Thanksgiving 2025, Part II

 Today is Friday, November 28. Black Friday.

On Wednesday morning, Pete vomited up a bunch of water. I did not think much of it as he hadn't vomited in weeks, and he does do that sometimes when he drinks a lot of water all at once -- too much, and his stomach is just like "nope." 

On Wednesday night, Pete began getting sick. We could tell he was nauseous, and seemed lethargic. He didn't want much, if any, food. I was able to get some Churu down him after his pills, but he was beginning to look like he was in October when we thought we were going to lose him -- wobbly, ill, sleepy. We kept an eye on him out of concern, and gave him his IV fluids on schedule as per the usual. 

Yesterday morning, he had diarrhea and once more refused food. I once more coaxed a Churu into him, but he hadn't really improved. Since we knew he was having diarrhea, Daisy started him on the stomach meds that our vet had told us to get him taking if he experienced diarrhea again, and we gave him nausea meds as well as the appetite-stimulant ear gel so we could see if we could get him to eat. 

Yesterday morning, of course, was Thanksgiving. A holiday. If he decided to go south quickly -- as Maggie and Sadie did -- there would be little we could do. We began to wonder if this was it, if it was time to call it and throw in the proverbial towel, to schedule his end-of-life appointment. Again, we've prepared for this mentally for a long time, and we know the process and order in which things must be done. Pete had been doing so very well since he'd recovered from his sickness in October -- he was basically back to being normal old Pete. So, to have him start getting sick again -- even though we know that's how it's eventually going to end -- was disheartening and stressful on us. 

These cats seem to love getting sick around the holidays; Sadie began having her seizures on New Year's Eve last year, and I knew then her time was almost up. I asked her, kindly and gently, if she could wait until after the holiday. Foolish, selfish perhaps, to think I could ask that of her and expect her to not only understand but to comply, but she did -- she lasted until January 2nd, when she had her next seizure, and at least one other on the way to the vet, where we peacefully ended her suffering.

Of course, Thanksgiving is a hectic time for both myself and Daisy, but moreso Daisy -- we were so worried about Pete that we got a very late start to the day, and Daisy was to cook Thanksgiving dinner at the parents'. They'd said they preferred an earlier meal rather than a later one, so that meant we were sort of on a time schedule. Pete's health, of course, came first. When he went to the pan and had diarrhea, he came back into the living room, laid down on the floor, and cried.

Pete is and always has been a vocal cat, but he doesn't really cry out in pain, he cries out for attention and acknowledgment. He has always been very good at keeping his pain hidden. Crying out in pain, for him, means he has to feel really awful.

Adding to the stress and frustration here was this:

We knew this was coming. Every forecast we'd seen throughout the week was worse than the last; this storm wasn't going to miss us, it wasn't going to be lighter or nonexistent -- it was on its way and we couldn't do anything about it. The first storm of the season to usher in winter. 

You might be wondering why this was a concern to us. Well...if we get snowed in and roads become impassible and Pete were to take a turn for the worse, we couldn't get out to get him taken care of and we certainly would not expect the in-home euthanasia group to go out and make house calls in the middle of a blizzard. If he were to get worse and pass during the storm, we'd be stuck in the house with his corpse until we could get out to take care of it. 

This, as I told Daisy, was my personal worst-case scenario; it's not like we have anywhere to store a dead cat for a couple of days. The mere thought of that, of having his body locked in here with us, is horrifying to me. I couldn't even look at Sadie and Maggie once they were gone; the vets had to remove them from my presence because their bodies just being there, but without them inside those bodies, filled me with a sense of dread and doom and anxiety that I can't quite place. Pete, as my first cat, my oldest son, the first cat I've ever had really love me, will be so much worse -- no matter how much I prepare for it.

Daisy said that her best-case scenario would be for him to pass peacefully in his sleep while she held him in bed, knowing that he was warm and safe and loved. She has a bond with Pete that I will never fully have or understand; he is, as she calls him, her "soul cat." 

We started discussing plans. I told Daisy that if he wasn't getting better I was okay to just call it to prevent him from getting really sick again and prevent misery and suffering. I told her it is what it is, we don't have to be happy about it but it was going to be the eventuality sooner or later. If it was sooner, that was unfortunate, but there is not much we can do to stop it. 

She did not want to call it, and I understand that. I didn't either. I reminded her that if he took a dive, the soonest we could possibly expect any sort of real assistance for him would be Monday because of the storm. 

However.

Over the course of a few hours, he acted like he was starting to feel better. He got down and went to the pan and peed, which tells me good, his kidneys are still working at least somewhat, and went to drink water from the fountain in the kitchen. He was still getting around okay. He'd eaten the Churu. He'd gotten his pills, he'd drank some water, and was lounging on the couch. He would get up and follow us to the kitchen and hang out there while we were in there, and would follow us back to the living room when we went back in there. He also got up and laid down in the cat bed in the window, one of his favorite sleeping spots.

His movement and use of the pan and the fact that he did eat something gave Daisy the confidence she needed to be okay with leaving the house for Thanksgiving dinner with the parents. So, we packed up everything we needed and made the jaunt across town. Daisy set up the indoor cameras when we left so that we could track Pete's movements and if he ate/drank anything else while we were gone. 

About two hours or so after we got to the parents', I got a notification on my phone from the cameras. When I pulled it up, it was Pete sitting on the couch eating food/treats from the bowl of them I keep there, which made me feel much more at ease -- he was eating, he was existing normally and didn't seem to be on the struggle bus so much.

