Last night, I slept in 20 minute increments.

Every 20 minutes, Jason's new CGMS would sound an alarm because it's still calibrating, and I'd be woken by extremely loud electronic shrilling.

Jason got up at 7:30 to drop Olive off at the vet for surgery* & X-rays. Nox was so distressed at Olive leaving in her carrier that he cried and cried and cried. Usually if I come out and lay on the couch, he cuddles up into my belly and calms down, but he absolutely would not, so I couldn't sleep. I was frustrated almost to the point of tears.

Today is the day I absolutely cannot switch or call out at the metals shop. I'm hoping a cool shower and a coffee will be enough to help me eke through the day. Because with very little sleep (an I think interrupted sleep is worse than getting a solid but small amount of rest), plus the anxiety of Bean being at the vet, it is not gonna be an easy day.


* She's just getting spayed. Everyone assumes that Olive has already been spayed because she never goes into heat. Not so. She has never gone into heat. Now, she may be going into a silent heat, which is really rare, but Nox doesn't react to her the way he reacted when Mim was un-spayed... so I'm kinda dubious about that. The vet told us to hold off until the end of summer to see if she was just a late bloomer, but at a year and change, we all decided to just do it as a preventative measure. Olive is a total fluke of a cat.

Olive is back. She's woozy and tired and the vet suggested quarantining her for seven days instead of the usual one or two. She got the full princess treatment and has several days of pain meds, to boot.

The x-rays showed definite abnormalities in her spine. About three, maybe four, of her vertebrae are developmentally malformed. The vet said that he sees that from time to time in dogs, and it's called Wobbler's Syndrome, but this is the first time he's seen it in a cat. He's going to show the x-rays to some of his specialist colleagues just to make sure that there's no cause for alarm, because otherwise it's a watch-and-wait sort of thing. She could stay as-is and have a great quality of life. Things could get worse and require drugs or surgery. Nothing is definite, so we just have to watch her.

Still, I'll pick that over a spinal infection any day.

Bean is going to be given the honor of staying in our bedroom with us, and being transferred to the studio when I'm working so she's not alone all day. She's got a shaved belly and a little lion's paw where they had to shave one wrist in order to insert an IV.

11. I'm grateful for a really thorough, gentle, and patient vet who treats Olive like our four legged child, and not just any ol' cat.