2024

 I knew it was going to suck. And suck it did.

The losses I expected came. The losses I didn't expect also came. 

We call this "tuck".

Chloe died in February. She had the trifecta of old cat diseases. I was managing them for a while, but when heart disease showed up her chronic kidney disease also stopped responding. It was always a quality of life decision (I'm extremely fortunate that money was never a factor), and of course once I made the decision I felt I waited too long. Not that she was in pain, just that she wasn't herself at the end. But that's an impossible decision to get right.

Also as expected, we lost our trio of sister rats. Billie was first, which was also expected due to an inoperable tumor. We really hoped Harriett and Rosa would be around most of the rest of the year, but they both developed tumors shortly after. Harriet's was also inoperable, which we learned while she was in surgery. Likely cancer, not the typical mammary tumor they usually get (which Rosa had and was successfully removed). Harriet had complications from surgery and died in a horrific way that made us distrust our vet. It messed us up for a while.

Album cover.

It was difficult to convince husband that Rosa couldn't be alone. Everything happened so fast we hadn't expected a single rat so soon. I wanted to risk getting a companion and being left with a single rat again. I called the rescue where we adopted them and explained our situation: we didn't want more babies and didn't want to extend the cycle. We'd had enough heartbreak and needed a break. Luckily, they had a female adult rat who was being picked on. They let us take her. She was part rex and had soft curly hair and whiskers. She also had big ears and a pot belly. Her name was Blossom. I wasn't a fan of the name but husband wanted to keep it. I think he was trying to keep her at an emotional distance.

Rosa and Blossom were never as close as the sisters were, but they did become friends. We got Blossom for Rosa, so while I certainly spent time with her and wanted her to know we were safe, it was most important that she bond with Rosa. Blossom came from an unhappy situation. Someone dropped her off with at least a dozen other rats. Apparently the woman's husband threatened to kill or release them all. The group of three that included Blossom had been adopted out and returned. After just a few weeks this fact was shocking. Blossom was the sweetest. How could anyone have ever wanted to do anything but love and cuddle her?

Blossom's talent was posing for the camera. Girl got it right every time.

Rosa passed a few months later, leaving Blossom alone. This time I felt OK about having a single rat. Blossom had experienced a lot and probably cycled through other rats who didn't always love her. In the four months we'd had her, I end up bonding closely with her. How could I not with her sweetness? I also ended up glad that we kept her name because she lived up to it, truly blossoming into a confident and content creature. Once she was alone, I spent every possible moment with her. She was in my jacket or on my desk while I worked, hung out on the couch with us at night, and on my shoulder or in a pocket while I cooked or cleaned. I made sure she wasn't alone except at night (I never could work up the nerve to let a rat sleep in my bed for fear I'd squish her) or when we were out of the house, and we even took her on short car rides rather than put her in her cage. But that only lasted a month before she also died suddenly. The vet offered to do a necropsy because of the circumstances: totally normal and fine at night, woke up to her on the floor of her cage the next morning. Turns out she also had heart failure. She died in my arms on the way to the vet.

Blossom passing was hard in a few ways. We didn't even start the year with her so couldn't have anticipated a fourth rat death. And we only had her five months. But in that five months I loved her so much. She was one of a kind and it breaks my heart that she had nearly two years with people who didn't appreciate her. She was also our last rat, something I didn't want to acknowledge. To add insult to injury, she died the day after the election.

So that's five. Thankfully, the bunnies made it to 2025. But not without their own hardships. Juno started having diarrhea, a deadly condition for rabbits. He lost a lot of weight despite eating normally. We spent around $2,500 on half a dozen tests until the vet ran out of ideas. We still don't know what's going on but we learned how to manage his symptoms for the most part. He's still a messy boy who frequently misses his litter box but at least he can keep on weight and isn't exploding any more.

Thankful for bunny stability and silliness.

Last year I'd said that anything unexpected would fit right in. And boy did it. Over the summer I started having severe digestive issues. I thought it was related to alcohol. It happened after a wine tasting when I drank a lot more than I usually do and had only light snacks instead of dinner. Then it happened after a couple of light beers. Then it happened after I had like two ounces of wine just to finish off a bottle. I stopped drinking and went to the doctor. She ordered blood testing and a celiac panel for fun, since I have a family history.

When the results came back I didn't notice anything unusual. The celiac test result even looked normal. There were no notes from the doctor, so I figured everything was fine and should continue to lay off the alcohol until I did some trial and error. I kept a supply of ginger ale and NA beers in the fridge so I could still feel like I was having something. I even bought a bottle of NA wine which I don't recommend.

A couple months later I had an alert about the bill so I logged onto my chart. There was a message from the doctor that I hadn't seen before: my celiac blood test came back extraordinarily high, which means I have celiac disease. Eat gluten free from now on.

I immediately messaged back: what (the fuck) do you mean.

I hadn't been eating gluten free at all for the last few months! I eat pasta at least weekly, had been on a trip where we ate sandwiches, I'd been baking... if anything I'd eaten more gluten than usual. But once I thought about it more, my symptoms never fully went away. After eating I'd rush to the bathroom probably a third of the time. Until she informed me I'd initially read my results incorrectly, there was no rhyme or reason to my bathroom habits. Looking back, all those times I thought I'd gotten sick from alcohol it was because it was beer or I'd also eaten gluten that day.

I tried a zucchini noodle lasagna. I wouldn't make it again.

