Sickness

I'm sick, sick, sick.

And not in a good way.

I spent all yesterday on the couch, blowing my nose and wishing my head would just pop off and float away. It got worse as the day went on, and by the evening my whole body ached. I woke up feeling a little better this morning, but I'm getting weaker as the day goes on. I took the day off work. I really need to get back to work tomorrow, but it will be a miserable day if I still feel like I do today.

I caught the cold/flu bug at my sister's over the Thanksgiving weekend. I often catch stuff when I'm around my nephews and nieces, who pick up diseases at school and bring them home. I don't mean that my nieces are particularly germy, but schools are breeding grounds for germs and anyone who comes into contact with kids will get whatever's going around.

The last time I was this sick was last January during the semester break. SnarkEx and I came home from the family Christmas gathering (again, at my sister's) and she promptly got sick. I caught it a few days later. I was out of circulation for an entire week. (My recovery might have been quicker if I hadn't played tennis when I thought I was getting better. I pushed myself too hard and almost passed out driving home. I learned my lesson, though, and postponed a match I was supposed to play yesterday.)

This is the first time I've been sick since SnarkEx moved out. Last night I had to call my brother to moan at him.

But my health problems are nothing compared to SnarKitty. I had to take her to the pet emergency room on Saturday.

Because of her fragile health, I took her with me to Thanksgiving. I kept her on my lap for three hours as I rode with my brother's family to a neighboring state. While she was at my sister's, SnarKitty developed an abscessed tooth which bloated one side of her face and made her leak a stinky yellow liquid that smelled like death. I took her to the pet ER when I got home, and they diagnosed the problem.

It's clearing up with antibiotics, so now I just have to worry about her rapid weight loss. Between Tuesday and Saturday she'd lost more weight-- now she's dropped below five pounds. At her prime she was over nine pounds.

She's dying. I talked to her vet this morning who said the only care I can give her at this point is to make her comfortable. I finally brought up the phrase "putting her down" and he said that as long as she wasn't in pain, which he didn't think she was, there's no reason for that yet. But she can't keep losing weight and live, right? Will she keep fading away until she disappears? I have a pretty good idea what's going to happen, but I don't know how it's going to go down.

For today we're spending a sick day together on the couch.