The Divine Mr. M

~As of yesterday afternoon, there is enough cash in the vet account to proceed with whatever this is going to be. Emotionally, I was unable to call them and schedule an appointment.

I just got up about an hour ago. I suspect I'll only be up for a another three hours or so. [I'm a mess] But I'll call this afternoon. *sigh* I'm immensely grateful to our Primary Donor...and massively ambivalent about what will come next.

~I called the vet and we're still at $380. That means we need at least another $370 to meet the halfway mark of $750.

The vet will go ahead with the operation once we have half the money. The end total will be $1500 for the entire procedure...if he does not have lungs spots.

So please call the vet and give as much as you can. Or send them a money order. Thank you all again. [Ignore the website for now]

Here's the vet info once more:
Mission Animal Hospital
845 West Palmdale Blvd.
Palmdale, CA 93551
661-526-1300
http://www.missionanimalhospital.org/
Ask for Michelle

His name is Icarus, and his owners are Leesa Hayes and Michael Daly.

~It's been two weeks since I composed the below. There's only a hundred bucks at the donation website, but there should be at least $380 at the vet, which is where we really need it. [I'll call them tomorrow and get the exact number] When we get double that amount – roughly half the total – the vet will proceed. So for now please donate directly to the vet. We can sort the rest out later.

So, here is the donation website again: https://www.giveforward.com/fundraiser/6ty2/icarus-leg-amputation-fund

And the vet info:

Mission Animal Hospital
845 West Palmdale Blvd.
Palmdale, CA 93551
661-526-1300
http://www.missionanimalhospital.org/
Ask for Michelle

His name is Icarus, and his owners are Leesa Hayes and Michael Daly.

A note on the vet donations. If we get roughly half the amount, they'll proceed with the surgery and we can pay them off as we go. That makes donations to vet preferable as such expedites the surgery. The website does not release funds until the fund raising goal is met, though we can change the amount later to reflect funds donated to the vet.

The site shows funding details with lovely graphics. I'll post a running vet total once a week with a raw number.

Meanwhile, I'm spending as much time with him as is reasonably possible, just in case we do have to send him over the bridge. If such is the case, we'd delete the website, which would refund that money and use whatever is left at the vet to take care of our other kitties' needs. Poor old Mauser still needs to be shaved for instance. *sigh*

And there you have it....

~Made the WinCo run yesterday morning early. It was still dark out. Spent a bundle, but we're well stocked now. It did knock the shit outta me. I napped through the afternoon and then was back in bed by 1am and slept thirteen hours.

I've been avoiding the whole fund raising issue I must confess. It seems to emotionally devastate me and leave me non-functional. So I had to back off or I'd get nothing else done at all. I'll have to suck it up and face that this coming week.

I have gotten quite a bit of work done on Chapter Three. It started pouring out right after the last time I bitched about not being able to write.

Not much else to say just now....

~At the beginning of July, the tumor was roughly the size of a chickpea. Now it is the size of a walnut, an angry purple/black walnut.

It seems I did in fact make the correct call, as much as any was possible, a month ago. Instead of excising the tumor, I opted for the chemical attempt to break it up. Unfortunately, that failed.

Here is the reasoning behind full amputation:

First: Because of its placement in the pad itself, it is highly probably the tumor will recur...which would lead to amputation anyway, along with more expense for us and suffering for him.

Second: Simply removing the foot would cause him to use the stump, which would irritate it and retard proper healing, etc. [see above]

These factors are why my first call was correct, though I did torture myself about that as we spent a week and a half shoving meds down his throat, poor baby, and the fucking thing kept growing.

There is a third issue here, something call Limb/Lung Syndrome. That is where tumor manifest both on the limbs and in the lungs. It is fatal. They're going to x-ray his lungs before surgery. If he has lesions, then we'll just send him over the bridge. [that's the part that gets me weeping]

So, here is the donation website again: https://www.giveforward.com/fundraiser/6ty2/icarus-leg-amputation-fund

And the vet info:

Mission Animal Hospital
845 West Palmdale Blvd.
Palmdale, CA 93551
661-526-1300
http://www.missionanimalhospital.org/
Ask for Michelle

His name is Icarus, and his owners are Leesa Hayes and Michael Daly.

