Jan 5

 Tired.

The days dissolve into blocks of four hours between each Athena set of eyedrops. My ADHD like itches constantly trigger, constantly watching the clock, constantly figuring out how much time, constantly giving me executive dysfunction as well, its only 3 hours away, I can't do anything. It's exhausting, and not just from a, hey, I'm not sleeping for more than 3 hours at a time !

Yesterday, on top of everything else, I also had to go flat sit Hazel's place for a while so the inspector could come round. He was, of course, late. Stupidly, when I got a little energy back sitting waiting at Hazel's, I decided to do her washing up and her trash runs and generally tidy the kitchen. She is absolutely a trash panda disaster. I'm a bit of a disaster myself. She makes me look great. 3 sinks full of washing up, 3 runs to the bins, and a pop over to the local shop for some cleaning supplies to clean her grubby stove top, and the kitchen was a bit better. I sorted putting away a bunch of her stuff too.

I didn't have to do that. I did it anyway. Gave me something to do whilst waiting.

Exhausted. Running on fumes and auto pilot.

So. Over the last week or so we have been in and out of the vets. Once every couple of days. Sometimes back to back days.

We're on two different anti biotics. The once every 4 hours drops continue. And now we also have serum spun from Athena's blood to drop in 10 minutes after the other 4 hour drop. This is a killer for me. Not only do I have to get up every 4 hours and pull together enough to do a reasonably tricky drop process. I then have to spend some time awake to do another. Super hard. In fact so hard, I am half the time not bothering. And just leave it to intersperse in the 4 hours - sometimes 30 minutes later, sometimes 2 hours later. But a similar 4 hour tempo. This means sometimes I am bouncing up and down every 2 hours.

I think as of yesterday, and what with cleaning Hazel's kitchen I have reached some kind of internal breaking point. I'm ok. Just tired. And slumping into a what will be, will be.

Despite doing everything I can for Athena, I think the result is looming that she has lost her eye. Her eye isn't healing, or perhaps, it's just a mess of healing. Either way she has a big gnarly chunk of scar tissue on her eyeball. Opaque. Raised. Very clearly visible. And she has completely lost sight in that eye. I think in the end, the eye gets taken out.

But who knows, maybe it needs a lot of time to improve. I don't see it happening. It has got worse, and then seems to be settling into a mass of scar tissue on the eye itself.

As for herself, she seems pretty ok with all of it. Up for walks. And dinner. And a bit of a wag of a tail. She also at this point seems to have acclimatised to not having that eye. Her bumping into things or being surprised has stopped. I think she's adapting pretty well to it.

I am worried about it. But not deathly worried about it. Not sure if that's because on balance I don't think this will kill her, or, that it's just because I'm exhausted.

There is always an existential risk to any kind of health worry for her at her advanced age. Even an aesthetic is a serious concern. The likelihood of her going in and not coming out is enough that the vets don't want to do it. Like myself however, it would in the end I think, be a peaceful way to go. And I suspect probably the kindest. Go to sleep with hope. But don't wake up. It seems less awful to me than going to sleep knowing you will never wake again. Perhaps that's just me.

If she does lose her eye - probable - they will need to operate to remove it. And knock her out. And so we roll that dice. And infection dice. And all sorts.

I already know that I am highly unlikely to have her see out the year. Age. And all that. To some extent, this is like end game positioning. Ares was different. And yet the same. The same increase in vet calls. Care. Effort. And then he was gone.

This week at the vets we got to bump into Sian again, a nurse. We haven't seen her in years. She was the nurse who looked after Ares during his surgery. She was the one who asked if I was ok when Ares got his diagnosis and I burst into tears. She was very kind to Ares and myself. And on the strength of that, her boyfriend also fell in love with Ares. And wanted a boxer of their own.

Whilst her kindness and care and the glitter of her soul has stuck in my head, I was not sure if she would remember me.

Remember me I asked ?

I remember you Mr Rice she said. And Ares. I was only talking about Ares just this Christmas. He was lovely. He will always have a bit of my heart.

Sigh.

I teared up.

Oh don't I said.

I'm sorry, I didn't mean to upset you.

It's ok.

As Hazel said, most of the people Ares met had their hearts touched. He tended to steal a bit of peoples hearts. A love bug. Cuddly and friendly and just always wanted to be with people.

I know that a whole bunch of people around me got dogs on the strength of hanging out with Ares and Athena. A bunch of people that had never had them before. And all got dogs. One group of 3 friends who all used to hang out with us, every single one of them ended up getting a dog.

I think. It's the effect of Ares and Athena. Ares especially. A big doofus lovebug who was happy to sit and cuddle you and fall asleep whilst you were doing something else.

I've always treated my mutts with love and care. I've not let them run riot. There are rules to keep them and others safe. But beyond that. I have let them be dogs. Be themselves. Discover life and do stuff. Not constrict them just for convenience. They have always been to me, people. I have always treated them with love. Not teased them. Always let them see they could trust me. And they were safe. And that people were nice. And I think. It rubs off. And they took that love and trust and safety with people and everyone they met, it shines. And I think people feel it. The warmth.

They're also boxers of course. Lovable goofballs.

I dunno.

I like to think I have done my best for them. And a little bit of it reflects out onto people. It is, in a way, a bit of my soul. There is that saying. That a dog will take a piece of your heart with it. And it will give you a piece of its own. So. Maybe. Ares and Athena have had a piece of my heart with them. The nice bit. The loving caring bit. Not the dark bit. The suffering miserable bit. Just the love bit.

And I have loved them to bits.

Anyway.

Off to the vets again tomorrow for another Athena checkover. We will see what the vet has to say. Perhaps there is some hope in the scar now formed on the eye - I really can't see how though. And the escalation of things we are doing also tells you what you need to know. The fight is not being won.

I am tired.

Just want to sleep. And rest. And fall into a deep oblivion. I am not suicidal. But at the same time. I crave falling into nothingness. Everything is pain. If I am active it's a struggle. If I am resting, it's a struggle. No matter what I do. It's hard. Breathing. Is hard. Ho hum.

I still have moments where I can forget things for a while. Interestingly, doing a stream of me playing a game is perhaps the strongest act of misdirection I can do. For a short while, the pains and everything get shoved into the background. The worries. The schedules. It's all there of course. But the stream distracts me. Until.. it doesn't. But it often does for a while. Different person. Much like the different person I used to be at board games. Strange. Multiple me's.

Work has been busy. Which is not helping. Mostly a case of everyone else fucking up. Marvellous. Frustrating. And underlines that even with more help and more processes being followed, it seems I am crucial to the stable functioning of shit. So many plates spin and crash to the floor unless me, and specifically me, come in to steady them. It is, at the end of the day, just a function of intellect. Just being better at solving problems. At seeing the issue. At critical thinking. That's it. People suck at it. I tend to do pretty well with it. It's not about technology. Or software. Or area of business. It starts coming down to things like, did you just make an assumption ? Did you actually read that. You made a typo there. No, you can't do that, think about it, it's not logical.

As it turns out. People are extraordinarily bad at all of that.

And when something actually starts to get technical. Requires knowledge of computers and languages, and data and networks and shit. Forget it. It has at that point reached magical status.

So I am where I am. Always correcting others homework at the lowest level. And at the highest, doing magical things that no one understands.

I - we - are doing our best to make me replaceable. Take me out. Replace me.

It is proving to be difficult.