open to us, one of which was spending a small fortune with no guarantee that he would be any better. We decided to make Sam's last weeks as comfortable as possible and have been amazed at how he had stubbornly refused to give in to his illness. Yesterday, however, we decided that the time had come to do the right thing and give him a dignified end to his full life.

It wasn't easy for Lou and I, lots of tears were shed, however Sam is now pain free. Run free in Rainbow Valley - Milly will have been waiting for you.

As well as saying goodbye to Sam we also said cheerio to Wheeto - leaving us with Obi as our only guest. Dogs are remarkable creatures because they have been so calm since Louise's and my return from the vets - it's almost as if they new something was remiss. Accordingly yesterday evening was very relaxed and, perhaps more importantly, this morning was very quiet.

With no invalid on the bed the decision was made to let the dogs upstairs. I think Obi appreciated it and will hopefully look forward to his next visit - he goes home today and he too will be missed :-(

Lappy days

1 comment:

Normy said...

You certainly did do the right thing. I work with people with cancer and they can understand that the treatment that they are going for will hopefully have a payoff in the future, but cats live in the present moment, and it would just have been torture. This way he got to be with you and not go through all the suffering that cancer treatment brings. We had our little dog put to sleep early February with liver failure and I suspected cancer with her too. I really feel for you and your family.