Frank, buddy, just breathe

He expresses his stress and frets openly--maybe that's why he's healthier than I am.

Last Saturday, we found out that our big, fat tabby cat (we'll call him Jake because that's his name) has diabetes--in a major scary way. A cat's normal glucose level tops out at 120; at 140 they go on insulin. Jake's blood sugar was 500. Frank had to learn how to give insulin injections the same day. He wasn't comfortable with the prospect at all.

Every day, Jake gets two injections. Each day this week, Jake got more irritated with Frank, and Frank got more filled with anxiety.

I had told Frank weeks ago that a group of women from work were going to come over on Sunday at noon to work on a special project--so he would have all of Saturday to do any home improvement work and Sunday he could relax and we could get our stuff done. Somehow, this became Frank planning to paint the living room and dining room on Sunday. Don't ask.

The vet called and said Jake needed to come back in on Saturday for a half-day of glucose tolerance monitoring. Drop him off at 7:30.

Mid-week, Frank's arm started to hurt terribly and given enough use, it would go numb. I told him this was nerve pain--and I should know. I explained that considering the things that made it worse, he likely had the start of thoracic outlet syndrome. My advice was to do a series of specific exercises each day, take some of my diclofenac (sounds like a Canadian city), ice it in the evening, and breathe deeply because stress only makes it worse. He ignored everything I said, and instead whimpered every time he tried to write, pick up a cat, or fill a glass with water. He'd collapse into unconsciousness if he had my troubles.

Friday afternoon, it occurred to Frank that my people were coming over on Sunday. Although I had told him that information at least a dozen times, he was taken aback--he swore I had said Saturday. They never come on Saturday. Duh.

And then the phone rang. It was the roofing company rep who had been at our house three weeks ago--at least. He wanted to let Frank know that the materials were being dropped off within the hour and a crew would be at the house--on the roof and working--at 8:00 Saturday morning. We, unfortunately, were going to be at the vet.

Frank called dog daycare (always busy on a summer Saturday) and after begging, they agreed to let Sparkle come and play. It was much easier to convince them once they understood that the alternative was to have a border collie in the house all day while a half-dozen Mexican men pounded on the top of the house loudly and relentlessly.

Frank was stressed anyway because Sparkle has arthritis and he was afraid she wouldn't fare well among the other dogs. It had been months since she was up to frolicking in daycare. Frank was truly starting to tizzy himself. He was too overwhelmed to spackle the bajillion nail pops running like vertebrae down the living room walls. He decided to do it on Saturday and still paint on Sunday.

On Friday night, we both went to bed much too late and slept very poorly. We were up by 5:00. I came into the dining room just in time to hear Frank breathing quickly and muttering that he just couldn't do it--it was all too much. He felt that the cat was angry with him for the shots. He had a headache. What if the dog was too arthritic for daycare? What if the roofers needed us to sign something before they could start? We had a big check from the mortgage company to deposit.

I thought he was going to work himself into some kind of a seizure.

Suddenly, I channeled every therapist I ever had, along with the physical therapists and a few editions of O, The Oprah Magazine. I told Frank to breathe. Calmly and in my smoothest voice possible, I heard myself explaining the technique and merits of diaphragmatic breathing. Frank gave me a doubting look that I took to mean he believed I was a hypocrite beyond description, but I had provided enough of a distraction that he wasn't turning in circles muttering to himself and describing how the world was coming to an end at casa de 5150.

In the end, we got the cat in the carrier, and I tried not to feel offended when Frank asked me multiple times if I was going to be OK holding that dog leash (implying I was going to sneeze and let the dog run off while I dug through my purse for a Kleenex). He was impressed that sometime in the last 12 hours, I had thought to print out stick-on labels reading "Jake Voirrey" on them to stick on the cat's OneTouch UltraMini glucose monitor kit and each accessory.

We went out to breakfast and sat on the breezy patio of a family-run business that only serves breakfast. It was lovely and Frank was starting to lighten up. He even took a few minutes to do some of the shoulder and arm stretches I had shown him so his arm wouldn't go numb. When we got home, there were, in fact, about a half-dozen Mexican men on our roof.

The rest of the day was noisy but relatively well-organized. At one point, I stretched out on the bed and dozed off. Frank had been talking to me nonstop from other rooms in the house, and I was already asleep for an hour when he figured it out. Standing at the foot of the bed, he said loudly (it was the only way--shingles were being hand-hammered onto the house at that point), "I can't believe you fell asleep under these conditions."

I opened one eye and replied, "Like you, I got up at 5:00, but right now, I'm feeling quite a bit better than you, my dear--so, take a lesson."

I got up and upon glancing at the computer, noticed that Frank had been watching Sparkle via the daycare's webcam. High-resolution webcam. She was fine. Absolutely fine.

At around 6:00 p.m., we headed out to retrieve the pets. Sparkle was first since daycare was about to close. We walked to the adjacent building and picked up the cat. He was fine, too, especially considering he had spent the day getting pricked with needles every hour on the hour. Frank was suddenly relieved to realize that the folks at the animal hospital had laundered Jake's faux-sheepskin cozy bed that was in the carrier. All that diabetes had made Jake pee in the crate on our way over--just one more thing to send Frank teetering on the edge.

Frank, you'd never make it as me. It took a major neurological event before I melted down in the face of stress, and even then, it was during a simultaneous helping of jabs that included financial crisis, my father dying, an oppressively difficult situation at work, being on the worst possible medication for me, and a bipolar volcano about to spew acid words, among other pressures.

The roof looks great, the pets are fine, and Frank finally relented, having decided I wasn't trying to get him to pop a hallucinogenic mood stabilizer, so he tried diclofenac for his pain and shoulder inflammation.

And we all slept soundly, soothed by our diaphragmatic breathing.