Peekos sista dagar – Peeko’s last days

Av Clarisse Yvonne Goethe

(Berättelsen publiceras i oöversatt skick.)

On the down-side . . . The reign of little ol’ Peeko, my 17 and a half year old cat is over. We went to the vet at PHV (American housing area) on 14 Nov 03. When I told them over the phone that Peeko was breathing roughly and not eating as he should, they could have told me then that their x-ray machine was not working and recommended that I take him elsewhere. Nooooo . . . they waited until we got there to tell me that x-rays of his lungs and blood samples were necessary for a diagnosis, neither of which they could accomplish in a timely fashion. Instead they practiced on the ol’ guy (in another room that I was not allowed to enter) trying to get a blood sample (which they weren’t able to successfully do ’cause Peeko’s veins were ”too small”), charged us $22 and sent us on our way with directions to the vet clinic in Frauenweiler and recommendations that we go there on Saturday.

I called Frauenweiler when we got home Friday to make an appointment and they told me to bring Peeko in that very evening. They took an x-ray of his lungs. By the time we walked from the x-ray room back into the examining room, the vet was pulling up the image on the computer. Peeko’s lungs were full of tumors! He had so many that they said there was no clear delineation between his lungs and his heart. He said that the tumors could have come up from his liver and there was no telling how long he’d had them, but that there was nothing to do about them. In a cat 7-8 years old, he’d be surprised to see something like that, but not in one Peeko’s age. They (’cause another vet came in to look at his x-ray too) wanted to put him to sleep right then!! They left us alone for a few minutes to decide. Maurice went and got Janet. I’d already decided that Friday wasn’t going to be Peeko’s last day (not after the ordeal at PHV), but I put Peeko down on the floor and asked him if he wanted this evening to end his last day. That little bugger walked over to his kennel (which is not one of his favorite places), went inside and sat down. We went home.

The vet recommended that I not wait longer than the beginning of the following week to have him put to sleep. When I asked I was told that Peeko was not in any pain, but that he knew something was wrong so that’s why he wasn’t feeding his body any longer. The vet also said that since his breathing was so labored, it was almost like slowly drowning. I stayed up watching Peeko most of the night Friday and half the morning Saturday, thinking that if he had another coughing fit like the one he’d had 2 weeks ago which seemed to trigger his decline, he was going to choke to death. I didn’t want that. Saturday afternoon a friend called the vet to make the appointment for me ’cause I couldn’t talk. I took Pee downstairs for his last walk through the neighborhood (he used to like to check on what sort of leftovers the neighbors put out for the stray cats – as if I didn’t feed him enough at home and as if, at this juncture, he felt like eating anyway), he drank a little kitty-milk, managed to eat some bits of chicken, went and sat in his kennel twice (which was an indication to me that he was ready to go), took a nice long (and much more restful than the night before) nap, then a ride on my shoulder to the vet.

When we got to the vet Peeko was so focused on me and my telling him what a good boy he was, that he didn’t even turn around or flinch when they gave him the first injection which was the muscle relaxant. His breathing stopped completely before the plunger of the second injection with the deadly narcotic was completely depressed. After that, he ceased to be Peeko to me. I remained calm the entire time Peeko was alive at the vet because I didn’t want him to be upset. He would have been upset if I was upset.

I even managed to remain calm and tell Peeko how rude it was for us to have this whole big discussion regarding disposition of his body while he was still alive. Part of this morbid, horrible discussion was taking place while I had the still living Peeko lunked on my shoulder and was walking him around the room trying to be cheerful (so he wouldn’t be scared) telling him to take a good look at the pretty plants and telling him he’s a cute and sweet kitty-boy.

They wanted me to bring him home!! On the phone my friend had already made it clear that I wanted him cremated and did not want his ashes. I already knew that I could not bury him in our yard. The brat who lives in the basement with his mother might have thought it funny or clever to dig up poor Peeko and do who knows what with his body and I certainly didn’t want that possibility. Ok, so they wanted me to bring him home and have the folks in Mannheim come to our place and pick him up for cremation! I’m thinking when? A week from Tuesday?

That’s the most awful, hardest thing I’ve done in my life because it was a decision I had to make for him. I miss him terribly!! He was just soooo much fun even when he was doing nothing, he was fun to simply look at. Since he was half Siamese, he was very vocal and told everyone everything. I’m just glad that he wasn’t sick and dragging around for months prior to his end or that he didn’t get hit by a car as an ending to his life. He had a good little life and that apartment sure attests to the fact that he DID live there. I still haven’t gotten rid of all of his stuff and I’m really in no big hurry to do so.

Här kan du se en hyllningssida jag gjorde till Peeko när han fyllde år för 5-6 år sedan. Den innehåller lite klipp från mail med Clarisse berättelser om sin ögonsten.