I headed in to shadow at 1 today. We saw a dog that was chewing a hole in it's paw (regulated to an E-collar since steroid spray didn't work), two dogs for laser treatment for arthritis, an old dog for a check up, a dog with nasty oily skin and a yeasty smell, and only two cats. The one cat was terribly sad- it was a kitten that had been hit on the road and these people had stopped and brought it in to see if anything could be done. I walked back right as they were euthanizing the little guy. He would have fit in the palm of your hands. His eyes were crusted over and there was blood and mucous running out of his nose. But what actually made my stomach churn a little bit was when the vet tech picked him up to show me the full reason why they gifted him with eternal sleep... He looked like a rubber chicken. All the bones in his back and hips were pulverized, and he was paralyzed from the front legs down. It was fairly disturbing, but I was so glad that the people had come and taken him in to be euthanized instead of leaving him there to slowly bleed to death internally and in pain and terror.
What lifted my spirit however, was the other cat that we saw. These two people were down from the North visiting their elderly uncle who has been dying in a nursing home for the last ten months. He had been a cat collector (originally had 10), but was down to three. One of the cats was friendly enough for them to catch her, but the other two were a little more feral. The clients had built a heated house for the cats, bought food and a heated bowl for water, and prevailed upon a neighbor to feed the cats. Mind you, these are cats that won't allow anyone to touch them and that this woman and her husband have only been around a few times. Luckily her uncle had gotten all of them fixed when they were young, so that wasn't an issue. She was trying to make sure that she could take them to "No-kill shelters", and they told her that with a feLeuk test and a rabies shot they would take them and adopt them out. So she was arranging to try to get them in if she can capture them, and had taken the third cat in for an exam. This one she was going to take with her on a six hour drive, and introduce into her home with the other three cats she had. The very first thing was a Feleuk test on the outdoor, eleven year old cat to make sure that it didn't have anything it could give to he healthy cats back home. If it came out positive, the cat would have to be put down. I think we were all praying that that test would come out alright. And it did, amazingly. The cat checked out fine besides some awful teeth, despite not having had any shots for at least 5 or 6 years, and was cleared to go to it's new home in NY with these wonderful two individuals who went above and beyond what many, many people would do. I'm sure that cat thought she had actually died and gone to heaven.
Melissa
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