Dinner was wonderful; over the course of an hour or two, Daisy was able to get everything put together and made. The parents did not opt for a turkey, but instead had some ham that Dad said was quite good, and I took his word for it. Mama made her famous rolls, two different types of cranberry sauce, and a peach crumble from peaches from their own backyard trees, and even doubled down on desserts with a tray of muffins. Daisy made the vegan turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, carrots, corn, green beans, and her famous gravy. We watched the Chiefs lose to the Cowboys, and I napped on the couch for a bit after dinner. 

Eventually, we packed everything back up and came home, where I found Pete in the same place I'd last seen him -- on the couch with the bowl of food/treats. He came to greet us normally and we loved on him. We sat up with him for some time well into the overnight hours, and made sure he got another dose of fluids, a big bowl of probiotic broth (which he loved, and drank up almost all of) and some more Churus. He was, for all intents and purposes, mostly normal again. Daisy even saw him pee again in the pan, which tells me that again, his kidneys are still functioning as per the usual at the very least.

I came upstairs around 12:30 to decompress a bit, and Daisy followed soon after, bringing Pete up with her so he could sleep with her. She conked out quickly, and I wore myself down over the course of about two hours before I crashed out in my chair for some rest of my own. 

I was awakened around 8am by the hair dryer in the bathroom on the other side of the wall from my office. Daisy had not showered before bed last night because she didn't want Pete to leave and go back downstairs, so she woke up early and showered. At some point in the night he had wandered back downstairs, so when Daisy checked on him after her shower she noted that he seemed normal, there was no more diarrhea in the pan, and she gave him another dose of the nausea meds before coming back upstairs. 

I got up to go to the bathroom and she was looking at Black Friday deals in the dark on her phone. She ended up doing a fair amount of Christmas shopping for everyone -- apparently including me -- before rolling over and going back to sleep.

It takes me ages to wake up, of course; my body fights me, as I think its natural state is somewhere in the realm of "unconscious and dead to the world as much as possible at almost all times," so there are times (many times, in fact) that it just does not want to be awake and mobile. This worsens in the winter months as it feels like my giant, hairy bear body is just telling me to hibernate until the weather no longer hurts to exist in. 

To be fair, I had no real plans for the day; it's not like I leave the house anymore unless I have to, and the days of me getting up at 3am to be at the doorbuster Black Friday sales for places like Target, Best Buy, and Walmart are far, far behind me. The most active I planned to be for the day was to shower and get something to eat, and do some laundry.

And dye my hair.

I had browsed, over the course of the week, some early Black Friday deals on various websites. One of the most obvious, of course, was Amazon. During the week I'd jumped on stuff on sale that I knew would go out of stock quickly as well as just normal household supplies that happened to be Black Friday deals. I got, for example, a new pair of Hey Dude shoes. Do I need a new pair of Hey Dudes? No, not at the moment, but I will eventually. Nevermind that I have two other pairs I've ordered on similar sales that are still in the box. Shh. We don't need that kind of negativity in our lives. 

Anyway, the stuff I'd already picked up ranged from wet wipes to fabric softener to packing tape -- just stuff I'd normally get at regular intervals anyhow -- and then I saw that my Clenditioner hair dye was on sale for half off. 

Now, to be fair, I haven't re-dyed my hair nor have I done anything to it since before visiting my parents in North Carolina in August; I'd dyed it so much and with multiple colors before eventually just covering everything up with black so many times that my hair was fully saturated with dye and was taking legit months to wash out/fade out. As it has faded in the time since, my normal brown-and-gray has begun peeking through at the roots and temples, and the rest has faded out to a dark black-blue that shimmers with green in direct sunlight or otherwise intense light. I actually liked the way it looked, even with the faded green in it, so I just figured I'd let everything wash out naturally and when I wanted to change up my look again, I would.

Well, when they put the dyes on sale for Black Friday, I was interested. I picked up a bottle of silver blue, two more pump bottles of black, and a bottle of Arctic Fox's "Blue Jean Baby," which is their midnight blue dye that mixes well with black as well as other colors. On Wednesday, I did a treatment of the silver blue, hoping that it would lighten and shine up things a bit, but all it really did was replace the faded out green with a dark blue. I wasn't mad at this.

This morning, I used the last of my bottle of blue mixed with a lot of black, and positively coated and caked my head with it to see how much I can get it to take. My hair is longer at this point and would be doubly long by now if I had not cut it before the trip to North Carolina, so it takes a lot of dye to make it look the way I want it to. 

When I went to the bathroom to do this, Pete was back upstairs and was laying with Daisy in bed, and gave me a "hi dad!" sort of look. When I came back out of the bathroom he was sitting in the hall waiting for me to let him into my office, something he's always done. I want to stress that this appears to be normal Pete behavior, and a strong sign that he's feeling a lot better. I let him in and he immediately got up on my ottoman, flopped down and began eating treats/food from the bowl that I keep in here. Again, normal Pete behavior. Eventually he dozed off to sleep there -- possibly his favorite sleeping spot in the house aside from my arms or Daisy's. 

So, I mean, I guess he's doing better. He appears leaps and bounds better than he was for the past two days. Later in the day he would eat more and spend more time in the window downstairs, which is pretty much normal for him. We're going to keep an eye on him to make sure he doesn't get really sick again (even if he does, again, can't really do much but hospice care for him), but marked improvement is good. Throughout the day and evening he remained mostly normal, ate more, drank water, got his pills and fluids, and was generally regular Pete. So, I guess we may be a bit of the woods for now. We'll see. It's always a day by day thing, and we're going to be on deathwatch for him from now through the end of his life regardless of whether we want to be or not, so...it is what it is.