Pets Are for Life

8:10 am on a Tuesday. The annual routine checkup for the pets. I triple wrap a "sample" from the litter box before throwing it into my bag and wrestle both cats into their crates. Omen settles in mildly annoyed, but calm. Callie turns into a furry octopus, using all her limbs, and even her ears, to resist the cage. But I'm bigger, I've done this before, and I have the scars to prove it. I turn her around and slide her in tail first before she knows what's happening. The dog foolishly thinks we're going somewhere fun. He jumps around like a 100-lb JRT until we open the door and he bolts for the car, wagging with his whole body and looking back at us as if to say, "Let me in! Let me in!" 2 cats, the dog, our (human) toddler daughter, my husband and I finally set off to see the vet.

For routine care, we visit the vet clinic on base. The facilities are tiny and old, but the staff are as caring as any around. We start with the cats. Omen weighs in at 14.9 lbs, which is normal for him. He tolerates the exam well, growling a bit at the booster shots, but otherwise remarkably patient. He's great, except he needs his teeth cleaned. As any cat owner knows, that's a $200+ full anesthesia event.

Callie is a slender 11.9 lbs. Since last Thursday, one of her eyes isn't working properly, and it's obviously my primary concern. I tell the vet tech that from my (layman's) online research, it appears to be Horner's Syndrome. I'm pretty sure they hear owners declaring things like that all the time, and I'm equally sure she thinks I'm an idiot. Still, she can see the cat's eye is weird and calls in the vet. Callie's eye isn't dilating properly, and her third eyelid is partially closed. The vet suggests it looks like Horner's Syndrome (told ya!). There are several possible causes of Horner's, from head injuries to simple earaches. After an hour of consideration and discussion, we have a referral to an animal opthamologist. The only one in the state will be in our area on Friday. For one day. I think we're seeing him long enough to get an estimate.

Orion has already had all his shots. We brought him in primarily to establish his medical record on base and get his tags. Oh, and the daycare people reminded me he's due for a Bordetella booster. I accidentally called it a "Bordello" booster, which would be a great name for a fundraiser for poodles of ill repute, but did nothing to convince the vet tech of my intelligence. We're also out of one of his two medications. I write we "are" out because by the time all this happened I couldn't remember what we were out of, so I couldn't buy any more of it.

So one routine appointment and $100 later, we have 3 irritated animals, 2 more appointments to make to further annoy them, and at least one trip back to the vet to get the medication we couldn't remember. While all this was going on, I heard a staff member explaining the procedure for getting rid of heartworms to another pet owner. Apparently her newly rescued cat was plagued with them. The instructions weren't too awfully long so much as dire, and I watched the woman's face fall. I could only hope that she was so sad about her cat's condition, rather than overwhelmed to the point of abandoning the cat. In our case, the vet tech used the words, "if you choose to see the specialist" repeatedly, even after I assured her we would. I suspect she's seen more than a few humans give up on their animals. Well, not these humans. And not you, either, if you've read this far. My husband and I didn't even have to discuss it; of course the appointments were made, immediately. In the back of my mind there's an old bumper sticker I saw years ago... Pets are for life, not just for Christmas. The quality of their lives is our gift to them, a small repayment for all they do for us.