I'm not even sure I can really write about this yet, but I'll try, just to get it out there. This past Saturday morning, we realized that Pixel (one of the cats) hadn't been eating much the previous few days, and was starting to lose weight again; she's our thyroid/intenstinal lymphoma kitty, who's been on lots of meds for a long time, but has pretty much held steady for a long time. We'd recently upped her thyroid meds, so it was surprising she was still losing weight and not interested in food. We decided to give her a quarter tablet of mirtrazapine, since that's the appetite stimulant we'd given her (and the other cats) before.

About an hour after her morning meds, she started yowling like I've never heard before, and when DH picked her up, she was completely limp. We spent the next half hour or so basically watching her die. We're still not sure what happened. At the time, DH was on the computer looking stuff up, and thought that the mirtrazapine might have interacted with her methimazole (thyroid med) and/or that she might have seratonin syndrome; after some more research, he gave her half of a cyprohexadine tablet (we had them on hand as an appetite stimulant for another cat who got really restless on mitrazapine). We debated taking her in to the emergency vet that's half an hour away, but figured there really wasn't much they could do, but then decided to go anyway as she got worse...but then she died before we actually got out the door. DH has done some more research since, and has convinced himself (thankfully) that the mirtrazapine probably didn't kill her (he was the one that insisted on giving it to her, and had been feeling REALLY guilty about it).

Our vet's office is closed every other Saturday, and of course this weekend was a closed weekend. This is where it really paid off that we have a good relationship with our vet and her staff; the office manager is also our cat sitter when we're on vacation, and we have her cell number because of that. We called her and told her what happened, and she immediately offered to meet us at the office (2 minutes from our house), to take Pixel and arrange for a cremation, rather than making us trek to the emergency vet and deal with people who don't know us or Pixel. Thank you so much, Kelli, for taking time out of your day off to make a really tough time a little easier for us.

Pixel was DH's baby. He went to the humane society in Phoenix 16 years ago to get a cat (this was well before I'd even met him). He'd been looking for a dark tortie, since the cat he grew up with was a dark tortie, and he missed her (she was still living with his parents). Pixel reached out of her cage and literally grabbed him as he walked by. She was a tabby and a year or two old, not what he was looking for, but he couldn't resist her insistence that he was HERS, so he took her home. She meant the world to him, and while he knew she was old and sick, she seemed pretty stable, and he was in no way mentally prepared to lose her so quickly; he was sure she'd be around at least a couple more years.

Good bye, and rest well, Pixel. You are sorely missed.
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