MY GIRLS – TWENTY-FIVE YEARS AGO
The Uninformed Internet
If you are like millions of people in the world today, you depend greatly upon the information found readily available on the internet. Unfortunately, very few truly understand that this dependence is tragically the opposite of life.
When did we give-in and over to the feeling of needing internet assurance that what we see and feel is factual and relevant? Why is it so easy to grant this power to the internet and relinquish our God given power of insight and intellect?
What we want is reassurance and the internet can often result in misinformation that does that very dangerous thing!
Unintentional – YET – Unresponsible
Don’t get me wrong, I honestly believe the internet, for the most part, is attempting to be informative and helpful. However, the misinformation, whether unintentional or not is abundant and uninhibited by scrutiny of any kind. This, in itself, is the greatest danger we can succumb to.
When did we remove humanity from the equation? Is this insignificance we share, something we are actually aware of? Or, is it possible that this is humanity’s attempt to rededicate ourselves to each other, to live life and love all that surrounds us?
Anyway you choose to look at it, the internet is free to inform and at the same time innocent of misinformation.
The truth about Covid-19 and its effect on your pets
When my wife, Anna and I tested positive for Covid last week we hardly considered the consequences it could have on our beloved cat, Sage. However, love can be the demise of your pet when this virus infests your home.
Our healthy, young and fit Sage was the victim of internet misinformation. She was a baby, just seven years old and a real tiger at heart. Unfortunately, for her, she was loving and trusting of her mommy and daddy. She loved a good belly rub and being nestled in her daddy’s embrace. This love and trust did her in.
When she developed sniffles and sneezing it was both cute and comical. This didn’t occur until late Friday night the 23rd of December. Come Saturday morning she seemed both hungry and confused as her nose kept the sniffles present. Mostly she seemed upset that she was dripping sniffles into her food dish.
It was at this point Saturday that I decided to research the effects of Covid-19 on pets. The internet had numerous accounts of infected felines and canines and seemed determined, at the very least, to assure pet owners that there were no known deaths associated with Covid. In fact, they cited thousands of reported cases that resulted in pets recouping fully and quite quickly.
However, one European group of veterinarians documented a single case of an older cat in France with an underlining heart defect that died from the effects of the virus.
For all intensive purposes the internet was much more concerned with the pets infecting the household as to the opposite happening.
One thing for certain the information was comforting and went as far as to say isolating the cat was the smartest thing to do. The advice was to feel very confident in keeping your pet at home and letting their own immunity revive their health. There was both practical and scientific evidence that a visit to the Vet was totally unnecessary.
The shocking strength of Covid-19
By Sunday, Christmas day, I was beginning to feel much better and my wife still achy and probably a couple of days behind me, in terms of recovery, seemed to be my main concern for the day. Sage was still wrapped-up in her bed, in a blanket I placed around her the night before.
Anyway, this was to be an at home Christmas void of family and friends. This meant lots of phone calls to all those that mattered in our lives. The cat endured the day, mostly unnoticed by the two of us. I did some cooking for us and we watched a “Christmas Carol” that ended at 8pm. We were both exhausted, most definitely from the ordeal of covid over the last four or five days.
At this time I went upstairs to look-in on my baby, Sage. What I found was alarming and troublesome. She had made her way out of her bed and was now lying flat on her belly with her face in a significant puddle of clear as can be liquid. She was absolutely limp and unable to get to her feet. I made calls not to one, but to three different Animal Clinics in the area. All were closed for Christmas and also for the following Monday as well. They did offer an emergency number to call and it was at this point I realized that nothing was going to help my little girl make it through the night accept her determined Daddy holding and wiping her nose and mouth continually.
I proceeded to take her to our bedroom and lay her down on a soft thick blanket while I got tissues to wipe her soaked face and neck and nose. She now was responsive enough to be starring at her daddy and conscious of my efforts to help her. It became obvious that she was ready to submit to my care and with loving, trusting eyes she watched my every move. I kept telling her how good she was doing and reiterated the words: “just keep breathing Sagie……keep breathing.” With that look of the “TIGER” that she was, she listened to every word and seemed determined to do just that. Midnight came and all the tissues were gone and I now come back to her after getting a second roll of toilet paper. Her eyes followed me with every move I made. Anna had now fallen asleep on the floor, lying upon a new sheepskin rug we bought weeks before.
Suddenly, the breathing Sage was struggling to do with her nose ended and her mouth opened wide to continue to breath that way. She stretched in a peculiar way snapping her head, into a position that appeared as unnatural as it looked uncomfortable. I tried to correct her position, but her body was now in a rock solid phase that would not loosen or relax. I was now the only source of keeping her warm and dry as fluid seemed to be pouring from her mouth continually. The second roll of toilet paper disappeared in less than an hour.
Her breathing was well over 100 breaths per minute and I knew that her heart was undertaking a tremendous strain to continue. All I could do was to tell her how lucky I was to have the best little girl ever, how much I loved her and how sorry I was for letting her down. At 2:37 am she coughed two loud coughs and with lots of liquid in her lungs I heard a thump as her heart gave out. She died with her eyes wide-open, staring at me as if to say: “Daddy what happened?”
We had our beautiful little girl cremated Tuesday, December 27th.
We will miss her dearly.
