by Nancy Laracy
Thankfully, summertime in the northeast quickly brought warmer temperatures and sunny skies. Our native rhododendrons were in full-bloom, some reaching up to ten feet tall, and the bright orange tulips had withered, making room for my favorite annuals, impatiens. Over the years, during these warm summer days, I often sat on the porch with Bunny Boy, which became a familiar sight in my neighborhood. Our neighbor Leslie, a die-hard walker and admirer of my flowers, would stroll across the lawn in her sweatpants and Keds sneakers to chat with me about Bunny Boy.
“I tell everybody about this bunny,” she would say over and over again.
“He’s my inspiration to keep fighting, Leslie,” I would reply.
That summer, Julie and Chris were helping me to plan the ultimate fiftieth birthday surprise for Ward. He would hit the milestone, god willing, in November.
Napa Valley, California, was the obvious choice. Ward had been collecting wine since the late 1970s, and we had yet to travel to any vineyards outside of New Jersey. I made plans for us to arrive in San Francisco the day before his actual birthday and drive out to wine country the morning of the big day. I was so genuinely excited I thought I could burst.
By late October, nobody had leaked a word about the surprise trip. Chris, in particular, got my special praise. He and Ward were attached at the hip these days. They watched sci-fi movies into the wee hours of the morning. They jogged together. They lifted weights and practically lived on protein shakes. I could feel Chris drifting from me, normal for any teenage boy, but I sorely missed snuggling with him on the recliner and watching Family Guy or spending late afternoons at the Guitar Center embracing his new hobby and learning everything I could about guitars. My little buddy was not so little anymore.
In an effort to placate her parents, Julie had also reluctantly agreed to tour the College of New Jersey shortly before Ward and I had left for Napa Valley. Ward’s brother and sister-in-law were adjunct professors at the very popular, highly competitive state school. After walking the campus for less than an hour, our screaming liberal daughter said, “The student body is so diverse. The kids seem just like me.”
And she was right. There university was known for its liberal policies and political culture, and the campus exuded a comfortable casualness. The school had Division I sports if Julie wanted to play tennis and a strong academic program. Bunny Boy would also be only an hour and a half away.
Meanwhile, Bunny Boy was spending more and more of his time just hanging out in the lagomorph lounge. He had slowed down noticeably over the past few months. He was also leaving occasional poop pellets around the perimeter of his litter pan and along the bottom of the sofas. According to Dr. Welch, this was normal behavior with a geriatric bunny. She thought he might also be developing some arthritis. Although Bunny Boy was clearly aging, he was still strong and determined. None of his trials or tribulations had dulled his spirit. But the reality began to sink in with me.
Bunny Boy was my rock. He went about life with a joie de vivre that inspired me. He had lived over six years from the date of his first surgery and had survived numerous medical catastrophes. With each subsequent mishap or health issue, my prayers intensified. I asked God to keep Bunny Boy safe when he underwent anesthesia and prayed he would never die of a heart attack from pain. Most of all, I hoped I would never have to euthanize Bunny Boy. I wanted him to die in my arms one day.
A week before Ward’s big surprise, Chris handed Ward a velvet wine bag containing the trip itinerary and two wine bottle Christmas ornaments. Bunny Boy was cradled in Julie’s arms. I lit a Merlot-scented candle.
“Surpriiiiiiise!” we screamed in unison, startling Bunny Boy who lunged headfirst onto the glass coffee table and slid off the side. He scrambled onto all fours and thumped loudly. Dear god, not another accident! I thought. I shamefully blew Ward off to check on Bunny Boy.
“I want to come back in my next life as that rabbit,” Ward remarked. “How about you kids?”
Bunny Boy’s theatrics turned out to be nothing more than a scare, and our much-awaited trip to the wine country was everything I had hoped it would be—relaxing, rejuvenating, and romantic. When we returned, well-rested, we were ready to host Thanksgiving once again. Bunny Boy went solo on our Christmas card that year, perched in front of the tree with his Santa hat. He looked like an oversized beanie baby. It was one of his finer moments.
