Daily Musings

Goodbye sweet girl

Goodbye sweet girl, originally uploaded by Kadacat (Marlene).

Well it has been a long time since I have posted to my blog and I do promise to go back and finish up on our vacation postings. I am not sure why I seem to have less time these past few months but hopefully I can do a bit of shuffling and regain some of it.

Many of you have already seen through FaceBook or flickr that we had to say goodbye to our very precious girl last night. It was such a difficult decision to have to make and I really didn't want to go there.

Almost five years ago we lost our precious cat Kada to cancer. A few months after her death, we brought Tess into our home to be a friend to Scratch. Tess (or Maggie as she was originally named) was looking for a loving family to adopt her. She was a humane society cat and was just a young kitten when we brought her home. She integrated into our home immediately and it wasn't long before she showed Scratch who was boss in the house. I think he is still reeling from that day :-).

Tess had such a wonderful personality - she was playful and loving and enjoyed being with her "people". She loved to torment Scratch - chasing him around the house. Scratch had to sneak to the food bowl to eat - as soon as Tess heard him there she would scare him off and attack the food herself. It is no wonder she got a bit chubby!

I am thankful for the many wonderful memories and photos I have of our sweet girl. Over the next few days, I plan on going through these and putting together a book of her time with us. It will help to heal this awful emptiness I am feeling.

For those of you that may have not experienced the love of a special pet, you may not understand this incredible sadness one feels when you say goodbye to a pet. In our home, our pets are an extension of our family. They are very much like our own children and the loss is just as significant when they are gone.

So, what happened to our sweet girl? Well, we noticed a few weeks ago that she was behaving differently. She was spending much more time on our laps and was feeling a bit thinner. A week ago, I really noticed a difference in her weight and that she was not interested in food. Having two cats in the house, it is not immediately evident when one stops eating. When I offered her a shrimp to eat and she refused, I knew something was wrong.

Dan took her into the vet on Monday of last week. She was severely dehydrated. The vet kept her, put her on IV and ran some blood work and x-rays. The x-rays indicated there were undigested mouse bones in her tummy. We have been plagued by mice in our house for the past two months and Dan came home one day to find Tess with the hind legs of the mouse hanging out of her mouth. We had never seen her actually eat her prey but for some reason, this time, she did.

We assumed it was these undigested bones that were giving her trouble, as did the vet. Initially, surgery was contemplated to remove the problem bones. When she seemed to be regaining her appetite on Tuesday, surgery was called off and she was discharged Tuesday evening to be at home with us. It was believed by eating, she would release enzymes to help in the breakdown of the bones.

Well, the eating did not continue at home. Over the Christmas break we got very worried about her and fed her water and nutrition through a syringe (along with her medication). This was not an easy task - cats do not appreciate being force fed.

Her condition did not improve and when she started vomiting, we took her to the emergency vet on Sunday. The Alta Vista Animal Hospital in Ottawa is THE place to be if you are a sick animal. It is a wonderful facility with the best equipment and veterinarians you can find in the area. It was due to this wonderful care that we were able to get to the root of Tess' problems. After further x-rays, and finally an ultrasound and tissue analysis, the diagnoses was a severe case of pancreatitis. From what the internal medicine specialist explained to me, Tess had so much inflammation in her stomach, pancreas and surrounding areas that she was not able to eat. In fact, they needed to stop feeding her in a traditional way to allow the pancreas to heal. Her liver and gall bladder were impacted by this inflammation. Toxic liquids were being introduced into her system as too much bile and bilirubin was produced. Surgery would have been deadly.

We had a very difficult decision to make. Do we continue with the treatment plan suggested? Treatment entailed blood and plasma transfusions to clean the toxins from her system and introduce healthy enzymes to aid in the healing process, IV fluids, medication, etc. She would remain in intensive care in the hospital for a minimum stay of 5 days while this treatment was administered and there was no guaranteed success. In face, the prognosis of recovering from this severity of pancreatitis in cats is not always favorable. It often results in ongoing, chronic issues.

The decision was made to stop her suffering. Dan, Garrett & I made the difficult trip back to Alta Vista hospital to say goodbye to our sweet girl. We spent time with her letting her know how much we loved her and thanking her for our time with us before it was time to say our final farewell.

