Cave Cat Wednesday, a Final Goodbye
Twelve years is considered old age for house cats, even if many — especially if in an indoor environment — may continue to thrive considerably longer. But at about twelve they can become prey to various ailments associated mainly with elderly cats. Resident cave cat Wednesday had her twelfth birthday in May last year. Moreover, Wednesday had already had some bad luck with her health the year before, in 2015, which she took a number of medicines for as well as getting a high-powered flea collar (cf. “Wednesday’s New Clothes,” October 30 2015). But then last fall, for 2016, she had her checkup and this time tested as having hyperthyroidism, a definite “old cat” kind of metabolism disorder, and a serious one. So in late November she started a special diet to keep that in check, but last weekend she stopped eating altogether and, yesterday morning, went to the vet to have more tests. The new problem seemed to be kidney failure. Very serious. So she spent last night at the cat hospital having her system flushed out in hopes she’d be better this morning, be able to eat again — plus have more tests, but it didn’t look good.
Last night was strange in a very sad way. I found myself doing little things I really didn’t have to be doing, closing the front door quickly behind me when I got home. Looking around me before I set food out in the kitchen unguarded — things I do when there’s a cat in the house. Missing, when I got home, how Wednesday would sometimes run out to greet me. I did look in on her yesterday afternoon at the vet, though, and she didn’t even seem to recognize me then, granted she’d had a really rough morning. But then this morning the vet called to say, while they’d had a little hope the night before, her test results, if anything, were even worse now. Other aspects of her health were going down as well, she still wouldn’t eat, and her temperature had gotten dangerously low. So, long story short, after much discussion I came back in this afternoon for our final goodbyes, she responding to petting a little at the end, but otherwise still didn’t seem to know me. Then at about 4 p.m., there being nothing else to do, we had to let Wednesday go.
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She was a good cat.
