I had plans to go to writing camp this weekend and was rather looking forward to it. Three days to just write sounded so lovely. I had a whole thing in my head about all the work I would get done.
And my cat is quite ill. He has not eaten for three days now and started vomiting bile early this morning. He is not his usual talkative, snugly self. He’s feverish and lethargic and clearly sick, rather than just being a cat with a snit.
I spent a large piece of today taking him to the vet. So now I am also poor, as well as needing to cancel my plans.
And I feel very anxious for him. He got sent home with meds and instructions to baby him, keep a close eye on him, and be ready to rush him back over to the animal clinic.
And also I am disappointed for losing the plans I had.
Sometimes life just sucks like that.
I have enough cat experience that
we don’t just run to the vet for every little puke. Cats just do that from time to time. Hair balls. Ate too fast. I did, in fact, wake up to a shoe full of puke a few weeks ago. This is not the normal kind of cat puking. He is usually the cat who eats too much, too fast and then has to regurgitate it. Not eating at all and puking bile is concerning.
It is not like there is any blame to be placed for fault to be pointed at. Which is also just how life usually goes. Shit happens.
Shit happens. And the real question is how will I respond to it. Are my feelings going to get to run the show?
It is, of course, tempting to point out that cats are notorious for puking on your stuff when you go out of town for a few days. They are attached, emotional little creatures. He could be doing it “on purpose” to manipulate me. But the thing is, whether it is pets or people, he legitimately feels sick, whatever the cause. So I trusted my trust in him and took him to the vet.
He had a noticeable fever and slightly off bloodwork.
It is easy to try to dismiss a person’s or a pet’s illness as “emotional” and assume they’re lying or a hypochondriac or “it’s all in their head.” Which says a lot more about the person doing the dismissing than it does about the actual illness or suffering patient.
It is like the classic kid with a tummy ache who doesn’t want to go to school. And mysteriously as soon as you call the school and your boss he’s suddenly better. It is tempting, easy, to decide he just wants to skip school. But usually this is because there is something real going on at school that needs to be addressed. It is not that the kid was not really sick but that being allowed to stay home actually did help him feel better.
It is, of course, inconvenient to have to cancel plans.
I’m glad I have intentionally worked to build relationships with my kids and my pets where they know they can trust me when they feel ill. They know I won’t overreact, make it about me, blame them, or dismiss their symptoms. But that does not mean I don’t still feel worried or disappointed or inconvenienced or frustrated.
The kids are old enough to tell me clearly and specifically what’s wrong. But the cats are more like the kids were as babies: they communicate by their symptoms, by crying, by acting strange.
I know someone who insists babies are born liars. She believes when they cry in the middle of the night and are not obviously wet or hungry they are lying. Because she lacks the empathy to consider that emotional and social needs are legitimate needs. The idea that maybe the baby is just scared or lonely and is being 100% honest about it is beyond her thought process. Her reaction to a crying baby at 2am is about her discomfort rather than the child’s needs.
That example makes it easier to see how damaging it is to make another being’s suffering about one’s own discomfort or disappointment. I try to keep this in mind when someone is unwell: they aren’t doing it do bother me and how incredibly self-centered to assume that they are.
So yeah, I am disappointed about my changes of plans. And discomforted about having to clean up puke and spend much of the day on a vet visit. And it is not about me. I am allowed my feelings AND the ability to simply have them without being an ass because of them.
I’m not going to pretend this is an easy “make the best of it” of “find the silver lining” situation. I don’t even know for sure what is making him so ill. I’m anxious and worried, even knowing that worry will change nothing. These kinds of feelings are sometimes just a natural, normal, healthy part of being human.
I bottle-fed this cat when he was a bitty little thing I could hold with less than one hand. He sleeps curled up against my back every night. (Except the last two nights which is part of why I am worried.) He is a primary relationship in my life for well over a decade. Of course I am anxious.
Cleaning up vomit is not exactly the kind of thing we should try to have a positive attitude about. It is the kind of thing that should be, because it is, a signal that something is wrong.
I am not going to engage in magical thinking that if I just think happy thoughts he will be better. I am going to open a can of tuna and see if that lures him out for a lick to eat. The vet’s instructions were the cat equivalent of trying to get him so start eating a little bit, slowly, just like you do with the BRAT (bananas, rice, applesauce, toast(unbuttered)) diet for a human who has as a GI bug.
the liminal life of m 