Chapter 25
By early February, the northeast had gotten pounded with eleven snowstorms. It was already the snowiest winter on record since the 1940s. It seemed Julie and Chris were home more than they were in school. Even Bunny Boy had temporarily given up his recent couch potato status, frolicking back and forth along the French doors in the sunroom chasing snowflakes or pawing wildly at the glass doors as the kids slid down the backyard on their snow tubes. I was ecstatic to see his renewed burst of energy, and the thoughts of Bunny Boy aging were pushed to the back of my mind, replaced by youthful images of my furry friend—the irresistible kit finding his way into our rambunctious family, the science projects and sports games where he became the star, the many calamities or antics that rendered us helpless as we laughed uncontrollably.
In February, we took a vacation to Puerto Rico. At first, getting there looked like a crapshoot. Three out of the four of us had gotten the dreaded stomach flu, though so far I had dodged the bullet, walking around wearing a mask and carrying the Kaopectate and Lysol. But our plans forged ahead, and we arranged for Kelly to drop by again to check on Bunny Boy. Another small abscess had cropped up on the surface of his face, and thankfully, we had caught it early.
The first wave of nausea hit me on the plane. The second came while we waited at Julie’s aptly named “baggage clam.” By the time we reached our hotel, I had vicious contents coming out from both ends of my anatomy. I quickly went into seclusion. I missed Bunny Boy. I wanted my security blanket. But the stomach flu took its normal course, thankfully, without causing any further complications. A few years back, during one of our previous trips to Puerto Rico, chest pain and severe sweating and anxiousness, side effects from Celebrex, had sent me to the emergency room in the small town of Dorado. The antiquated EKG equipment consisted of four metal cuffs for my ankles and wrists that were attached to a small monitor. I sat there feeling I was about to be executed. Fortunately, it was a temporary issue, and I was able to stay on for the vacation.
Similarly, this time I recovered from the stomach flu soon enough to enjoy the warm weather, a perfect winter interlude for the whole family. On our return, there was a note on the counter from Kelly.
“Everything went fine, but call me when you have a minute.” As I suspected, Kelly, too, had noticed that Bunny Boy was slowing down.
During this time, Chris had begun playing high school tennis, and he wasn’t off to a good start. Although he was naturally athletic, Chris was a head case. He couldn’t settle his nerves. While Julie’s emotional makeup made for a more consistent tennis player who stayed cool under pressure and wore her opponent down, Chris was easily frustrated, often trying to kill the ball instead of returning it to his opponent. Due to his erratic play early in the season, I received instructions not to come to his first matches. But I ignored the warnings and went down one afternoon, hiding behind a car in the parking lot, wearing my bright red jacket and matching hat and gloves. It was a poor choice in colors. I was spotted, and Chris only got more distracted. By early April, Chris finally started to play more consistent tennis.
Midseason, I found out that one of the player’s mothers had recently been diagnosed with fibromyalgia. She was “shattered” by the diagnosis, her words. I arranged to have lunch with her to share my over ten years of accumulated knowledge and provide some resources to help her live with the disease. Essentially, I compiled a layperson’s survival guide to living with fibromyalgia. I prepared an entirely new diet and nutritional program for her, based on scientific findings. We focused on greatly restricting her carbohydrates and initially eliminating all sim
ple sugar and yeast, both of which are shown to exacerbate the many symptoms of fibromyalgia, namely the diffuse muscle pain and fatigue.
My guide was also complete with web information and links to the various medications I had seen go through clinical trials and get FDA approval, such as Lyrica and Neurontin. Lyrica, in particular, showed great promise in treating the nerve pain associated with fibromyalgia, though I was yet to try it due to my usual fear of medicines. There were also links to holistic treatments to help manage fibromyalgia, including yoga, chiropractic treatment, massage, acupuncture, and other modalities. And finally, there was a very important reference to AAT, animal assisted therapy, with links supporting its efficacy, an avenue I had just begun to formally research myself despite being on the receiving end of pet therapy for years with my beloved rabbit. Caring for Bunny Boy—feeding him and changing his litter pan—kept me moving, which is critically important when you have fibromyalgia.