A note on the vet donations. If we get them roughly half the amount, they'll proceed with the surgery and we can pay them off as we go. That makes donations to vet preferable as such expedites the surgery. The website does not release funds until the fund raising goal is met, though we can change the amount later to reflect funds donated to the vet.

The site shows funding details with lovely graphics. I'll post a running vet total once a week with a raw number.

Meanwhile, I'm spending as much time with him as is reasonably possible, just in case we do have to send him over the bridge. If such is the case, we'd delete the website, which would refund that money and use whatever is left at the vet to take care of our other kitties' needs. Poor old Mauser still needs to be shaved for instance. *sigh*

And there you have it....

~Okay, this is the plan. We're going to set up a page at this website to work on raising the money for Icarus. That will hopefully spread the net wider. As soon as it's up I'll link y'all and then please send it around

He's okay except for his foot. Same big loveable dope. He coat is shiny and his weight stable. He was just chasing a 'flying something' out in the hallway.

But he is limping badly and the thing is getting bigger and seeping blood. We've been cleaning it and putting coconut oil on it a few times a day. I cleaned it with hydrogen peroxide just a little while ago, though I don't want to do that too much because it is pretty harsh stuff.

It breaks my heart to see him hobbling around like that, yet otherwise healthy. I worry....well, shit I just worry. And cry.

~I took Icarus down to the vet this morning. I let Le-Le sleep because she wasn't feeling well last night.

The vet said the tumor has gotten bigger. So, essentially, I fucked up. I should have had him remove it three weeks ago. Now that operation would run close to a grand because they'll have to take off his small toe, which will require an over night stay, etc. Obviously, that ain't gonna happen.

It still hasn't hit me yet, that I fucked up, that I wasted all the fucking money y'all donated. But it will. Le-Le will try to talk me out of it...but I am wired to punish myself for my failures and it's really too late to change that.

Meanwhile, the big old ginger fool is lounging here in my room. He's just happy to be home again....

~We were going to make the vet run today, but neither one of us is doing all that well and it's already 99° out there. Even if we could handle that, the brake pads would be very unhappy. We'll go on Monday.

It's hard to tell how his foot is doing. Looks better one day, worse the next, the same the day after. We simply cannot judge. He is just fine on the surface, same big loveable dope, bounding around the house. He's especially happy now that the Evil Pink Shit [aka antibiotics] regime is over.

I woke up to the idea of massaging his foot with coconut oil on a daily basis. I did a Google and apparently it's highly recommended for furbabies in general. I'm thinking about making an early run to Lancaster when it's still cool to see if The Whole Wheatery has some at a decent price. It's worth a shot.

~The vet had renal failure concerns about the anti-inflammatory that he gave Icarus, said to watch for signs like peeing a lot, drinking a lot and listlessness. Hard to keep track of the first two with this whole mob, but I think he did pee a bit more than usual. However, he seems his same goofy self, though he's justifiably twitchy about Burrito Kitty Torture Time, poor thing.

There's just one more dose of the anti-inflammatory tonight and then it's just one more week of the nasty cherry shit [antibiotics] which he hates worse than death itself. Believe me, wrestling with a nineteen pound cat that obsofuckinglutly Does Not Want is no fucking joke.

The tumor still looks ugly and I cannot see any change. *sigh* But it's only been a week. And yeah, I've second guessed myself about going with meds instead of surgery more than once.

We're still about sixty bucks short of covering the vet bill but that won't bite until the end of the month.

~One of the things that makes dealing with this tumor issue tougher is that as long as I've known him Buckethead has always sounded and acted like a starving kitten who's been abandoned under a porch in the dead of winter. I suspect that's largely a result of his being a cat who thinks he's a dog. *sigh*