Celiac disease is probably the most annoying and inconvenient disease. It's autoimmune, meaning my insides attack itself if a bread crumb gets in accidentally. Even if I didn't have symptoms, or felt like risking it all for a burrito, damage is being done. I've been mostly vegetarian for close to 20 years and am experienced finding the one acceptable dish on a restaurant menu or asking for substitutions. But being vegetarian is a choice and I'm often flexible with that choice. Having celiac disease also means finding the one acceptable dish on a restaurant menu, but then asking what feel like really invasive questions about how it's prepared or if the sauce is made with roux or how something is fried. I have to read between the lines of an uninformed server ("yes, the tortilla chips are naturally gluten free" as if that was the part of the dish I was questioning) and ask them to go check the ingredient list or talk to the chef. It's exhausting. It's embarrassing. And because so many people are gluten free sometimes but not all the time, like how I can be vegetarian with flexibility, I have to be direct and tell the whole world I have celiac disease and am not asking these questions for fun and bad things will happen if they don't believe me.

I also randomly had the worst non-Covid respiratory illness I've ever had, in which I was prescribed an inhaler and multiple antibiotics for two weeks. I've read that people with celiac disease are born with the gene that causes it (since it's genetic) but something triggers it in life. Maybe this is what triggered it for me, since it was about a month before I started experiencing symptoms. Super duper fun.

Then I skipped a period in September. I'm the most regular period-having person out there. Even though I'd been sterile for 9 years at that point I still took a pregnancy test. I thought I was going crazy. I had nightmares about finding out I was 8 months pregnant and being forced into parenthood. This lasted for months. September was sort of a stressful time (my friend's wedding was stressing me out for several reasons, I just accepted a new job offer and dealt with wrapping things up at my old job, all the pet loss, and the world in general) but I'd had far more stressful periods without missing a period. It was probably the first sign that I'm entering perimenopause. At 38. But you know what? Bring it on. I'd love to not have a period anymore.

All that said, 2024 wasn't completely without its bright spots. We traveled a ton, something we haven't done in a very long time.

Trippy Times Square at midnight.

In April we traveled to our friend's house in upstate New York to watch the solar eclipse. We planned the trip in the expectation that Chloe would be gone by then, but told our friends that we'd bail if she wasn't. It was the very definition of bitter sweet. I'm glad we saw our friends, and the solar eclipse is practically a religious experience (if anyone reading this has not seen a total solar eclipse, there's truly nothing comparable - you have to see it once in your life). We spent a day in the city after, a first for husband. We saw an incredible play, ate incredible pizza (a small thing I'm very happy to have done since it's the last time I'll ever eat a New York slice), and experienced Times Square at midnight (so weird).

Lil baby salmon.

In May we went to Seattle. I had a work trip and husband came along for the weekend before. The city showed off and gave me my best argument yet for moving there. Husband loved MoPop, we saw young salmon in the fish ladders, stayed in the most adorable house in existence, and ate and drank our way through a few neighborhoods. I stayed for another weekend after my work trip and saw one of my best friends and my favorite cousins and ran in idyllic weather.

In July we celebrated one of my other best friend's 40th birthday in Mammoth. We stopped in Independence, CA on Independence Day and had ice cream from a little shop with the cleanest bathroom, and went to a firework festival on the top of a mountain wearing dino hats and Jurassic Park shirts. Then my sisters came to visit with my niece and nephew and we introduced the kids to our bunnies and rats.

Alpine lake in Mammoth.

In August we celebrated our dating anniversary with a stay at a hotel downtown. The draw was that there's a private entrance to Petco Park from this hotel, so we got fancy seats to watch the Padres. We felt so bougie! We were welcomed right in without bag checks or other hassles from the front entrance. We had dinner at a restaurant I love with all sustainable seafood. The waitress brought us complementary champagne for our anniversary. We took her recommendations on what to order and learned we don't really like sea urchin. Honestly, I really wanted to since we need to eat those guys while the sea stars are recovering.

PRONGHORN

Later that month I traveled to Albuquerque for another best friend's bachelorette party. We rode horses and stayed in a lovely house with peak weather watching windows and a hot tub. Husband came with in September when I returned for the wedding. We went early to go nerd out at the Very Large Array out in the middle of nowhere. It was so out of the way that we saw herds of pronghorn on the way there and the way back — life goal achieved!

LA is quite beautiful.

Husband turned 42 in September and we had a weekend dedicated to the answer to life, the universe, and everything. I decorated the cake like the universe and we went to the Griffith Observatory in Hollywood (and took a Paramount tour on a whim - stars are kind of on theme!). Our hotel was right next to an In 'N Out so of course that was dinner. Husband suggested we take it back to the room to eat. I don't like eating in bed because crumbs, but he reminded me that it's a hotel! The sheets will be cleaned tomorrow by someone else. Brilliant. It was my last burger (well, last grilled cheese) and it was perfect. On the way home I received the official offer for my job, which promised an opportunity to do something new.

Pineapple that I grew that gave me a tummy ache.

Other random happy things happened. I harvested a pineapple that I grew. It made me sick to my stomach but it was delicious. Our friends hosted a chili cook-off. We went out dancing on Halloween and visited the Queen Mary Dark Harbor event for a friend's birthday. I got a tattoo. We made great use of our zoo memberships. We helped out at a few beach and community clean-ups. Our friend launched a book and beer event series that will eventually turn into a business. I ate incredible food. Art was everywhere. Husband had an incredible professional year. I dyed my hair Barbie pink and it came out more like cherry Coke. The year was full of nature.

It's important to write down that good things also happened. And to remember that we can do hard things. I'm still incredibly privileged and most of my worries are about other people. I will continue to do things that will invite loss into my life and I'll hopefully do things that invite struggle. I never want to be complacent or afraid of something coming to an end.