Chasing Lightning Bugs Studio Blog

we buried our beautiful Floyd on Friday.  beside telulah.  his death was so difficult.  he was young and strong.  and rippling with energy. but in the last few days his big mischievous eyes had grown soft and sad.  he couldn't breathe.  he had sustained some sort of an injury to his trachea.  a fight?  a fall?  a blunt force trauma?  it was a couple of weeks ago we knew something was amiss.  he jumped on me and his skin was puffed with air and crackling.  sub-cutaneous emphysema.  the air he breathed leaking under his skin.  puffing him up.  our vets scoped him and found a small stricture deep at the base of his trachea.  they implanted a little spout on his back.  I would knead the air out in big gulps. he sat for hours on my lap.  warm and sleepy and sweet.  after a few days it appeared the air in his skin was less dramatic.  but his air hungry seize of a cough was still there.  still convulsing him whenever he made too much movement.  and when he began to struggle to breathe, we rushed him to the vet's oxygen crate.  he was comfortable in the oxygen, or he appeared to be.  but when we brought him out, his sides heaved, his mouth opened, working so hard to get air.  his eyes followed us around the room.  he was locked on us.  he trusted us.  he didn't seem afraid.  just tired.  and once again, our wonderful vets did all they could for us.  even coming in from his day off to do another scope.  where he discovered the stricture they had originally seen had tripled in size, cutting off his windpipe almost completely.  leaving just a tiny pinhole for him to breathe through.  the original injury, over healing and building scar tissue that was cutting off his oxygen, his life.  oh Floyd.....we couldn't let him go on choking with every breath.  so while he was under the anaesthetic, they euthanized him.  he just didn't wake up.  they wrapped him in his quilt and he sat on my lap as we drove home.  I couldn't quite believe he was dead.  so warm and soft on my lap. he was still warm, when I wrapped the quilt around him the last time and laid him in the ground.  he looked so comfortable and cozy.  it's all I could do. 
only 4 years old and such a spirited part of our family.  our house is more than a little dull now.