Frustration

Bullwinkle is feeling somewhat better tonight. I have an appointment with Dr. Blackshear tomorrow afternoon and we will talk about whether we should do hospice care with him or put him down -- it feels to me as if it could go either way. I do think that finally, tonight, he's starting to realize some benefit from the most recent chemo treatment. He's alert and has acted more like his old self than he has for a couple of weeks. But regardless of what my decision is for him tomorrow, we are not going back to chemo.

When I got Bullwinkle home from the cancer clinic on Monday, I could see he had some tape wound pretty tightly around his right forefoot. I figured that's where they'd drawn blood from, so I left it on that night -- but it was bugging him so much yesterday that I decided to take it off. After I'd gotten most of it off, I realized it was holding what looked like a catheter in place. I called the cancer place last night and basically said I would have appreciated being told that they were leaving a catheter in his arm, and could they please call me and let me know how to deal with it since I'd already taken most of the tape holding it in place off. I asked them to call me at home if they returned my call at night, but if they called during the day to please call me at work. I gave them both numbers. Naturally they called me this morning at home -- while I was at work (that was frustrating).

So... after being gone for the better part of 14 hours, wondering why I hadn't heard from them, I returned home at 9:30 p.m. to hear their message, which was something like: "We understand that a catheter was inadvertently left in Bullwinkle and we really apologize; all you have to do is pull it out and put pressure on it for 45 minutes and everything will be just fine." Wow. I'd call that another frustration (although that may be an understatement). I hate how cynical I feel right now -- but they were quite deliberate Monday about making sure they got paid before I took Bullwinkle home. Too bad they couldn't have been as meticulous about removing the catheter.

As if that weren't enough, I checked Bullwinkle's feeding tube tonight (I could tell it was bothering him) and the stitches holding it in are really tight and are pulling his skin up -- and his skin is very warm around there. Chalk up yet another frustration -- to say the least.

My poor little kitty-boy has had such a rough time -- and I'm really starting to feel that part of that tough time has been inflicted on him by the very people I've paid (and paid well) to take care of him.

The whole thing just sucks.:(