After a disastrous meeting with Pastor yesterday in which I said and did all the wrong things and there was lots of talking sideways, I sobbed for over an hour. Then, with Kashi licking my leg in comfort, I thought I would fetch Fancy because I had not had some sweet-nothing-talks with her lately. Shuffling to and from work, letting Kashi out, and feeding all three birds is about all I have done. When I picked her up, I was horrified to see that she was skinny. After putting her on the scale and seeing that she had lost 1/3 of her weight, I burst into tears again and called the vet. I told her it would take me a while to get there because the electricity had been off since 5:00 in the morning and I was getting weaker and weaker from the heat. She said she would have her two male vet techs meet me at the car. I brought in all three birds so Fancy wouldn't be alone and so they all could have their nails clipped. Walking to the exam room from the parking lot took 20 minutes. I think Dr. M would have given me a fierce lecture for driving except for Fancy.

In short, Fancy is dying.

Hearing that news, I just sad huddled in the exam room, wailing for quite a while, Fancy tucked beneath my chin where she seems to prefer to be. Dr. M gave her an antibiotic shot and gave me some some more antibiotics and some high caloric food to force down her, but stressed that she was just too thin, that something was going on and we most likely would not be able to stop it. At 10, she is not old, but neither is she young.

This morning I weighed her and she has lost another 12% of her weight from where she was yesterday. I cannot believe she is still alive.

Dr. M said leaving her there would not be in Fancy's best interest because I am her flock. If there was any hope it would be in trying to get her to eat as much as possible and hope the antibiotics worked. Her poop is this yellow foam now (it should be a tight green coil).

Dr. M also said that birds' metabolisms are so very fast that she could have been going down for just a day or so...that I did not do this to her...that something could have been in her system a long time that has now come to the forefront, that it could be intestinal cancer, that Fancy has been a very much well loved bird for 10 years and I should remember that.

She has not been to visit me for a couple of days, but she does that from time to time. She is still preening herself and never showed the signs of a distressed bird (fluffed up and shaking). Yet I wonder if I had noticed her weight drop on Thursday if I could have saved her.

Seeing her so painfully thin hurts so much. Knowing that most likely tomorrow morning, when I awake (last night I slept on the couch with her because I could not make it up the stairs--it was after 10:00 PM before the electricity came back on), I will find her gone is overwhelming to me. And, right now, I will not even be able to bury her in the back yard next to Madison because I am too weak to use a shovel. Who can I ask to come do that for me? I cannot just throw her out in the trash.

I know she is just a bird. I know that. It is just that I have had bad news again and again and again of late, this week being the worst one yet. And for 10 years she has been such a great companion, preening my eyebrows for me and taking naps with me and putting up with me each time I startled her by leaping up off the couch and cheering wildly when the Cowboys were doing well in a game.

As strange as it sounds, I think Kashi knows she is gravely ill, too. He has not protested once her continued presense with me and spent much of yesterday curled up beside the couch instead of on his bed, just as he is now.

Oh, my heart hurts so very much right now. I know that God is bigger than all the bad news, than being trapped in a wet-noodle body, than Fancy's illness. I just wish my heart would listen to my head....