Everycat: October 2012

Oliver Pozz Bollywogz de Bozmonger

Born: (maybe) 2000

Bridge: 28th September 2012

It is with a horrible, lingering shock and sadness that I wanted to tell our friends that Oliver, our beautiful fluffy boy, our Puffkin, who was made of love for all cats suddenly went to The Bridge in the early hours of last Friday.

Whiskers awry on lookout duty

Thursday night, we went to bed about 00:15 and five minutes later I heard a strange miaow from the kitchen. I immediately went to investigate, strange miaows mean something. Oliver was lying on his side on the floor, still and giving sad pain filled miaows. He was on a cushion that had been on the chair by the counter, which was his step to get up to where the fuuds are kept. I thought he had fallen whilst jumping up and the cushion had slipped and had hurt his back, but inside I knew it was something worse.

I went to him and touched his head, speaking softly to him and he screamed, a real splitter of a scream and bit my finger through to the bone. I gently felt down his body and from about midway down his back he was limp. His tail was limp, his back legs had no tension. Nothing.

Dozing in the doorway to the garden this summer

We got him onto a towel, more fingers bitten to the bone in the process and slid him into the carrier using the towel as a sling. He screamed and yelled with every touch. He was terrified, in agony. Our vet is about 3 minutes walk around the corner and they have their own out of hours service. We put in the call and got him there in the car within a few minutes. Liz the vet met us at the door and examined our lad in his carrier on the floor of the surgery. He'd been thrashing about inside the carrier and got tangled up in the towel sling. We slowly tipped the carrier on it's side so the lid could be used to slide him out with minimal movement. Liz checked him carefully and gently. She could feel no femoral pulse at all, his heart rate was wild and erratic and worst of all, his back legs were cold and starting to stiffen.

Making sure Mungo knew he was loved

I had feared the worst when I found him, Saddle Thrombus had flicked through my mind, then Liz confirmed it. Powerful clot busting drugs and even specialist surgery were all there was and even then, the chances of our loving Oliver making any recovery were utterly remote. There was nothing to be done to save him, no miracle, no treatment that would be safe or effective that wouldn't leave him in a terrible state. Liz said she had never seen a cat successfully treated for this and the treatment would be arduous, too arduous. Too much for our lovely Oliver.

In the face of that, the awful decision made itself. Liz gave Oliver a sedation shot and as he dozed off, still growling, we stroked him very gently and whispered our love to him, thanking him for the eight years he shared with us and for the love he shared with all of the cats who have lived here. Oliver always looked after any cat who was sick or injured. He always knew when a cat was about to fall sick or it would soon be time for them to go to The Bridge and would stay with them until they were well or it was time for them to go. He was an expert ear licker and groomer. He was friends with all of the neighbourhood cats and a wonderful friend to us, the apes.

Keeping a paw on Wuudler & Gerry

Once he was asleep, Liz carefully lifted him to the table, even asleep he still managed a growl, that's how bad the pain of Saddle Thrombus is. The final shot went into his leg vein and even though the sedation shot and the thrombus slowed his circulation down a great deal, in a few moments, he breathed his last, made a couple of respiratory spasms and he was gone.

We stayed with him for a long time. Stroking him, talking to him, feeling his wonderfully soft fur. Beautiful friend, suddenly gone.

Dreamytime lens hussy

How could this have happened? We asked ourselves again and again, but Liz assured us there was nothing we could have done that would have predicted this. Oliver was the healthiest cat we'd shared our lives with over 20 years living here. He had no major health conditions. One vet, years ago thought he could detect an "only just grade 1" heart murmur, but no other vet could detect it again. But then we thought back to August.

A floofy lad needs his oatgrass

On 22nd August, Oliver had suddenly had two small Grand Mal seizures within 30 minutes of each other. He had behaved normally in the run up, just like he did last Thursday. He came around from the seizures very quickly, got up and went to eat his crunchers. We got him to the vet straight away. He was hospitalised overnight under supervision incase he had more fits. The first blood panel showed a very low level of potassium, so he was given a potassium supplement on his food. The next day the K level was back to normal. As low potassium can develop spontaneously in older cats and Oliver was probably about 13 years old - that was the diagnosis. Everything else checked out fine. He had a K supplement for two weeks and several check up panels, he seemed as right as rain again.

Good mancat pals

Mario. the vet who attended him had a niggle though. Oliver's heart rate would race then slow under examination, during the space of a single breath, which is not totally unusual, but something about it niggled, something he couldn't put his finger on. Oliver seemed well and settled, he had no more fits, so it was put down to the level of K.

I might be Puffkin but now I've had Enuffkin!

Hindsight is a wonderful thing. We discussed the previous fits with Liz as our lovely lad lay there lifeless and she wondered if the fits may have been caused by tiny pieces of clot breaking off and going to his brain. If at the time, Oliver had had a heart rate issue that had been significant, he would have had an ultrasound immediately, but there was nothing at the time that showed he had a problem with his heart.

Oliver and Gerry doing the chair share

Gerry and our "new since February" mancat Mungo are now wandering the house, looking for Oliver in all his sleeping places. They are subdued, as are we apes. We are still in shock, still asking ourselves if there is anything we could have done, if there was something we did that caused it? We know the answer is no. Sometimes this just happens, our wonderful furry darlings are here, then they are gone. It just happens.

First sleep with Mungo

Sometimes you just have to wait to grieve too. I took my bitten fingers to the GP on Friday morning and was sent straight to hospital for 24hrs of IV antibiotics. It's amazing just how big ape fingers can grow when they have the bitey legacy of Oliver. At the time I thought I'd rather be missing an odd finger or two than missing Oliver.

Oliver during his first week here. He soon grew some more floof.

Oliver came to us out of the blue. He'd been lurking occasionally for a couple of years, he never stopped to feed. He was a grubby, thin stray. Then one day a neighbour found him in her house eating her cat's food. So we set a trap inside her cat door and caught him. Neutered and fed, he soon blossomed and formed a firm, deep friendship with Tabbus.

Snow patrol from the inside where it's warm

Oliver was always his own cat, he would tell us when he wanted to be petted, where on his body he wanted the pets and it was a firm bitey for any ape who didn't heed his direction. The only time he would settle on a lap was when an ape was sitting on the toilet, then he would purr and knead, in total delight. He refused to be brushed, despite us trying every type of cat and ape baby brush available. Lately I'd tried using some TTouch techniques with him, but he wasn't buying any of it. He kept his own coat and the coats of every other cat immaculate. This was especially valuable for Gerry our funsized scruffbag.

Watching the snow fall

Oliver would come and snuggle in the ape bed most nights, having a good knuckling around his big chops, purring up a storm, then he'd suddenly have had enough and be off to the end of the bed or to snuggle with one of the other felines for the night.

Oliver was a mighty hunter too. He was the scourge of mice and Greenfinches.

Showing a mousie that a career as cat food is in the offing

So here we are, one friend down. Many empty beds, many echos of a good life filled with love and the hope that somewhere, at The Bridge, Oliver is reunited with all the feline friends he had loved and lost over the years.