It is a very big loss and I am very sad - it even surprises me how hard this has been. We tried so hard to save her and I wish the outcome would have been different.

Rest in peace, sweet Tess.

My Marathon & My Life

by Jordan Thoms

Editor's Note: this is a post my son Jordan did on FaceBook. I am so proud of him and asked his permission to post this on my blog. It looks long but it really is worth the read.

A photo of Jordan running in the Rattle Me Bones race in the fall.

Alright so bare with me, I'm jumping on the FaceBook note bandwagon. This note is about my journey to running the full 42.2K Ottawa Marathon – ohh look another cliché story about someone’s running story, yeah very funny! I have a feeling it’s going to be a long note so I’ll lay it out for you now. I’ll talk about my mental training and sport psychology courses at uOttawa, my mom as an inspiration to getting me running, my first running clinics, my failure at the half-marathon clinic last summer, my hiatus from running, signing up for a 5K, no wait 10K, ugh maybe ½ marathon…okay just go for the full marathon, and finally getting into contact with Ray Zahab and bringing him to the Orleans Running Room to speak about the same things I will write about in this note.

Many of you know I am taking Human Kinetics at uOttawa, and it is now my 4th year. I have learned so much through the amazing people I’ve met, courses I’ve taken, incredible professors, and just the general experience overall. That being said, I’ve had ups and downs with friends, professors, courses, and experiences. I only signed up for Human Kinetics in the first place just because it sounded cool, because I was into the whole teenage “let’s-all-look-like-arnold-schwarzenegger-phase”. I sat and thought, if there’s a four year program about this shit, sign me up right now! Well as the years went by, I discovered so much more about myself and life in general. I can’t say there was a moment-in-time where something clicked, but I can name a few occurrences where I felt a shift, especially while taking my two all time favorite courses in my studies – Mental Training, and Quality of Living. These courses were taught by two very well known Canadian sport psychologists, Penny Werthner and Terry Orlick. With their knowledge, I’ve learned important sport-related and life-related psychological qualities such as perseverance, focus, confidence, imagery, controlling distractions, ongoing learning, etc. But wait, I learned these same qualities in a sport-oriented class and life-oriented class, both geared towards excellence in the respective context. How can this be? I thought living life was one thing, and playing sports was another – or could they be one of the same? Could life and sport intertwine with one another and transfer learning lessons between the two? Is that even possible??? At the time, it sounded pretty mind-boggling.

Well it was about a year ago from today, and actually probably a little more…not really sure on the exact time-frame but my Mom and some of her co-workers decided to get into shape and try this whole “running” thing. They’ve seen the crazy runners and walkers in various colored jackets and heard about the Running Room so they decided to give it a shot, why not right? So they found a location close to home, just down on Centrum Boulevard…across from the YMCA (relax people I’m not promoting it I’m just pointing out the facts). Okay so this whole running idea seemed pretty easy – put one leg in front of the other and repeat. But it was hard! So they tried walking first (still putting one leg in front of the other and repeating, of course) and would see how that felt. Well a long story short, they’ve completed several clinics in the last year and a bit – working their way up from walking, learn to run, 5K training, 10K training, to several half-marathon clinics. Not to mention tons of 5K and 10K races, and about 3 or 4 half-marathons (including one in Florida at Walt Disney World). And at about the time they took the 10K clinic I decided to tag along and see what this was about. I figured 10K would be a good starting point for me since I was active with ice hockey and ball hockey. It turned out to be a lot harder than I thought!

I now realized running is one of the best workouts you can give your body! I did the whole 10K clinic and successfully completed the 10K goal-race at the end. I felt pretty good about myself, and the race was an amazing experience! It was the 2008 10K Canada Day race with 1000’s of people! And I got a cool dri-fit shirt and a medal as well. This running thing actually seemed pretty awesome; I thought I’d try the half-marathon clinic next. This turned out to be a complete disaster! I ran very well up until we reached 14K for our weekly, long-slow-distance run. I remember going to a party over at Dom’s, and although I didn’t drink, I couldn’t sleep very well that night and felt sluggish the next morning. It was hot that morning and I may have overdressed too. At about 11K on the route I felt so unbelievably exhausted and so I told them to go on without me; big, big mistake. First of all, I think I bit off more than I could chew with signing up for the half-marathon clinic. Secondly, I didn’t have a good sleep, I was tired, and I had abandoned the other runners. I was alone and walking towards the store from forest valley and it seemed forever until I arrived back at the store. I finally got back and everyone was so relieved to see me – they had even sent out drivers to look for me! I felt so bad! I felt like such a moron and now I felt like everyone had lost confidence in me. I decided to just stop with the half marathon clinic and maybe one day I’d try running again.

