the things you learn...

Turns out, our kitten is in heat. We figured it out on Wednesday when she started acting a little... well... odd... She has always been affectionate, but this was over the top-- she was meowing like crazy-- and rolling all over the floor. We looked it up online and sure enough, she had started her heat cycle.

What a nightmare!

Listen, we're responsible pet owners-- we diligently spay and neuter our animals, they are all on heart worm medication, flea and tick preventative, we buy them really good food and always, ALWAYS exercise them.... then THIS happened! What a complete shocker. We had totally missed it! Then I started to count backwards from when we found our kitten and it had been 6 months. How had 6 months gone by and we hadn't had her spayed?!

So now she's on the rampage (as I type this she's patrolling the house meowing like mad). I walked into the house after work today and the smell of cat urine hit me like a brick wall. Apparently when your cat is in heat she'll pee on things. Awesome. I let the dogs out and started to do "pee patrol" and found it on the dog bed and the love seat. Thankfully our couch cushions come off and are washable-- easy fix-- just doused them with white vinegar (the only thing that works, in my opinion) and threw them in the washer. They're done and back on the couch-- good as new-- but still, where will she go next?!

I hate to quarantine her, but I think it has to happen until this madness is over. You can technically spay a cat while she's in heat, but it's kind of... well... much more messy for the vet and they usually charge you extra, so I'm thinking we might wait it out. It should only last a week... I say that now, but we'll see in a day or two.

And I feel so bad for her because she's obviously not comfortable and having a tough time. This goes to show that sometimes I have to slow down and pay closer attention to things.

Lesson learned.

the week of doctors

In my last job, I provided case management services which included providing support and transportation to doctor's appointments. In 2 years, I had been to countless types of doctors-- orthopedic, pain management, oncology/hematology, ophthalmology, dentist, medical imaging, gynecologist, veterinarian (it still counts!) the hospital for two surgeries and one delivery of a child, and the local clinic countless numbers of times. I was so tired of going to doctors all of the time that I neglected going to the doctor for myself!

Now that I'm in a different job, I thought I had procrastinated enough about going to the doctor. This week I scheduled three appointments-- my yearly GYN exam, the eye doctor and the *dreaded* dentist.

I spoke with my OBGYN about our plan to start trying to have a child and the recent medical tests that I've had. He assured me that none of the tests would impact any chance of having a baby-- man, was I glad to hear that. He did, however, say that the issue with my liver enzymes needed to be sorted out before we started to try to conceive-- which makes total sense-- and I have a follow-up blood work appt for April. Hopefully (keep your fingers, toes, and eyes crossed) all will go well and the results will be normal. The hydescan on my gall bladder revealed that my gall bladder is apparently functioning normally. I don't know what the next step is if the blood work doesn't come back normal... but hopefully we won't need to find out.

It was kind of neat to be in the GYN office with the idea that- if all goes well- I may be in there much more in the future. In the waiting area there is a huge bulletin board full of pictures of the many babies that were delivered by the doctors. I just stared at those pictures. It's amazing to me that a doctor can deliver one baby, let alone hundreds. Ah well, who knows? Maybe one day one of our pictures will be up there... :)