aka: cosmic

I've recently been grappling with the inevitability of mortality.

My cat of 14 years, Nadia, has been having a roller-coaster ride of health issues since June.

What started out as a slight decrease in appetite, thought to be caused by a few teeth with resorptive lesions, has snowballed into a terminal diagnosis.

Two teeth removed.

Respiratory infection.

One-time vomiting of bloody mucus.

Normal labs. Normal x-rays.

Ultrasound. Samples taken.

Either inflammatory bowel disease or small cell lymphoma. Nearly identical presenting diseases, even under a microscope.

Samples inconclusive but no "obvious" signs of cancer.

Start treatment for inflammatory bowel disease.

Have a WONDERFUL month, then things took a turn in October.

Wheezy breathing, given antibiotics. No real improvement but didn't get worse.

Suddenly had pupils that are different sizes.

Emergency vet visit. No immediate danger but don't know what's causing it.

Ophthalmologist visit resulted in a diagnosis of Horner's Syndrome.

An answer that just brought up more questions. The syndrome itself isn't life threatening, but it can be caused by a number of different underlying issues that can be life threatening.

I remembered the cystic adenoma (benign tumor) in her neck she was diagnosed with in early 2024. It shrinks and grows at random. So I thought maybe that's the cause.

But the adenoma wasn't there when I felt for it. Instead, about 1/2 to 1 inch over from where the adenoma would typically be, there was a large lump right in the middle of her neck.

She happened to have a follow up at her primary vet already scheduled for 10/30 so I brought up the lump in her neck then. The vet examined her and agreed that was the most likely cause of the Horner's Syndrome.

The vet also said the mass felt pretty unmoving (the cystic adenoma she had was pretty movable). She went over options: pursuing further diagnostics (CT/MRI) and treatment (surgery), or palliative care.

I was too stunned to think. I'd been hoping it was just the cystic adenoma that had shrunk and grown back in slightly shifted spot and we could, I don't know... drain it?

But it wasn't that. I said I'd think it over and we went home.

After about a week of thinking about what to do, I sent an email with a bunch of questions to the vet practice late Friday night.

I got a call back on Monday from a different vet (but one that has seen Nadia many times). She went over all my questions. I decided to at least have x-rays done to be sure there weren't other masses that had spread to her lungs or other parts of the body. The vet also told me the mobile internist would be there on Wednesday and could review Nadia's case to give her thoughts on what steps we could take.

So Wednesday came. I got a call while I was in a meeting at work and I quickly stepped out.

The good news? No other masses seen on the x-rays. Just the mass in her throat.

The bad news? The internist said a CT scan with contrast would give the best imaging of the mass, however, given the size and placement of it, she suspects it most likely would not be surgically removable.

I asked the vet if there's anything we can do to try and shrink the mass or at least stop it from growing more. She said typically the types of tumors that they see in the neck and/or head of cats don't usually respond well to chemo or radiation, so the only non-surgical option to try and control the size of the mass is steroids. Since Nadia's already on a steroid, she said we can try increasing the dose to twice a day.

So that's what I've been doing since Thursday. Along with gabapentin to keep her relaxed.

It's just so disheartening that every time it seems like she was stabilizing and getting back to normal, something else popped up. And now it's something that isn't fixable.

It's so hard because everything else for her is totally FINE. She still asks for food and eats. She still grooms herself. She goes to the litter box without issue.

But this lump in her throat has made her sweet little meow sound deep and gravely. She has random moments when her breathing sounds like gurgling. She can't even purr without coughing. In the past 2 days I've noticed a few times when she's seemed to have issues swallowing pate style food. Loud gulping/gurgling sounds.

Even so, it just doesn't feel like it's time yet.

When I had to say goodby to my cat Max, it was a hard but ultimately obvious decision. He wasn't eating, he wasn't going to the bathroom, he would just sleep and occasionally reposition himself.

Nadia's just not at that point yet. But at the same time I'm so scared she's going to choke on her food or suddenly not be able to breath.

Tonight I was hit with a strong feeling that she won't make it to the end of the year. I can hope, but day by day she just seems to be getting worse.

By the halfway point I was baffled and kind of annoyed at how Belinda was reacting to the situation.

For someone who got offended that the Doctor scanned her DNA without consent in the first episode, I felt like she accept a little too happily the idea that a magical wish baby was made using half her DNA...without her consent.

She easily fell into being fiercely maternal and protective, to the point I thought the Wish World still had control over her in some way. She seemed super happy about the whole situation. It just seemed really odd to me. It seemed jarringly out of character.

Then Poppy disappeared and Belinda went back to "normal", mostly how we've seen her act before, if not a bit more chummy with the Doctor and more keen on traveling.

Then the Doctor did his time energy release thing and suddenly we have this whole new retconned reality where Belind had ALWAYS had a daughter. We're shown memories of conversations with the Doctor that we had seen before, only now, she was talking about wanting to get home for her daughter. A detail that had never been given to the audience before. If this is to be believed as what really happened in the original timeline, then it's like they're telling us the Show itself is an unreliable narrator and things don't just happen offscreen, even the parts we see are selectively edited. However, it would definitely explain why Belinda so easily accepted Poppy as her daughter in the Wish World.

Except, we saw what Belinda's life was like prior to Earth exploding. We were shown she lived in a house with multiple roommates. No signs of any children living there that I can recall. Even if Poppy always spent nights at Belinda's parent's house, there'd be SOME sign of her at Belinda's place.

I want to like this twist, but I'm left wondering... Is it the genuine reality that was withheld from us for some reason, or did the universe warp reality to somehow "fit" Poppy into it? Was a whole Ritchie Akingbola created to be Poppy's dad? Was Belinda's whole life path changed to accommodate Poppy's existence? But then, Poppy was human on the Doctor's scan 🤔