Thanks, Carolyn. Your words mean a lot.

He's really declined today. He's not eating much and as of this evening, he's not purring when I pet him. Dang it. I really don't want to see about putting him to sleep with my kiddo at home tomorrow but at this rate, I don't know how much longer I can allow this to go on. I can't believe how fast this is happening!

I feel just sick over this. My poor cat.

Cloudy, I can feel your pain while reading this. I hope your kitty doesn't suffer too much.

I worked a long day today and came home to find he had really rallied! He ate more then he has in a few days and talked to me a little bit. He purred while I was making his cat food soup. So I was thinking that tomorrow was going to be The Day but now I think I'll take it day by day, maybe he has a few left in him?

Ok, reality check here. He's still not eating near enough and clearly every bit of food he's eating is going straight to growing tumor as he is losing weight at an alarming speed. But I feel like I just need to go with the flow based on his behavior and his behavior this evening was good. Ok, reality check here too, he still spends all his non-eating and non-litter box time in the bathroom. But still, purring and meowing, to me that's saying the pain meds are working.

I guess I'll see how he is tomorrow.

this sounds like good news. I think it's totally fine that he feels safe in the bathroom. He probably doesn't have much energy to roam around.

Thanks Chipper. I think I remember you posting about going through some stuff like this with your bunnies? This is clearly my first time doing this. I've had pets all my life but most of my pets pre-18 years old stayed with my mom and Syrus is really my first cat as a Grown Up Lady.

Anyways, my gut is saying the same thing you are, that he feels safe in the bathroom and it is somehow comforting to him (although really... gross. Lots of, uh, stuff happens in our one bathroom, like we're having to step around him after showers and stuff so I'm sort of perplexed by this). So what if that's where he wants to spend his time? It just makes it a little harder to give him extra love since I can only spend so much time hanging out in the dang bathroom, lol.

I don't really "go with my gut feeling" on much but it seems like a good approach for something as blurry and in the grey area as this situation is. I want to work with facts. Numbers. Quantify stuff in order to break it down and find the correct answer. That just doesn't work here so I feel out of my comfort zone bigtime.

I really appreciate this thread for me to spew all of my thoughts on this. This is just so much harder than I thought and I do think a lot has to do with nothing being black or white, I'm just not a good "grey area" person.

Purring is good, he must be happy. We all know that there can't be a happy ending to this story, but it sounds like it doesn't have to end just yet. Do the best you can to enjoy the time you have left with him.

Im sorry hugs

not quite. She has a condition that could be caused by cancer but also there is bunch of other reasons that can be causing it. So we are trying to find the reason, or rule out what she doesn't have. So far we found that her hip is "almost destroyed" (that what it's looked like on the Xray) but she is doing fine despite of this. Eats, runs around, and everything. Actually we did Xray for bladder or kidney stones but didn't see any. The condition that she has is urine scald - "rear" fur soaked in urine. Not too bad though. We will know for sure about cancer when we spay her.
You know what I just thought? Why aren't pets considered dependents? We spend time and money on them as much as on kids.
I hope Cyrus feels better today. Cancer or not, I hope at least pain control kicks in.

Just a quick update, Syrus has really rallied these past few days. I actually skipped his pain medicine yesterday because he seemed to be doing pretty well and the vet wanted me to back off to just once every other day if that worked for him. This med is hard on the kidneys. Anywho, I learned that no, he needs his meds every day so that's what I'm going to keep doing. He's still not eating a lot in one sitting, rather he eats many, many small meals which is difficult to juggle when I'm trying to keep the dog from sneaking in to eat it, which gives him diarrhea and the aforementioned Super Happy Fun Time! It makes me feel guilty when I have a work day, because when I'm home, I'm feeding him almost every hour or two. Oh well, it can't be helped, it's not like I can't work.

I'm cautiously thinking that maybe we can hold off on the home vet visit until late next week. I find that I'm having to remind myself that he's not getting better. He's just feeling a little bit better. It's amazing the gymnastics your brain will do to avoid thinking about or acknowledging something unpleasant, like death and dying.

I know that this whole situation is definitely giving me more perspective on death and dying in general.

is this not enough to keep him here?
But, it's up to you of course. I am glad he is at least feeling better.

My friend's brother was found unconscious (basically in coma) in bed, and he was unconscious longer than you want to be in this situation. He was in hospital last time I spoke to her, and now I am afraid to ask her again how he is doing. Stupid that i am afraid to ask, isn't it?