goodbye Jellybean

I've felt like part of me has been missing this week and really there has been.

I got out of hospital Monday afternoon and spent the evening with Chris and the dogs. Jelly seemed fine that night but by morning she was a lot sicker. Chris had spent a lot of time up and down during the night with her and when I woke just after 7 she had been coughing for a while. (Coughing is a sign in congestive heart failure dogs that their lungs are filling with fluid).

Chris gave her extra medicine in the hopes that would slow her heart and begin to dry out her lungs but it didn't help so around 7.30 we decided to drop her at our local vets to be put on oxygen and for the vet to see her when she got in.

We had already discussed what we would do if she had another coughing episode so we knew in a way what was going to happen, we were just waiting for the vets confirmation. Around 9am Lucy (critical care vet) called Chris and confirmed our worst fears, Jelly had reached the point where medicine would do nothing more for her. We agreed we would head to the vets and do what we needed.

Waiting at the vets was almost as hard as saying goodbye, we decided to pay the bill before we went through to the consult room so that way we could easily leave. We had to sign a consent form for them to give her the drugs but I just couldn't do it, I felt like I was signing her death sentence (which it essentially is) so Chris had to sign.

We were taken through to a consult room to wait while they brought her in, she was still in the oxygen box and looked so sad. Her little heart was working overtime and her chest was pounding. Lucy pulled her out of the box and gave her to me and we could just tell she was struggling to breath and wasn't comfortable. We had a few minutes with her alone to say goodbye and give her hugs.

Lucy came back in after a while and told us what would happen and began administering the drugs. So we sat there and held our girl as her heart slowed and then stopped and she took her last breath, in all it was less than 30 seconds and her pain was over but mine began.

We stayed there and held her for a while longer and said our final goodbyes. Lucy was wonderful through all of this; giving us privacy when we needed it and we could also tell it made her upset as well.

Eventually as much as I wanted to stay there with her I needed to leave so we gave our beautiful girl to Lucy and went home and cried.

We decided to have her cremated and had already picked Lawnswood to come collect her and bring her home. Jelly was delivered home to us on Friday morning and the reality really sunk in that she is gone.

I don't regret the choice we made as it was best for her but I just wish I had more time with her, I feel like I was robbed of those 2 weeks because I was in hospital. It's been difficult adjusting to life without her. Gizmo and Millie are grieving, Gizmo especially has been very quiet since Tuesday and has mostly just slept the days away and refuses to play with Millie.

Jelly was such a big part of our lives and such a big personality. She loved to chase cats and play with Gizmo, she dominated a Weimaraner and took crap from no one. But she loved nothing more than sitting on a lap and having her ears rubbed, she always turned to putty when she had her ears rubbed. 

my beautiful girl

a photo from the shoot we had done in October 2012

in her jammies this last winter, cuddled up with me on the lounge

 

the not happy new year

No witty puns or remarks to be had in this post.

I spent my new year in hospital, 14 days to be exact.

On the 28th December our oldest dog Jellybean became very sick late at night so I spent many hours at Murdoch Emergency Vets with her. We were told her heart murmur had developed into congestive heart failure. Over the rest of the weekend I went back to emergency vets and our local vet after she had more trouble breathing.

I'd been feeling down (energy wise) since the Friday and I was focussing more on looking after my girl than myself but by Monday there was no denying something was wrong, I'd nearly fainted at the vets office and just had zero energy. By the afternoon my temperature reached 39 so I had to head to the hospital.

Now I thought it would be a simple case of doing a couple tests, giving me some drugs and sending me on my way but I was wrong. Turns out I was febrile neutropenic (fevers and no immune system) and that's not a good thing.

So I was admitted that night (New Years Eve) under the impression that I would be there a couple days (wrong again). Thankfully being neutropenic meant I got a private room, don't think I could have survived 14 days in a shared room. Neutropenia is where your neutrophils (to do with your white blood cells and immune system) drop below a normal level. Normal neutrophil levels are between 1.5 and 7.5 and mine were 0.05 when I was admitted.

Not much else happened for a while. I sat around for days while they tried to take blood and put in new cannulas, my veins in my right arm have all pretty much gone caput. So after a week of begging they finally relented and organised for the PICC team to come and put a line in my arm so no more needles.

I had a CT, chest X-rays, ultrasound and a gallium scan (2 trips to Fremantle in ambulances were required for this) and all came back with no result as to where the infection started. All in all they still had pretty much no idea what it was that was making me sick. By sick I mean I felt fine but was having regular high temperatures, on a good day I'd have 2-3 temp spikes a day and on a bad more than 4.

Anyway I pretty much demanded I be discharged on Monday as I had been feeling fine for a couple days and felt no point in being there another 2 days. So at 5pm Monday the 14th January I was finally released from hospital.

My hair began falling out on my third day in hospital so on the Thursday night I had Chris shave my head to reduce the stress I was feeling about it. We were meant to have our fundraising headshave BBQ on the 6th but I was still in hospital so we had to cancel that. My beautiful friend Thanh and Chris's stepdad Darren have both shaved their heads too.

Chris and I with our baldies

Darren - Chris's step dad

Thanh Le