By this point, with my experience and keen interest in studying and understanding my diseases, I had become a wealth of information for new patients. I was honored that several rheumatologists felt confident enough to refer their fibromyalgia patients to me as a support system and guide. Fibromyalgia has no single definitive cause as of yet—just some solid theories—therefore, having an effective treatment plan can be complicated. Treatment usually encompasses mainstream medicine as well as a holistic approach, and often doctors do not have the time or capacity to provide comprehensive alternative medicine recommendations to their patients. That was where I came in.
Over the years, we had stacked up even more nicknames for Bunny Boy—Energizer Bunny, Happy Ears, Sunshine Boy, Pookie Doodles, or Butchie. But as of late, he was known as Iron Bunny, an endearment gifted upon him by Dr. Welch and enthusiastically supported by the Animal Medical Center. Bunny Boy had helped to teach the veterinarian community that indoor family rabbits can endure more medical procedures safely than they had previously believed. Bunny Boy had blazed a new trail for rabbits.
But having compromised immune systems set both him and me up for a myriad of annoying and sometimes life-threatening problems. By this point, we were routinely having Bunny Boy’s molars and front teeth trimmed or his surface abscesses, which kept popping up, drained. Between the two of us, I was not sure who spent more time at the doctor’s. Around this time, I was dealing with my own health issues. While on Enbrel, I had used a corn pad on my right pinky toe. When the salicylic acid burned a hole through my skin to eliminate the corn, it also caused an infection. When on Enbrel, a simple infection can become problematic quickly, and this precipitated a ten-day round of antibiotics.
Additionally, despite brushing my pearly enamels three times a day, flossing rigorously, and rinsing my mouth with Listerine, my gums bled enough to send Ward running out of the bathroom. They had bled for years, another less common symptom of an autoimmune disease. Chronic inflammation was the term the doctors used, and anything could become inflamed, gums included. What I thought was a small inflamed pocket of skin over my eyetooth, which I noticed in the bathroom mirror one morning, turned out to be anything but. And Bunny Boy helped “discover” it.
I was lying on the sofa one afternoon, sulking over Julie’s impending departure for college and Bunny Boy’s aging. But Happy Ears wouldn’t stand for it. He hopped onto my chest and swatted my face with his front paw, looking to play. When he drew his paw back, I noticed that it was bloody and that I had a nasty taste in my mouth. I looked in the mirror and the tiny bubble on my gum I had just seen early that morning was bleeding. It had grown to the size of a chickpea in a matter of hours. I snapped out of one funk and was thrown into another.
“We’ll need to remove the growth,” the gum specialist, Dr. Young, said, with an urgency that told me this was not simply a large pimple like I had initially assumed. “It might be a deep infection in the gum or the bone, or there’s a chance it could be cancer.”
I should have known better. I was aware that when you are on a powerful biologic like Enbrel or Humira, a small medical issue can turn into something life-threatening quickly. For the three days I waited to have the procedure, I couldn’t eat or sleep. I told the children I had a small gum infection. There was no need to say more at the time. I also decided not to worry my mother or my siblings. Ward would be my strength. To get through those few days, I researched bone cancer on the Internet while the children were at school, and Bunny Boy stayed by my side almost constantly. I needed him near me, now more than ever.
The morning of the procedure, I got up, heavy with dread. I feared what the day would bring. The thought of cancer terrified me, but I knew Ward and I would face whatever it was together like we always did. The last thing I remembered was the bright light overhead as I sat in the chair and drifted off into semiconsciousness.
When I woke up from the anesthesia, Dr. Young was looking down at me. Ward was by his side.
“You didn’t have cancer,” he said, patting my shoulder. “But there was an abscess in the bone stemming from the root of your tooth.”
I squeezed Ward’s hand, wanting to cry. While I knew how dangerous a bone infection could be for me, at least I didn’t have cancer!
He continued, “I implanted antibiotic beads into the bone that will release slowly over six months.” My ears perked up. “It’s a new procedure we’re using in oral surgery.”
His words were exact, his first sentence so familiar. For a split second I felt like I was back at the Animal Medical Center in New York. I had to speak up.
