Lucille Dumbrava

It is early morning, and I am sitting on the sofa with Tuffy Too trying to coax her to eat. The other cats are eating cans of Friskies on the kitchen floor, but Tuffy's bowl contains an expensive organic chicken and tuna pate. The special food and the coaxing are necessary to try to build her strength back up. She has cancer.

Tuffy Too had been looking thinner. This almost seems impossible since a year ago during her last illness, she lost three of the eight and a half pounds that had been her normal weight. But then I realize she is not eating at all. Of course, this happens on a Friday night, so by the time I call Dr. Patrick on Monday morning, she has gone days without food.

He examines her, his brows knit tightly, and although he chooses his words carefully, I can tell he's very worried. There is nothing obvious on the exam - except for her weight which is now less than five pounds, but he draws blood and then takes Tuffy into the back to give her some IV fluids. I take her home, and the wait for results is almost unbearable. He has explained that, based on what he sees, there is a strong possibility she has cancer. Finding something else wrong on the blood test would almost be good news.

The call comes early Tuesday morning. She needs to go to the veterinary hospital for scans to try and locate the problem. By Tuesday afternoon, she has been x-rayed and scanned and probed. The only option now is surgery to determine the cause. They decide to do it right away on Tuesday evening because they worry about bringing her out of the anesthetic and then putting her under again. At her age and in her condition, it's too big a risk.

I learn it is no easier waiting for surgery results when the patient is a cat. Waiting brings back too many memories of other waiting rooms in other hospitals. I try to lose myself in a book, but every noise, every voice, every door opening is a distraction. Pages are turned but the words do not penetrate.

When the surgeon finally emerges, I can tell right away there is no good news. Intestinal lymphoma, he explains. Treatable with chemo and prednisone. Very good results. Of course, there is no curing the lymphoma, but with treatment, cats have lived twenty-two months. Unspoken is the fact that Tuffy-Too is eighteen and in poor health to begin with. But the vet's words are positive and he seems encouraged by how well she did in surgery.

An hour later, I am taken to the back where Tuffy is recovering. She is in a cage that is piled high with blankets and she has fans blowing heat on her. A tube protrudes from her neck - her feeding tube, I am told. She is groggy and lethargic and when she moves, I get a brief glimpse of the surgery sutures from her chest to her groin. But then a nurse moves her slightly, and Tuffy draws her head back and responds with a loud hiss, and everyone laughs and claps. She's feeling a little feisty - a good sign.

Days later, I take her home, her weight barely registering in my hand. For the next few days, there will be tube feedings and pain injections and pills. I wonder if I've done the right thing. But, she is soon behaving, if not like her old self, at least more energetically, and when I pull her close, her purr is strong. The feeding tube gets eliminated, much to both our delight, and we settle into a routine of special foods, prednisone and chemo, and trying to get back to normal.

Normal is this: Eight or nine times a day, I take the bowl of food to Tuffy and encourage her to eat as much as she can. She occasionally wanders out to the kitchen and gives her bowl a few licks, but loses interest pretty quickly. The day after she gets the chemo - which is given every three days - she eats hardly anything. Her fur in all the areas they shaved (half of her neck, her entire front, her right front leg) is slowly growing back. She walks carefully and jumps even more carefully onto chairs or the sofa. She cries if picked up - I guess the surgery scars still hurt. She has started to purr again when I scritch her ears and the back of her neck.

Even hoping for the best, I will probably have her for just a year. But, every minute is precious, and I plan to be thankful for whatever time there is.

Lucille Dumbrava is a retired Teacher/counselor whose love of cats and love of writing started when she was a child. Many of her stories about the cats in her life have been collected in a book entitled CatHouse, now available from www.bookstandpublishing.com, Amazon, Alibris and local Northern California bookstores. You can also order directly from Lucille. She can be reached at Email