I didn’t entirely give up running but I didn’t run consistently. I may have run a few kilometers here and there, 20 minutes at the most from time to time. It wasn’t until very recently (November/December 2008) that I decided to try again. I had already completely forgotten about what had happened in the half-marathon clinic and assumed everyone had moved on. I didn’t want this to bother me, it didn’t have to. I decided to start small with baby steps and contemplated running with the 5K group. I went for a few runs with them to see how it felt and it felt fantastic! I was back into the swing of things and was running again. But then I started thinking of jumping to the 10K group for a little more of a challenge. And literally as I was thinking about this, so many friends of mine at the Running Room were going to sign up for their first-ever half-marathon clinic – I decided to do that! It’s so much easier when you can run with people you love to be around, and also it was mid-winter; much cooler than that scorching heat 6 months previous. I thought I could definitely do this! It’s just one leg in front of the other right?

Well it was in January of 2009 and I really wanted to do something big for myself, and others. Note that I’m not a believer of New Year’s resolutions – I think people should always be setting goals throughout the entire year. For example, if it’s early December and you want to change something about your life, why not do it now? Don’t wait for the calendar-marked New Year’s Resolution for the “appropriate” time to start. The best time to start would be now. But anyways, I had a few ideas brewing in my mind in the winter months for some big, big positive changes.

Last year in 2008 I had heard about this guy, Ray Zahab, last year in my Mental Training class, and then again in my Quality of Life class. He ran 7500 km across the Sahara Desert in 111 days with no rest – that’s like two marathons a day! WHAT THE HELL! Is he crazy!? Why would he do this? I was incredibly interested and I had so many questions to be answered, so I bought his book. I’ve never read a book so fast in my entire life! His website was listed at the end, so I visited it. I snooped around the site for an hour or so, looking at his biography, stories, races, etc, and saw contact information. Maybe, just maybe, I could email him and ask him some questions that have made me wonder and get an answer to them. At the same time I was involved with a Mental Training project to do with running and mental qualities involved. Perfect! I could kill two birds with one stone – get my answers and help with my project. So I emailed him my questions, and he replied! It wasn’t a very long reply though, just his phone number, asking me to call him sometime so we could chat. What, really? Ugh man I’m going to be so nervous for this, but as if! He turned out to be a really down-to-earth guy and was so “human”. Sounds weird, but so many people (including myself) put these kinds of people on a pedestal making them out to be god-like. He really wasn’t (not to take anything away from Ray). He was a normal guy, from Carp, Ontario, and now lived in Chelsea, Quebec. The difference was that he committed to something and persevered through the tough times to reach his goals. He works hard! Really, really hard! So I got some good answers for the project, and we aced it! Talking to Ray also closed the perceived gap between super-hero like people and just normal people. We are really all the same.

