girl in greenwood

Booshka was a remarkable cat. He was extraordinarly in tune with his people and valued the time he spent with us. R* and I both firmly believe that he lived as long as he did because he loved being with us so much.

R* got Babooshka in 1988 in Washington DC. R* was much younger then and actually bought a black kitten at a pet shop as an accessory for the outfit that he was wearing to go out clubbing that night. The next morning, R*'s roommate J* awakened him by announcing "Your cat just shit on my rug." R* said, "What cat?!" not remembering that he'd bought a kitten the night before. That kitten was Booshka, named after a Kate Bush song. (Although he kind of stopped answering to Babooshka and liked Booshkaboo better.) After that rather casual meeting, R* and Booshka were inseperable for the next 18 years. R* took Booshka to several different apartments, even asking his friend Z* to keep Booshka safe in her bedroom when R* was between permanent places to live.

Fittingly for the cat of a musician, Booshka enjoyed music a lot. He would even tap his tail to jazz music (specifically jazz music). R* and I had the thought that Boo was a reincarnated old jazz cat like Thelonius Monk. Can't you just imagine him with a beret and hipster glasses, if he were a human? When R* rehearsed on his guitar in the living room, Booshka would sit near him or even under his stool and close his eyes and listen. His favorite CD was Jazz, My Romance by Ron Carter. It's a mellow acoustic jazz record, just bass, guitar, and piano. We played it for him during his last couple days at home and he snoozed on the couch and listened.

In 1997, I moved in with R* and Booshka and Kadydid. Booshka took his time warming up to me, but eventually decided that I was The Girl and was nearly as good a human as R*. He turned to me for butt scratching, for feeding and watering, for playing with the string, and for sleeping on my feet. As time went by, he decided that my lap was just about as good as R*'s. And best of all, I bought The Brush and started using it on Booshka. He could hardly believe that he had gone 8 years without a brush in his life!

After R* and I got married, we moved into a house for the first time in Booshka's life. He was thrilled with having more space, and stairs, and more privacy in the litterbox, and hardwood floors for better mousie-chasing, and a backyard in which to enjoy the sun and chomp grass. Plus he'd never experienced forced-air heat before, and would spend every winter parked in a cat bed (aka the kitty bucket) in front of a heating vent with his nose millimeters from the grate, purring while the warm air blew on his face.

The most amazing thing about Booshkaboo was that he really listened to his people. He would almost always come when called, or at least meow to let us know where he was. He understood "no" and "get down" and "come here" and "sit down" and actually complied with those instructions. Not like a dog does tricks, but as though we were really communicating. He also was the emotional barometer in the house - if R* and I were fighting, he would look between us with a worried expression, and if we didn't cool it, he would leave the room. If one of us got angry (like swearing at the computer) he would hide under the bed. One of our friends was over for pizza one night, and Booshka was sniffing at her plate. R* said, "Booshka! That's our guest's food and it's rude to bother her." And Booshka backed off and sat down. She was amazed that Boo seemed to really understand.

In these last few months, Booshka clearly decided to live life to the fullest. He became interested in human food of all kinds after years of ignoring everything we ate. He particularly liked the crumbs from chocolate chip cookies and scones. He licked plates with caesar salad dressing on them, sampled pasta, and closely observed every bite of a burrito I had for lunch one day. His other favorite activity was chomping on R*'s shoelaces - whenever he got a new pair of shoes, Booshka would enthusiastically chomp the laces. Every time a door was left open, Booshka would be in the doorway or tiptoeing outside to sniff and explore and eat grass. Over this past summer he got so enthused about going outside and sampling the local flora that one day he passed out a dandelion. He appraised everyone who came into the house, and if he found them acceptable, would try to coax them to scratch his butt while he ate from his bowl. Our friend A* took it up a notch when she brushed his butt while he ate. PURRRRRRRRRR, he said. Oh, and Boo completely stopped having any respect for his people being otherwise occupied. He pushed textbooks off my lap so he could sit there. He plopped down between us in bed and shoved one or both of us to make enough room for himself. He got up on the table to inspect our interesting human food more closely. It was hilarious to see his personality change - he seemed so much like an elderly human who has decided they don't need to follow society's constraints anymore.

