Thank God for country vet prices. Even though we walked out of there with nearly $300 in charges we got a lot of work done.

ECG/EKG
Blood pressure
Blood chem
Urine sample
Thyroid test
Heartworm test
Tick fever test
Medicine to knock him out
Medicine to wake him up
Heartworm medicine

Everything came out normal. We are still waiting for the thyroid panel results. Should be a day or so.

So that leaves either thyroid or brain tumor. I’ve never prayed so much for somebody to have a thyroid problem. Gauge is the best baby on the planet. He rescued me when my grief over Reb’s kidnapping was overwhelming. He lifted me out of a state of despair unlike any human could have possibly done. I love him more than words can express. As much as I love my cats, and I really do love my cats, my love for Gauge far exceeds anything I’ve ever felt for any animal.

Like BJ is on the human side, Gauge is truly my soul mate in the dog world and Taz in the cat world. Pray, pray, pray for it to be his thyroid!

God really does know all things. As much as I felt sorry for myself yesterday when I walked out of the eye care place without glasses because of the price, I now know that God had bigger plans for that money. I’m so glad I listened and he spoke!!!

Edit: August 23 - Results back from the vet says - It’s not the thyroid.

What the heck is going on?! Mom says I’m really being tested, and I believe her. Last night, after pilling Taz and Tigger, feeding the horses, getting Devon medicated, going outside to clean Punkin’s wound and give him his antibiotic, coaxing and nurturing a feral momma kitty and her itty bitty baby, I came in (late as usual) to finish supper. As I was pulling a hot pot out of the oven, I hear Gauge (the dog) slipping and sliding and making all kinds of racket on the wood floor in the office.

Just as I was about to holler out to BJ to find out what the heck he and Gauge were doing, BJ hollers out at me, “Get in here, something’s wrong with Gauge!”.

Gauge was having a full blown seizure. What the heck?! After totally freaking out for what seemed an eternity, he came out of it, and acted just fine. But what makes an 8 year old dog suddenly have a seizure? Good grief. I listen to Devon through the baby monitor every night, terrified he’s going to have one, and now I have to worry over Gauge too?

Could it have been the new food? Could it have been the smoked oysters? Could it have been some wild exotic fungus he snorted up his nose while hunting for crickets and grasshoppers? I called the vet and he says the usual causes are heartworms, brain tumor or thyroid. Here’s hoping to a funky thyroid. My God…what will you send me next? I’m getting a little paranoid about these sick animals and kid. I’m not sure my nerves can take much more. I’ve spent every available dollar on vet bills the past 4 to 6 months. I’ve spent more at the vet these past few months than I have on all the animals combined, over their entire lifetimes.

What’s up with THAT?!

Please God, heal them all. Please.

I have created the perfect chocolate biscuit. The first batch I made were good, but pretty fudgy. This last batch? Ooo-la-la, boy oh boy, BABY! They were truly a biscuit. You could close your eyes and take a bite and your first thought would be “Mmmm, that’s a good biscuit. Wait…was that chocolate?!”

I can’t wait to send these to the folks. They are going to RAVE about these. Y’all go find you some strawberries and get ‘em sugared up ‘cuz Shelly’ll be sending you some really sinful biscuits here soon. Man!

Dear God - Bring order to the chaos of my life.

My job is to submit to his sovereignty, humble myself before him, and ask for his help.

The Purpose Driven Life devotional this morning must have known the order I seek and pray for on a daily basis. How else could they hit a target so close to home on the same week I re-initiate Flylady? With Devon, the house, all the geriatric and sick animals, four jobs, and BJ — it’s no wonder I am such an insomniac. If I would just follow Dr. Stanley’s Life Principle #1:

Obey God and leave all the consequences to him.

For the umpteenth time this year, I made my way to the vets office to get a cat looked at. Punkin, the neighbor’s cat that I adopted after they died, has a one inch circular whole in his side that looked like was getting gangrene. I had started giving him antibiotics about 3 days ago, and it just looked worse to me. As it turns out, it is getting better, but that skin is going to slough off even more before we’re done. I got another week’s worth of antibiotics to pull him through.

Taz and Tig are doing better with their heart and thyroid meds. Daily doses every morning are wearing me out. Tigger is loud and demanding and gets all the others meowing for food — all before I get my morning coffee. Sometimes it’s just too much and I feel like drop kicking him into the other room. He knows when I open my eyes and I lay there pretending to be asleep. He knows. He starts right in before I even make a move. Meow. Then he starts digging at the covers. MEOW. As if perhaps I didn’t hear him the first time. Then he runs across me and the bed about three or four times. MEOOOOOOOW. By this time, of course, I’m yelling…”TIGGER!”. He just jumps off the bed and waits for me by the bedroom door. If I take a little too long putting on shoes, he comes and bumps my legs two or three times to ‘help me out’. Read the rest of this entry »

Asked for and received a slew of volunteers to taste test my marshmallows. Yippee! I started in making them last night and the 2 gelatin ones are finished and I’ll be finishing up the other two tonight. Maybe…it’s already 7:00. The first batch looked great, as good as I remembered. They may be a bit soft, but that’s why we’re experimenting.

I’m extremely curious as to how well the sticky ooey gooey mess will hold up under all this heat. I can baby them all the way to the post office, and it’ll be cool in there the whole time, but at some point the transport truck is going to haul them away, and it’s going to be hot as Hades in that truck. I’m afraid that they’ll end up as one solid piece of goo by the time they arrive! I guess we’ll see.

Sure are tasty though. I envy those who can chug down sugar like that. I sure can’t. But maybe that’s a good thing, otherwise I’d be 150 pounds or something!

Had to drive into Fort Worth today for a 3 month check up with the neurologist. Good thing too because Devon has had five siezures since July 28. He had one last night. I began to wonder if maybe the Depakote was bad or something but the doctor assured me that it was most likely Devon’s body had just become accustomed to it, or that he had grown enough to need a higher dosage.

As it turned out, we changed medicine today because of Devon’s ‘tics’. At first we were just going to increase the dosage of his anti-seizure medicine, but I thought to ask about those ‘tics’ because we are working on them so hard during OT (occupational therapy).

As it turns out, the tics have a name: Myoclunus with Action.
http://www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/myoclonus/detail_myoclonus.htm

The medicine he was given should help with the seizures and reduce those jerky movements. The doctor said that this medicine has very little side effects, fewer even than the Depakote. However, the one side-effect it may have, although rare, is that it will modify his behavior.

“Oh really?”, I asked, “How so?”.
“It will make him into a bad kid.”, he said.
“Bad kid?!”, I gulped.
“Yeah, think ‘belligerent drunk’”, the doctor chuckled.

Oh boy.

Luckily it’s rare, and if he starts acting like that, we can go back to the Depakote!

and please stop the rain.

Whodathunkit a year ago that we would be crying stop the rain? Certainly not me and half the ranchers in these here parts, but I’m hearing stories that even the infamous Lake Bridgeport who’s notorious for being low, is about to overflow her britches, er, breeches, er, beaches. I’ve had enough, thanks.