Pole Dancing In The Dark

Fortunate Kitties

Back in 1997, I worked with a girl who owned a cat that had serious health issues. Most of which were due to the fact that the cat was obese. (And I don’t use that term lightly.) The cat had the same frame as my little black kitty with about 20 extra pounds on it (I kid you not.) Yup. It was the first 28 pound cat I had ever had the experience of meeting. And bitchy? Yeah baby, that cat could my bitchiness to shame, which is why I felt such a strange affinity for her. Well, one day, Queen E came to work, beside her self with grief. It seemed that at some point during the evening, her cat had ceased walking normally. E woke to the sound of her kitty mewing for attention as she dragged her hind quarters along with her front paws. E took her to one of the all night animal hospitals to find out that the cat had damaged it’s spinal column (probably by jumping or falling with all the extra tonnage.) There were two options for Diva, a $5000 operation or being put down. E didn’t have the money, but couldn’t live with the idea of putting kitty down. She also wanted the chance to take her cat to her vet and see if there were any alternatives. I thought she was nuts.

Mind you, I had all ready owned and lost two dogs. The first one was put down because she had such horrible arthritis that she could no longer walk and the second – well, she was supposedly “given away” because she lost her mind due to neglect (I was away at college at the time – and this remains a point of contention with my parents). I honestly believe they lied to me about it to make themselves look better. The thing is, it didn’t help, puppy wouldn’t have ripped a leg off another dog if someone had actually taken care of the puppy while I was away. (I still get angry/nauseous when I think about it.) (And they wonder why they don’t have grandchildren… anyway, back to the subject…) My point being that I understood how attached someone could get to an animal, a pet, so I could understand the conflict. But I also thought she was nuts for even considering spending that much money on a cat that was already 13 years old. Especially after she had told me that she was still paying off the surgery for Diva’s legs (she had dislocated her “knees” – for a lack of knowing what they are actually called.) I tried to explain to her that putting the cat to sleep may well be the best option. She didn’t listen, nor did I expect her to. I probably seemed really heartless at that point. But there would never be a day that I would throw down a lot of money on an animal…

Until February of this year, when I found out that my baby, my little bitchy black kitty had a tumor on her thyroid which would kill her eventually. That’s when I had a change of heart on how much I was willing to spend to make her healthy. We went the most expensive route because it was the most effective and efficient. We nuked our kitty with radioactive iodine which annihilated the tumor and she was finally able to put on some weight. She went from 7 pounds in February to about 10 pounds now. She has definitely filled out nicely. Now if only I could get her to stop licking all her fur off.

Aside: I read on several pet sites that cats do that when they are bored. So I went out to the local Petsmart and loaded up with toys, drug rugs and catnip. I also purchased one of those wand like things with long string and a feathery colorful stuffed thing on the end of it. I have been tormenting the kitties for days with it because the site said to have “interactive play” with your kitties. Apparently I tormented the wee beasties with it too much. Well, one wee beastie in particular – for at 4:50 AM this very morning I was serenaded out of a sound sleep by way too vocal mostly Siamese kitty. She was bawling up in the attic (which, since the bat incident has always made me a little leery) non stop. After four minutes of listening to this, hubster went to investigate. As soon as he turned the light to the attic on, we heard her doing her duck impersonation. Hubster stayed up there for a while with her, while the suspense was killing me. I heard a lot of her quacking and meowing still. Finally, she settled down and hubster came back to bed.

I asked him if she was ok and he said, “In a manner of speaking.”
”what do you mean?” Asked I.
“You must of tormented her too much with that toy this afternoon, because she killed it.”
“What do you mean by killed it?” At this point I am imagining that she is all tangled up in the string part, and was choking on the toy.
“She ripped the stuffed animal part right off the wand, and was guarding it. She wouldn’t move until I congratulated her.”
Stupid cat. Next time, I’m going for a chinchilla…(end of long winded aside)

Any how, the reason I am writing about pets and what we are willing to do for them is that I was led to a website by Key Issues called Save Wampi. Wampi is a beautiful Maine Coon kitty that was apparently thrown off a roof of an apartment building by some assmunch. (For which I hope has Karma kick his/her ass.) The owners love their furbaby but have other financial obligations (like their daughter) so they are asking the World Wide Web for help. I am pleased as a human that the WWW has responded so well, but more money is needed. Hubs and I were lucky enough that we could afford Shadow’s radiation treatment, (although many people told us how crazy they thought we were) but not everyone is as fortunate as we were.

Just thought I would let you all know.

And for anyone wondering what happened to Diva, Queen E’s vet recommended a type of kitty brace. I don’t know the specifics but I have been led to believe that Diva actually got better and was still alive the last time E and I talked (which was about a year or two ago.)

Posted by Ethne at August 10, 2005 12:19 PM | TrackBack