On Thursday, my mom called in the morning to say that she was now better and really wanted to see the kids. She also called to say that she and my dad had decided that it was time to put Ramses (the pom pom) down, and that they had made an appointment for the following morning.
At breakfast, Henry vomited. His nanny thought that it was because he had gotten a piece of bacon caught at the back of his throat. He refused to take a nap. At lunch, she asked what I wanted to feed him. I got some chicken masala out of the refrigerator. As I was cutting it into pieces for him, he vomited again, having not had anything to eat yet. It was a lot of vomit. I took him to the bathroom and gave him a bath. Miss R was thankfully still asleep. I gave the nanny the rest of the day off. She very nicely offered to get us some supplies from the store. I thanked her but said we'd be OK. We thought that it was still possible that he was sick b/c of teething. Teething can induce fevers. And when kids salivate a lot, the excess saliva can irritate the stomach.
Henry was acting fine (other than the two episodes of vomit). Grammy still wanted to see the kids, so Jeff took them over to her house. We then picked up dinner and brought it to Grammy and Poppy's. We wanted to spend a little bit of time with Ramses before he was put down.
Ramses wasn't in a snuggling mood b/c he knew that food was around. Despite all of his problems, he continued to have a knack for finding food sources.
When we got home, we put the kids to bed. Henry was a floppy fish. We got him settled, but he cried for Daddy ten minutes later. I went into the bedroom to comfort him and fell asleep with him around 9:30PM. Around 3AM or so, Miss R woke up. She'd wet through her diaper...again. I hadn't put the overnight diaper on her b/c she had fallen asleep in the car. I'll have to bring some overnight diapers to my parents' house so that when we change them before leaving their house and the kids fall asleep in the car, there won't be a big mess. As I changed her, she felt warm to me. I took her temperature. It was 100.3 axillary, meaning that 101.3 was probably closer to the truth. Sigh. OK. So Henry may be teething but he's also sick and so is Miss R. Double sigh. A few minutes later, Miss R vomited a little bit. Not much, but some. Triple sigh. Jeff comforted Miss R. We cleaned up the mess but didn't want to strip the sheets b/c Henry was finally sound asleep on his side of the bed. Jeff managed to get Miss R to sleep in the crib. I was wide awake, so I sent an email to our friends unfortunately having to cancel our camping plans for Saturday. :(
Jeff called the nanny in the morning telling her that the kids were sick. When the kids are sick, she doesn't work so as not to get her child sick. But she said that she'd come over to get her paycheck. He also called my mom telling her about the situation. She volunteered to take care of the kids today. I took the kids there at 9:30AM. The nanny must have arrived shortly after I left. Jeff explained to her that his trip to Philly made him realize that he truly needs a quieter place to work and the situation wasn't adequate for his work needs. He gave her a nice severance check and wished her well. She was understanding about it. She is willing to babysit in the future if we need her or get together for play dates with the kids. I'm glad things ended as well as they could. Jeff called Shirley, Henry's PT, to cancel our monthly appointment; she works with fragile children, so it is especially important that we don't get her sick.
Meanwhile, I spent a little time with Ramses (aka The Ram, Ram Ram, or my favorite, Rambo). Carolyn bought Rambo some roast beef and chicken. He loved it. After Erin arrived, my dad, Carolyn, Erin, and I took Ramses to the vets' office. His usual vet was out of town, so Dr. Carolyn Lopez handled it. She did a nice job. We got to spend some time with Ramses after they put the catheter his right front leg. They also gave him a mild sedative. We petted him, kissed him, and said our goodbyes. When we were ready, Dr. Lopez came into the room with the shots. And he passed away.
All of us are sad at Ramses' passing. I'd like to say just a few words about Rambo. Ram Ram came into our lives about seven years ago. When Erin's high school friend went to college, her parents wanted to get rid of him. He was about 12 years old at the time. They were going to take him to the pound. It is unlikely that such an old dog would be adopted. It would have been a death sentence. My parents took Ramses in. At that time, nobody thought that he'd live that long b/c he was already 2 years past the average life span for a Pomeranian. Ramses and Indiana got along very well. In his "younger" years, Ramses would clean Indiana's teeth every day after they played, which was kind of gross but hilarious all the same. They were so cute together when they'd play fight b/c Indiana was so much bigger than Ramses. One of Ramses' quirks was that he'd attack anyone who would wake him up. I'm not sure that he had any teeth, but he'd make growly sounds. He was the first dog that we had where the phrase "Let sleeping dogs lie" was very appropriate. My sisters warned me about Ramses' behavior. He could be a bit strange at times. I believe that I was the only one who dared kiss him on the head. Jeff didn't understand how anyone could think Ramses would do anything inappropriate until he stayed with my parents for a few days in the summer of 2005, house shopping. That's when he encountered "The Dark Side of the Ram" one night. He never touched Ramses while he was sleeping or groggy after that. Ramses was a pest when it came to food. He spent a good deal of his time in the kitchen waiting for someone to drop something. He loved to patrol the pool area in the morning when my dad was water the plants. Ramses was 19 years old. Toward the end, he had problems breathing, had cataracts, and was showing signs of dementia. The decision to put him down was motivated to prevent him from pain and discomfort. He will be missed but not forgotten.
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