Booshka used up all nine of his lives, and in fact required more medical care than many humans-of-pets might have tolerated. But he was always such a part of the family that we never hesitated to do what was necessary for his health. And it was kind of a lot... [Edited because I'm not sure that anyone really cares about the details of Booshka's illnesses other than me & R*. Short version: Boo had flea allergies, irritable bowel syndrome, benign skin tumors, acid reflux, and insulin-dependent diabetes and we treated all of 'em.]

The last two days he wouldn't eat. He would only drink water, chicken broth, or the juice from canned tuna fish. He had enjoyed food so much his entire life that we were sure this was the end. When we took him to the vet to let him go, she palpated his abdomen and found a mass near his stomach (could've been stomach, pancreas, small insestine...) that was obviously painful. And so it was clear that the right thing to do was let him go peacefully before he suffered any more. It was so hard and so sad, even though it was the compassionate thing to do.

Our friend Em wondered if he'd been reincarnated immediately, or if there was a delay for processing and paperwork. All I can say is that I hope Booshka's next life is a fantastic one, because he sure was a joy in this life.

Labels: Booshka, cats, end of life

Labels: Booshka, cats, end of life

All I can think about right now is nursey stuff. If it's not the papers I have to write, the procedures I have to do in clinical, or the drugs I have to memorize, it's the nursing care of Elderly Kitty. Who is hanging in there, but still needs lots of attention.

This week in clinical I pulled a drain from a surgical incision, removed a Foley catheter, and passed meds. My clinical group also went to a flu shot clinic at the hospital and gave injections. I was super nervous but it went just fine. Although the first person I injected was this very skinny old man and I felt the needle bump into his bone. He didn't flinch, though, and I just eased the needle back a little bit and aspirated (no blood) and injected the vaccine. Aaaugh. The other shots I did went picture-perfect, and in fact the last patient told me "I didn't feel a thing!".

Tomorrow morning I've got an exam for which I need to know a metric assload of drugs. I'm hoping I don't just blank out - I've done my best to learn them in a short amount of time. If only there was a way to pipe stuff directly inside my head!

Friday was a super-long day - got up at 5:30, went to clinical, went to flu clinic, dropped off M* at the park & ride, took J* back to his car by my house, changed out of my scrubs, shot up Elderly Diabetic Kitty, went to R*'s gig on Capitol Hill, had a beer (hallelujah!), hung out with some friends of friends who all turned out to be nurses, talked shop, balanced my caffeine level with Diet Cokes, ate dinner, drove home because R* had a lovely cocktail with dinner, passed PM meds for Elderly Kitty, and collapsed into bed.

Since then I've basically just studied. And ran a couple errands. And had a nice breakfast out with R* today. Time to do it all again tomorrow.

The little boy I babysit for is nearly two, and is talking but mostly in one-word declaratives. When he's finished with something (eating, playing with a particular toy, swinging on the swings, etc), he announces "all done!" and moves on to the next thing. Last week he'd had a rough night and on the way home from playtime he sniffled and said, "....aaaaallll dooonnnne...." in this very sad voice. He was just worn out. I told my carpoolmates about it, and on Friday while we were driving M* back to the park & ride, J* shut his eyes and announced, "All. done." M* and I just cracked up because we so knew what he meant.

Labels: babysitting, Booshka, nursing school

Mr. Black Cat is doing much better. He's not back to 100%, but he seems much more like his old self. Just like any elderly patient, he's up to 4 different meds administered at 3 different times of day. And yes, I have to wipe his butt on occasion. Although at least this IBS flare-up has not been nearly as disgusting as the last one. I'm not expecting that he's going to live years longer or anything, but I do think he'll be with us for a few more months. Today he wanted to sit on my lap and sniff every single bite of my lunch before I put it into my mouth. This is a good sign.

