Emergency

 I got into big trouble with my pain level by Monday night.  It got so bad I finally put out a plea to several people online, stating I needed a ride to the ER.  

I no longer could even rid myself of the pain lying flat.  I'd unwisely tried some exercises on a link someone put up in comments on facebook, to relieve sciatica pain while in your bed.   But the exercises increased the pain 50 fold, to a nightmare.

It was Alice who said she'd be right over, even though it was by then past 10 p.m.  I met Alice over cats, of course.  I trapped a mom cat and her older kittens, that showed up near her house, and a friend relocated them.  That was the first time I helped her with cats.  Then another time she had a tame male tux with a right ear tip show up in her house.  I took him to Heartland and they found him a home.  The third time was when I trapped Kona and her kittens in the ditch below her house.  Kona remains here, but her kittens went to Heartland, to go up for adoption.  She also adopted Copper from me.  Copper was one of five kittens I found near death out on McLagan road after a Circle K clerk contacted me about those kittens in bad trouble.  Later on, I got all the cats, most orange, fixed at the nearest barn.  Alice took me once on a day trip up to her cabin near Breitenbush.  It was so beautiful there.  We ate lunch by the river.  Her cabin burned last summer in the wildfires.  She and her husband who helped me sell my old car, and Richard who lives on their property, are forever friends.

At the ER, the bed was so uncomfortable and I was nervous.  The nurse was very efficient and compassionate and knowledgebale about sciatica since she suffers that paiin herself quite frequently. 

They gave me valium and a muscle relaxer and some antiinflammatory shot.  It wasn't a steroid and I was still in pain when I left but was instantly asleep once back home.  I didn't get up til 10:00 yesterday morning and realized a good share of the pain was gone.   I attribute that to whatever was in the shot.  I was so relieved that yesterday did not bring the same suffering.  My brother called too and I told him how happy I was to be out of the severe pain.  That made him happy also.   

I began trying new positions in cleaning litterboxes, almost squatting, which will make my knees stronger too.  And squatting first to pick up anything.  If  the pain begins in my back and leg, I squat back down and roll up which seems to release something causing the pain and then I'm ok.

I'm still without enough confidence in my back, to venture out and a little afraid of driving my car, for fear that seat will crimp me again.  I got a better front seat for the old car, at the wrecking yard, when it became too worn down, at about 200k miles.  This seat has seen five owners, including me, and over 200k miles, so its time to find one in better shape at the wrecking yard again.

I read in the paperwork the ER gave me, on sciatica pain, to not sit or drive for longer than 30 minutes without a break that includes some walking.  I will follow this advice.  Why wouldn't I.

I intend to take five cats to the clinic Friday, some way or another.   A Lebanon woman with an in heat female has volunteered to drive the cats up, which is great, and the Sweet Home woman with three cats needing fixed badly, because one at least is in heat, will somehow get them to me, she says, because she so badly wants them fixed and has no money to take them to a private clinic.

The Albany woman with two female strays was very gracious when I had to cancel on her for them going to the FCCO last Sunday.  I want to get them trapped and in to be fixed also.

The Albany woman who has been rounding up friends and neighbors barn cats to be fixed, then bringing them to me, is suffering a loss.   Her husband had a stroke last Friday and now is in hospice care and not long for this world, she says.  This has tugged at my heart all day, because I know how much she loves him.

I've sure met a lot of wonderful people through the years, when getting their cats fixed.   Last night, I lay on the futon, flat out, no lights on, relaxed and happy, and watched Nomads on Hulu.  The interesting characters in the movie mirror many folks I've met during my years cat wrangling.