Fast forward. It’s now January 2009 and I had decided to check out Ray’s website again (www.rayzahab.com if any of you have been wondering). He happened to be in the midst of another ultra-crazy running expedition – all in an effort to raise awareness of global warming in the polar ice caps by running to the South Pole! He did the same with other running expeditions – raising awareness for the ONExONE foundation (www.onexone.org), and also the water problems in Africa (H20 Africa and Ryan’s Well Foundation). Amazing guy!! I decided to email him and see how he was doing. I had this crazy, farfetched idea that maybe he’d come to speak at the Orleans Running Room to talk about his fascinating expeditions, purpose behind them, and to talk about how running and life can be used to learn the same lessons. Who knows, maybe it could happen? I gave it a shot. I emailed him, and got an email just as he returned from the South Pole. He seemed excited and wanted me to call him again. Anyways, this process took many, many emails and phone calls between so many people. The good news is that he agreed to come speak at the Orleans Running Room on June 25, 2009 in benefit of the ONExONE foundation. Awesome!!! I couldn’t believe it! But as time has been passing, the gap between “super-hero like” people and “normal people” became smaller and smaller. I won’t go as far to say that I feel on the same level as Ray Zahab, but I do feel that I have potential to do more with my life now. From what was perceived as impossible, is not perceived as very possible – thus Ray’s values behind his newly established foundation, impossible2Possible (www.impossible2possible.com). Maybe, I thought to myself, could I do a full marathon? Could I use all that I have learned in my mental training and quality of living classes, inspiration from family and friends, and the realization that anything is truly possible, to complete a full 42.2 K of running? There’s only one way to find out, and that’s by trying (obvious enough right?). But there was a problem. The full marathon group was 5 or 6 weeks into their training program already, and the half-marathon clinic had just started. At first I thought (and I wrote a note about this) I could just train with the half-marathon clinic and run the full marathon with help from my “expertise” in mental training. I thought as soon as I ran passed the halfway mark, I would just use my awesome mind abilities and I was so convinced this could work. Yes and no, possible but risky. So I looked at the training for both groups and tried to find a safe way into the full marathon without risking injury. Sundays are our most important run; they are the longest of all! With the half-marathon the distances progress as follows: 7, 7, 7, 9, 9, 10, 10, 12, 14, 16, 16, 12, 18, 18, 20, 6, race day. The full marathon distances are something like this: 10, 10, 13, 13, 16, 16, 19, 23, 26, 19, 29, 29, 32, 23, 29, 32, 23, 6, race day. I saw in the full marathon group that they run 19 twice. I didn’t want to run 23 or 26 off the bat – I would surely injure myself. Considering I had run up to 10 K with the half marathon group, I decided to latch on with the full marathon when they ran 19 K the second time.

Last week was my first run with the full marathon group. It was 19 K and I felt amazing! I honestly felt like I could run even more after that. But it was this week that I was really excited/nervous about – it was a 29K run. I just got back and although I didn’t finish the whole run, I felt like I did the best I can; here are the stats:

Total calories – 2817 calories
Total time – 2:57:43 hrs
Total distance – 24.20 km
Average pace – 7:21 min/km

The numbers are pretty intimidating to look at for most but it’s just an accumulation of the same process. One foot in front of the other and repeat, drink before you become thirsty, eat the gels/gummies/Gatorade before you feel it physically, stay focused, use others as support, talk to them, support them with motivation, share experiences, etc. This is where I turn into Dr. Phil. Those kinds of qualities can be easily transferable to a general life-context to strive for excellence – whether it involves getting a new job, acing your finals, or achieving any set out goal. Fundamental concepts like perseverance, focus, pursuit, self-control, distraction control, intensity maintenance, commitment, confidence, mental readiness, ongoing learning retention of purpose, and many, many more can be shared through sport, physical activity, your job experiences, relationships, education, and so on. For example, if you can run with perseverance, focus, commitment and confidence to finish any distance race, then why shouldn’t it be possible to apply those same concepts (along with what you have learned by doing it) to any other walk of life? Finally, to finish off, I would like to use a few quotes from Ray Zahab. Keep in mind the transferable quality between life, physical activity, employment, education, relationship, etc. Use one domain of life to help the other, and vice versa. Everything seems to be connected doesn’t it?

“I pushed the reset button and then found a new reset switch. My limits were all in my mind. I had tricked myself into believing I could only go so far. But we don’t ever know what we’re capable of until we push ourselves. It doesn’t just apply to physical limits either. Once you go beyond what you ever thought you could do, there’s no going back. It’s with you forever.”

“You can stumble around for your whole life, feeling like you don’t know what you’re doing and letting it get in your way or even letting it stop you or you can accept that maybe you don’t know what you’re doing but you’re going to give it your best shot anyway.”

“What was easy? Easy meant quitting, it meant giving up. I didn’t want to do those things. I wanted to finish. I wanted to silence that negative voice that told me I couldn’t do the things I set out to do. I stood up and I went for it.”

