Lost my girl before euthanasia appointment
I lost my baby, Maui, overnight and woke up to her lifeless body on Tuesday morning. It’s was absolutely searing pain and grief at finding her like that, and I am wracked with guilt and shame and a feeling of failure—on top of missing her like crazy.
Maui (age 13 or 14) had intestinal lymphoma with symptoms starting last Christmas and a mass identified by ultrasound/palpation more recently—about a month ago. With the help of my vet, we were going the palliative care route, since it was likely so far along and too costly for me to get a biopsy done in another city. Maui responded better to a long-acting injection steroid rather than the oral one. But this last injection didn’t even last one week before she was having diarrhea again. I was also giving her fluids at home when possible (difficult to do with her), and bupenorphine, and opioid pain med. The vet who prescribed all this had told me to think about euthanasia back when she was getting her first shot. I told him I wasn’t ready yet that day, although he said as gently as possible to consider her best interests and how sometimes pet parents can hang on too long. But her health rebounded after that steroid injection. I was shocked at how well she was doing for almost 2 weeks! At that point I made appointment for another steroid injection as she was feeling bad again and needed the pain med 2x a day.
The second shot went okay and she hadn’t lost that much weight at that appointment. But she didn’t rebound like she did last time—the cancer was winning. On Monday she was feeling pretty horrible and the pain meds and fluids didn’t seem to help. Heartbroken and vacillating, I called the vet and made a euthanasia appointment for the following morning, but wondered if she should be euthanized that very day. When I woke up Tuesday morning she was gone already, and it didn’t look very comfortable at all. She looked like she passed in misery.
Trying to find comfort in other posts here but most cat moms made the decision in time and are praised for doing right by their babies. Yknow, “better a day early than a day late”. I am crumbling inside knowing I failed to do the right thing, and it’s too late to change that. My intentions were good but that means nothing to my poor baby cat. I was probably selfish and lying to myself about it. I thought I was doing palliative care but I was prolonging her suffering.
I loved her so fiercely—I’m so very sorry, my sweet girl. I wish so much I could have held your paw as you drifted away. The reality of her death is much harder. 💔