Okay, as for the brainstorm - I didn't have one, I'm asking for your help with one! I have to present an article to my clinical group at post-conference on Friday. I'm totally fine with the article and the speaking part, but I'm supposed to use a "visual aid" and I'm drawing a blank. The topic of the article is prescribing a "range order" for painkillers and why it's important for nurses to advocate for range orders for their patients, and how to use these orders to keep patients as comfortable as possible. In case you are as clueless as me (I just learned this today!), a range order is a prescription, typically for pain medication, that allows the nurse to use her judgement about how much to administer based on the patient's status and the situation. For example, the doctor might write an order for morphine, 1-4 mg/hour by IV, as needed for pain. This would give the nurse the leeway to crank up the patient's dose to 4 mg/hour if the patient was in terrible pain, or to crank down the dose to 1 mg/hour if the patient was getting groggy and the pain was long gone.

So yeah, I don't need to recap the whole article for you - just tell me what you think I could do VISUALLY to help with this presentation! I don't have access to a computer or overhead, so it's gotta be something I can just hold up, pass around the table, or tape to the blackboard. The only idea I've had so far is to bring some kind of tiny candy, like smarties or jellybeans, and use them as "units" to demonstrate how I could dose 2 different patients with the same range order...?

Any ideas would be appreciated!

Labels: Booshka, cats, nursing school

Mr. Black Cat gave us a scare this weekend... Friday night we were out late because R* had a gig, and we went out for dinner after he played. When we came home, I gave Booshka his usual nighttime pill and we went to bed. Then he woke us 3 times in the night because he was throwing up. Saturday morning he refused to eat and was very weak. We were really worried about him and took him to the vet, where we saw our very favorite doctor... and she examined him and said it is most likely a flare-up of his irritable bowel disease, and that extra steroids and antacids should make him feel a lot better. They gave him some fluids and took blood and urine samples just to make sure that nothing else is going on. When we got home from the vet, Booshka ate a little bit and then went to sleep. But he wouldn't eat in the evening when he normally gets his insulin, and he just ate a tiny bit at bedtime.

This morning, though, he hopped out of bed at 6:00 and asked for breakfast. So I fed him and gave him his insulin injection, and an extra steroid/antacid dose to keep his tummy from hurting. So far, he seems like he's bouncing back.

Last time this happened, about a week later he had an explosion from the hind end that necessitated daily baths for a few days. We're hoping to avoid that this time around with the extra steroids before the explosion. Keep your fingers crossed, because that was just gross, even for an experienced butt-wiper like me.

Labels: Booshka, cats

Mr. Black Cat gave us a scare last night. He's been doing really well with his insulin treatment for his diabetes - he's gained weight, gotten stronger, and has even started to play with toys again. So we were shocked yesterday when he vomited 6 or 7 times between 9:00 AM and 4:30 AM. He woke us every two hours going "owowowowowooooo" and then barfing violently. He was obviously miserable, poor guy, so we took him to the vet this morning. They gave him some fluids and some injections to settle his stomach (an acid reducer and an esophageous-constricter). The vet said he could come home but needed to not eat anything for several hours, a plan that Mr. B did NOT approve of. Since then he's had a chance to eat, and there has been no barfing since 4:30 this morning.

It may be too soon to make a declaration, but it looks like today is not the day that B is going to bite it or take a turn for the worse. In fact, the vet (who diagnosed B's diabetes but hasn't examined him since) exclaimed, "You look good!" when B first got out of the carrier.

And another thought? If having a newborn baby is similar, in that you have to wake up and take care of a small creature every two hours, I'm not so sure about having one. I feel like crap warmed over today.

Labels: Booshka, cats

Mr. Black Cat went to the vet last Friday for all-day blood sugar monitoring after his first insulin injection of the day. He flunked - his sugar was too high all day long. So we've doubled his dosage starting on Saturday, and he's supposed to go back for another all-day monitoring session after two weeks.

Last night was the first time I've seen him act like he genuinely feels better - not just slightly better, but actually good. While I was cooking dinner, I heard "Meerrrroow!" issuing from the office, accompanied by the scratching sound that means he's either stretching up against the wall (like you see leopards do against trees in nature programs) or trying to open the wardrobe. So I called him and he came jogging out of the office, and I tossed him a fuzzy toy. He was thrilled, and proceeded to bat the toy around, pounce on it, bite it, and even shake it like he was breaking its nonexistent, fuzzy neck.

Labels: Booshka, cats