Luckie Kitty's Tail

June came and with it another crisis of sorts. We knew the tube was going to need to be replaced soon and were talking about trying to get that scheduled with Jen McClellan. She was going to put in a low-profile tube which would get rid of the foot and a half of tubing that had to be secured with bandages all the time. But before we could make that happen, we awoke one morning to find that the tube had split open. Damn! As soon as the vet's office opened up, I called. Jason McClellan wasn't in. But keeping our fingers crossed had worked, and Mary Ann Sanfilippo was working there now and she was in. That was the good news. The bad news was that Jen McClellan was out of town. Dr. Sanfillipo did some calling around to try to find someone who could replace the tube. Unfortunately, the closest place she could find was in Woburn, Massachusetts. This was definitely not the way this was supposed to happen.

We packed up Luckie and headed to Massachusetts. When you've become accustomed to working with veterinary staff who know the history of your case, it is frustrating to have to see an unfamiliar vet. They wanted to do more blood work even though they had the result from the blood work she had the previous week. How about we do an ultrasound on her heart while we're at it? It's been a couple of months since she's had one of those! And in the midst of this, Luckie feels fine, so she's spunky as hell, hissing and growling. We did not have them do the ultrasound but did acquiesce to their desire to do blood work. So, they tell us to leave her with them for a few hours and they'll pull out the old tube and put in a new one. Excellent. We went out and got some lunch. Shortly after lunch they called to say that they took out the old tube and can't get the new one back in because they can't find the hole in the stomach wall. Do we want them to put her under and go in with a scope to replace the tube? Our knee jerk reaction was yes. After we got off the phone and started talking about it, neither of us felt good about doing that. Luckie was eating on her own quite a bit. Do we put her through this with the unknown condition of her heart? This turn of events had essentially tripled their estimate of cost and although if we felt that she truly needed this, we would incur the costs, it seemed like the tube was more of a convenience for us than a necessity for her. We called them back within minutes, told them not to replace the tube and get her ready to go home. She would have to eat on her own. We would have to learn how to get medicine into her without a tube, and most devastating for me, was learning how to cope with losing the sense of control that the tube provided.