I Got a Lot of 'Splaining to Do...

We're back, finally, with an update.

Things are going fairly well for Mister Tanaka, but it's been a long, long three weeks, and he's not home yet. But first, the excuses:

Not updating the blog for the past three weeks has been, to some extent, a conscious decision. The last thing I want this blog to become is a daily medical update for Mister Tanaka. Knowing that you might abandon me no matter which path I took, I -- seriously -- thought a bunch about whether you'd be less likely to come back after weeks of vet reports or after weeks of neglect.

The reports from the vet, complete with Shelly's bar graphs showing the ups and downs in Tanaka's blood work, have been very important and, fortunately, exciting for us and a few others, who we have kept updated through e-mail. But, really, would a cat's red blood cell count and blood urea nitrogen measurement really make good content for a blog?

With that, I resolve to write only a few paragraphs about Mister Tanaka and the vet. Today marks the end of three weeks at the vet, and we're all, frankly, ready for him to come home. It looks, finally, like that might happen in the next week. We've spent what amounts to an embarassing amount of money on his care, and he's been through no fewer than three surgeries. He's been hooked up to an IV for most of the last three weeks and, I'm sad to report, he no longer has a penis.

So, back to a couple of weeks ago... I have felt a lot of guilt over the past couple of weeks for choosing the vet I did. My reasoning was sound -- he advertises in an area where a bunch of foreigners live -- but he was not able to do what Tanaka needed to be done. Friday, March 17, Tanaka had his first surgery and, aside from emptying his bladder, nothing was resolved. His urinary tract obstruction was still in place, because the vet couldn't get a catheter inserted. So, after a call to our vet in Delaware and to Shelly's cousin, who is also a vet, it was clear that if I left Tanaka at the first vet, he would die. Shell's cousin made that clear: "If you don't take him to another vet tomorrow, or even better, tonight, he'll be dead by Monday."

The vet was nice enough to give me a referral to another vet, this one in Makati, which is where I should have taken him initially. By the time I arrived at the Makati Dog and Cat Hospital on Saturday morning, Tanaka was awake, but not moving around much, still drugged from the previous day's surgery. I had read so much online and learned so much from the vets I spoke with that I knew exactly what was happening and what would probably need to be done.

Within 10 minutes of my arrival, the doctors at Makati D&CH were prepping him for another round of surgery. This hospital has been in business since 1916 and is currently run by a fourth generation vet and his father and is certainly one of the most experienced places in Manila.

Dr. Carlos the elder took me into an examination room to show me a poster of a procedure called a perineal urethrostomy, which is used in extreme cases of urinary tract blockage and, essentially, turns a male cat into an anatomical female by removing his penis and creating a urethral opening too large to become blocked again. I had read about this and had assumed it would be an option and agreed immediately. Ah, would I want Shelly to be so cavalier with my penis? Well, I suppose if dying was the other option, I would be...

"His penis is small," Dr. Carlos said. "So small."

***

An hour later, Tanaka was unblocked, hopefully permanently. Recovery time for this procedure is usually seven to 10 days, so I was hopeful he'd be home in a week or so. I left for lunch, then went back a couple hours later to peek at him through the kennel doors. He was already much livelier than he had been prior to surgery. Even worse than losing his penis, the vets were unable to give him any painkillers due to the damage that had been done to his kidneys by his backed-up urine.

About 10 days ago, his stitches were removed. What Shelly and I have taken to calling his "mangina" has healed well, but a day or two after the stitches were removed from his stomach, the incision the first vet made opened up, causing Tanaka to quite literally spill his guts. After emergency surgery to get everything back in place and to remove some dead tissue, he was stitched up again. Those stitches were removed today. We're keeping our fingers crossed.

In addition to his three surgeries, countless infections and complete lack of pain killers, Tanaka has also had to suffer the indignity of an Elizabethan collar.

Despite the setbacks, we've watched his blood work improve pretty much everyday. The numbers have stabilized now in fairly good territory. He has learned how to pee again. He has gotten loads of grooming from us, because he can't reach anything around that Elizabethan collar. He'll probably have to be on a special diet for the rest of his life, and his life will likely be shorter than it would have been without kidney damage. We're hoping he'll actually come home next week, after nearly four weeks in the hospital.

***

And, if you're still here, you now understand why I didn't blog about this every day. My eyes are glassing over, and I was actually there for most of it.

The rest of the excuses for blog dormancy come from my otherwise entirely pedestrian life. I've been busy with lots of freelancing, including a project writing marketing copy for a new client in Manila. Add to that that Shell and I have spent roughly three hours a day driving to Makati, visiting Tanaka and driving home, and I frankly haven't had much spare time to write. I have a couple of writing projects I'd like to be working on that have had to take a back seat to, well, life.

A couple of interesting things have happened, and I'll get those posted in the coming days. One of them is the onset of summer. Despite the fact that it's nearly 9:30 p.m., it's still a balmy 29ºC/85ºF here in Manila. Meanwhile, in Delaware, Brad has just informed me that it snowed this morning...