I haven't blogged in a couple of weeks. I haven't finished a book in a couple of weeks. I haven't done much of anything the past few weeks because life got really tough, really quickly for a while. I won't go into everything as I don't really feel like reliving it, but basically my sweet dog became severely ill on the 25th of January. She wouldn't eat, she vomited and her breathing became laboured. We rushed her to the vet for an emergency appointment, and after running some blood tests, we were told that she had advanced diabetes (which we weren't aware of) and had diabetic ketoacidosis (which is basically a diabetic coma). The vet told us there was 20-30% survival rate and we might have to think of saying goodbye; however, where there is life, there is hope. I got my Christian friends and my family to pray, and we all prayed very hard. Each day the vet called us and said she was doing better, but we weren't out of the woods. Saturday she looked so good and then Sunday she was quite unresponsive and I felt like my hope was slipping. We continued to pray. We continued to visit her and bring her home-cooked food that we knew she would like (she didn't want to eat the vet hospital's food and she needed to in order to receive insulin). We kept waiting for the day we would be past the worst.
Wednesday night she was discharged and came home - an utter miracle. I'm so thankful to God that he had His hand on this situation. Even though she's home now, it's still a long road ahead. It can take 3-6 months to stabilise a dog (get their blood glucose curve to a healthy range and the proper insulin dosage), and it's been a week. It's a massive adjustment. We have to inject her twice a day, take her glucose reading three times a day initially (which is quite frustrating at times, because we don't always get enough of a sample to get a reading), weigh her food, keep a strict schedule etc. We don't mind, we're just so happy to have her home. 💖
As you can imagine, it's been very, very stressful. My dad also had to go on a business trip, so my mom and I had to catch trains and taxis to the vet hospital (as it was one that wasn't in our area). We had to learn how to inject her and test her blood (I haaaate needles and blood, but luckily I'm managing). It also snowed so heavily Thursday/Friday that I was worried about getting to the vet, as the hill we live on couldn't have cars up or down.
My anxiety has also, obviously, been awful because of this. I'm just hoping things calm down in February - I feel like I haven't caught my breath the past two weeks!
It's also my 20th birthday next week (how did I get old so quickly like wut) which I was going to spend in London with my family, but we can't leave Poppy right now, so I think I'll just go book shopping and eat some cake, which is always a good way to spend the day!
Sea Witch - ⭐⭐⭐⭐.5 | Before You Say "I Don't Believe" - ⭐⭐⭐ | Hard Questions, Real Answers - ⭐⭐⭐⭐ | Ink, Iron and Glass - ⭐⭐⭐⭐ | Last Safe Moment - ⭐⭐⭐⭐ | Light Years - ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (NEW FAVOURITE) | Pacifica - ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ | By a Charm and a Curse - ⭐⭐ | Spinning Thorns - ⭐⭐⭐.5
January was an interesting reading month. I started off SO STRONG but then with all the stress the past two weeks, my reading was nonexistent. I read quite a few good books, but I also had some disappointing ones. I LOVED Sea Witch, Light Years and Pacifica - they were so good. Ink, Iron and Glass was quite good after I got into it, but it didn't blow my mind. By a Charm & a Curse was...terrible in my opinion. I wish I had DNFed. Spinning Thorns was quite good, but again, I didn't love it. The two non-fiction books I read were quite good too, but NF books don't generally evoke strong opinions from me so...
These are a couple of the books I'm hoping to get to this month! Have you read any of them? What did you think? How was your January?