“Several years ago, our house rabbit, Bunny Boy, was one of the first mammals to have what sounds like similar antibiotic beads implanted in his jawbone at the Animal Medical Center in Manhattan,” I exclaimed, suddenly wide awake. I was intrigued by what seemed to be another unbelievable coincidence, or just a plain old miracle. “Bunny Boy had a recurring chronic abscess and is immunocompromised. The veterinarian community believed that the beads, in addition to oral antibiotics and penicillin injections, could change the course of the very aggressive infection he had and that rabbits are prone to. Bunny Boy is alive and well, and a testament to that fact.”
“Without the beads, the outcome might be very different in your case,” said Dr. Young. The concern in his voice told me we were not completely out of the woods yet. “Once these infections are deep in the bone, they can go into the bloodstream, quickly causing septicemia.” He didn’t candy-coat his words. With a mother who was a nurse and my own keen interest in medicine, I knew exactly what septicemia was. It was often fatal.
“I would like to know more about your bunny’s surgery at the Animal Medical Center when you are feeling a little better. I will make a call over to the AMC when I have a moment.”
The revelation that I didn’t have cancer, the miraculous coincidence of the antibiotic beads, and the stress that had been pent up over the last few days were too much for me. I released everything in tears of joy, while I quietly prayed. I thanked God for my life, my family, and my Bunny Boy, whose love and companionship had been such a godsend. I had yet to wrap my mind around the fact that Bunny Boy’s groundbreaking treatment a few years ago had, amazingly, come full circle and helped save my life!
“Please stop in one day with Bunny Boy,” said Dr. Young as he handed me a prescription for an antibiotic. “My partner, Dr. Pullman, has a particular affection for bunnies.” Apparently, Dr. Pullman had a six-year-old rescue bunny named Flopsy, whom he adored.
“I’ll see you at my post-op visit with Bunny Boy,” I said, smiling.
• • •
Julie was due to leave very soon. In the lead-up to moving day, Bunny Boy and I were back to some of our old tricks, cruising the aisles of retail stores with Julie in tow for dorm room supplies and a new college wardrobe. Bunny Boy would sit in the top of the wagon at Marshalls or HomeGoods while we piled on our supplies.
While Julie and I ran up the credit cards, we reminisced about her younger years. The days of My Little Ponies and Care
Bears, gymnastics lessons, and dance recitals. The days of ironing waxed paper onto beaded shapes for the neighbors’ kids who played at our house almost daily. And finally, our time spent together in the Girl Scouts. I was halfway through a six-month protocol of gamma globulin infusions when Julie, who was in kindergarten, convinced me to run a Daisy/Brownie troop despite the fact that there had not been one in our town for the past eight years. When the regional supervisor brought the troop flag and a pile of manuals over to our house a week later, she looked stunned when I answered the door with my intravenous pole trailing behind me.
“Are you sure you’re up to this?” she asked hesitantly, staring at the vial of medicine.
I was lost in my memories.
Bunny Boy, I suspected, would feel Julie’s loss profoundly, too. Julie hung out with him more than usual, telling him of her college plans and whispering, “I’m leaving home, little guy. I’ll miss you, you know.” Bunny Boy would nuzzle deep in her neck, tickling her with his whiskers. “Ooh, I’ll miss that too. And take good care of Mom.”
Chris, on the other hand, claimed he’d barely miss her. He liked the idea of having full access to the computer and food supply. But despite his strong statements, I sensed he was getting a little sentimental.
“Want to hit some tennis balls or get sushi, Jules?” he would ask. They would drive off in Julie’s used bright red Honda Accord, which we had gotten for her sixteenth birthday, that suited her personality so well.
I, of course, would miss Julie with my whole heart. She was my first-born, and we had a special connection. Despite the usual challenges, we had made it through the teen years with very few issues or dramas. To soothe my upcoming loss, I would look through our baby albums, staring at Julie’s pictures. Chris’s accusations were not unfounded—there were many photos of Bunny Boy. Sadly, I realized how much he had aged. His cheeks were not as plump as they had once been and his fur had lost its thickness and brilliance.