29 K run. I stopped at 25 k ish but i was still very satisfied with how far I got! I wanted to stop at 5K, 10K, 15K, 20K, 25K, and every K between. I kept with it, stuck to the run as long as i could, and then let the others know i was going to head home.

A New Week!

Scarlet Rose, originally uploaded by Kadacat (Marlene).

Do you ever feel like time is moving so fast that you are just a bystander watching it revolve around you and not really participating?

I have been feeling a bit like that lately - I haven't been out on a photo shoot in a long time now. I have been weighed down with the guilt of not having my business financials and household taxes done. I promise to sit down and do them rather than doing what I love but I have continued to procrastinate. Finally, last night I got serious and have sorted all my receipts and statements. I am ready to move on to the next step. I know I will feel a huge weight lifted from my shoulders when this is done. And really... when I get to it, it isn't that bad. I am on a roll and would like to stay home today and get it done (or at least mostly done) but I can't seem to get my laptop to dial in to the RCMP so I can check what is on my plate today - **ughh**. So, I will likely go in and see what's up.

I had planned on working on this every free moment I had this weekend. Good intentions but not much action - LOL. What kept me busy you ask? Saturday morning started with a 10K St. Patrick's Day race. I was disappointed with my run but I am not sweating over it. Let's just say I didn't break any personal bests here - LOL. Went for breakfast after the run where I was proud of the choices I made - had a healthy spanish omellette full of veggies with a side order of whole wheat toast. I skipped the hash browns and had only one piece of toast.

Dan & I went to a St. Paddy's Day house party in the evening. I really didn't want to go but being a good wife I tagged alone. We did have fun and the food was delicious. I tried to make good choices which was difficult since it was beef brisket and scalloped potatoes on the menu. And I had a small piece of pie with ice cream - **blush**.

I ran 10K Sunday morning with my running group. I figure the runs will at least counter balance the not so great food choices. Thank goodness each 10K run burns approximately 700 calories which is between 6 & 7 extra points for the day if I choose to use them.

I made two batches of soup in the afternoon (yes, more ways to procrastinate for what I should have really been working on). Soup helps keep me on track. I like to be able to take a bowl of soup for my lunch during the week. I had extra leeks and dill in the fridge that I wanted to use up so I made Happy-Go-Leeky soup. It is yummy!

It is Garrett's birthday on St. Patrick's Day (can't believe my baby is going to be 20!). We have a hard time with schedules here so went out for dinner last night to 'T Basil - a vietnamese restaurant in Orleans. Again, tough to make good choices... I am going to have to be very good this week in order for the scale to show any results at all. I am going to make a lower calorie type cake (Angel Food) for Garrett - it is one that he loves and suits my purposes too ;-).

Wishing you a wonderful week!

Graduation

Graduation Bokeh, originally uploaded by Kadacat (Marlene).

Garrett has officially graduated - he received his diploma this morning at his commencement ceremony! We are so very proud. No, he wasn't on the scholar's list, he didn't receive a scholarship or a citizenship, music or sports award. But that is not important to me or to Garrett. What IS important is that he finished high school, he passed and he feels good about himself. He is ready to move on to future studies at the University of Ottawa in the fall. Another big step that we are very proud that he is taking. Just two years ago he had no interest in passing high school or moving on to secondary education.

"Make the most of your life for that is all there is of you."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Congratulations!

Congratulations!, originally uploaded by Kadacat (Marlene).

Garrett's commencement ceremonies are this morning. Our last boy has made it through the high school milestone. We are so proud of Garrett - he has struggled the past few years and this is an important milestone for him to reach. He has been accepted at the University of Ottawa for the fall program and is planning on pursuing a degree in Religious Studies and Philosophy.

Happy Father's Day!

I think of my dad everyday and wish he was still here to celebrate this special day! This is one of my favourite pictures of my dad - it was taken by my nephew the year before he passed away. We miss you Dad!

Happy Father's Day to all you fathers out there!

It's True!

I actually finished some scrapbook pages on Monday. I know it is hard to believe since I have been so side tracked with other things but here is the proof. Some of these pages I did at NavCan in March and a pile of them I started at The ScrapBox on National Scrapbooking Day but I actually finished them all this morning and I did a few new pages too!

