Beading for Life

I've been beading all day today as if life itself depends on it. In a sense, it does.

Cosmos has been ill. Very ill. After stalling as long as I could because I knew the news would not be good, I finally took him to the vet a week ago. After initial consultation and more testing, it was concluded that he is in "moderate to severe kidney failure." He spend a couple of days in the doggie hospital, and now is home with me.

I've been financially ruined by being on disability for over five years. Mom has intervened for me on more than once occasion when medical bills became too big or numerous to deal with (don't even ask me about SSI and Medicare which wasn't finally awarded until about a week ago, even though the Judge in the trial said it should have commenced back in 2003, and apparently it is not retroactive). And this time, she intervened for Cosmos so that he would have a chance to live. He rewarded all of us by bouncing back from grave illness not only better than the vets anticipated, but "in a way that they've never seen before."

Of course, he is still very VERY sick, and kidneys do not regenerate. He will be on medications and home IVs for the rest of his life, for however long that will be. The vet says that he could potentially go on like this for a very long while. A year. Or two. But a lot of it depends on me.

I called Mom yesterday to tell her Cozie was home and express my gratitude. Believe me, it's beyond words. But her response - as usual - was a kick in the gut. She told me that she was "done with me now, and that if I couldn't afford it, then I should just take Cosmos in and have him killed. (Yes, she said "killed.") That she could not go out to dinner now for the rest of the month and that his life was the cause." Not that a lot of it's not true, but why does she always have to be so horrible and mean and put things in the worst possible way to be sure and dispense even more misery? No wonder I'm the only daughter who will have anything to do with her, stupid me.

Anyway, I've been feeling better for six weeks. It was time, anyway, for me to get off of my duff and start to produce again. I'd only completed one necklace since being able to sit up and work. I need to get going. New Year's Resolution # 3 for 2009 is to get my Etsy Shop open and running. #8 is to clean up Chapter's 1 through 3 of my book and find a representative or publisher. All of this is do-able right now; all of it must be done.

I've never had to put an animal down just because it was inconvenient or I couldn't afford it before. It's horrible to contemplate, and I don't know that I will survive it if I have to go there. It would have been so much easier if Cozie's problem had been a return of his cancer (which was what I thought was going on) for which there would not have been a treatment, not that I'm wishing that on him by any means. I love that dog; he's been through so much history with me.

So I'm beading and writing and trying to figure things out. It's a matter of life and death.