So, if any family members are viewing this you can see I am actually working on this gift. Hopefully I will have it complete before their one year anniversary - LOL.

 

Family Fun

I got a bit sidetracked this week and haven't had a chance to post more on our travels on my blog. I am back with some pictures from our stay in Fraser Lake. Apart from the beautiful wedding on Saturday, August 18, we had some wonderful family time Friday night and Sunday at my sister's cabin (yes, in BC we have cabins, not cottages as they are called in Ontario - lol).  Our stay was much too short but in the time we had we did manage to catch up with my mom, brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, great nephews and a few family friends. I even managed to go out for a morning run twice while I was there (realizing how small my home town is - I didn't even get a 5 K run in going the circumfurence of the village - lol). Going home is always such a pleasure and this visit certainly was just that!

Friday evening we celebrated my brother Jim's 50th birthday. His birthday was in March but we didn't have a chance to get together until now. I made him a scrapbook album and my sisters put together a bag of goodies for him. Here are a few pictures from the evening:

Here are some pictures of family at the cabin. Unfortunately, I do not have a picture of everyone but I did my best to include all that I had.

And one final view of some more family pictures from the wedding:

Congratulations Jeremy & Brandy!

    

The long-awaited wedding finally arrived and it was well worth the wait! What a beautiful, well orchestrated day - everything was perfect. Brandy, as a self-described princess, was just that and she was radiant. My sister and her husband had worked hard to prepare their beautiful home and yard for this day and the gardens shone in the sunshine - a perfect backdrop for the ceremony and photos. Jeremy designed and built the amazing wedding altar that fits perfectly in the yard. Brandy and Jeremy are such an amazing couple and their love and happiness was certainly evident on their special day. We were so blessed to have been able to be a part of it!

    

I just don't have the space here to show you all of the pictures captured from this day (I took about 450!) but here is montage of the ceremony to give you just a glimpse. I may return with another montage before the night is over.

    

My Boys

I thought I would do a quick post about my boys (more like young men). I am feeling pretty good tonight - why you ask.

Ryan, my eldest son, whom we moved to BC in August called me tonight to tell me he has received a job offer in Prince George. It isn't the job of his dreams but it is a good job that pays better than he was getting in Ottawa. And to be honest, he just needs to be bringing in an income right now. He can search for the dream job while he is collecting a pay cheque. This job is to manage the HMV store at the local mall in Prince George. He will receive training in Vancouver as well as attend a conference in Toronto within the next couple weeks. He is happy to have a job but he is already feeling guilty because he is pretty certain he will receive a better job offer from the College of New Caledonia. He has met with them several times and they want him to work with them but don't have a job to offer yet. I love these qualities in Ryan - he cares about his professional image and genuinely cares about the people he works for.  I am so happy for Ryan that he has a job - takes a load of worries off his own shoulders and mine too.

Jordan, our middle son, has grown into such a sensitive, caring young man. He is very responsible, loves so many of the same things that I do. He starts back to school next week in his third year of University. I can't believe the time has gone by so quickly - it won't be long until he is finished his education and will be seeking his own way in life as well. And, as a side note, Jordan had his photo taken with Stephen Harper today at Play It Again Sports in Orleans (this is where Jordan works). Apparently the PM shops here every year for his son for hockey gear. He came in this afternoon with 5 body guards and his son and did a bit of shopping. Now how cool is that?

I had reported in an earlier post that Garrett, our youngest son, had received a job offer at Michaels. This was true, however things did not go as planned unfortunately. There was a mix up in the day he was to return and set things up and he showed up a day late. This was very heart breaking - probably more for me than for him but disappointing for sure. He did get over this upset though and while we were on vacation went out job searching and landed a job at Zellers. I am so proud of him for taking this step. This is a part time job which will keep him busy and give him some spending money while he upgrades his high school marks this semester. I have to give Garrett a lot of credit for standing up for his moral values and not accepting things just to get by when his principles don't agree. He has so much maturity and wisdom in so many ways.

So, I am feeling good tonight. All my boys are gainfully employed and are becoming responsible citizens. A mom has to feel good about that, right?