Thursday, July 22, 2010

I'm Sorry, Patches


Patches was born a couple of years back to Hannah's cat Germany. This particular litter was plagued with problems. Of the five kittens born, one died for unknown reasons, one had to be euthanized due to problems, one had to have a leg amputated, one was perfectly healthy, and Patches - the fifth - had a hernia protruding from her abdomen. We thought Patches would also have to be euthanized, but they fixed her hernia and she healed up perfectly.

Over the two years, we never got Patches spayed - partially because of lack of funds, and partially due to ignorance and laziness about the number of homeless or abandoned pets. Once we learned that it is imperative to spay and neuter your companion animals, we began neutering and spaying all of our cats. However, throughout this two years, Patches had two litters of kittens. The first litter all found good homes. The second litter was peculiar, as she only had two kittens, and had them more than 24 hours apart. These two kittens now live with our dear friends Crystal and Dawson, and one of the kittens, Callie, looks just like her mother - it's uncanny; the other kitten, Tessie, looks just like a kitten (pictured below) from Patches' first litter.

We finally had the money to spay Patches, and we set an appointment with No More Homeless Pets for this morning (July 22, 2010). Paige got up early, took her in at 7am, went back and picked her up at 2pm, and immediately realized something was wrong. Patches was abnormally lethargic, and her eyes seemed to be glazed over. Paige called the vet, and they said this is normal for some cats. However, at approximately 8:30pm, my sister Bekka told me that Patches - who was sleeping in Bekka's room - was wheezing when she breathed. I went in and checked on her a couple of minutes after that, and she was no longer breathing or moving, her eyes were open, she had left us.

I have so many mixed emotions, partially because Patches was so amazing, partially because she did absolutely nothing wrong - we chose to take her to the vet and have her spayed, and partially because it was so unexpected. I cannot say much more about how I feel right now, besides that I feel how anybody would feel after losing a very close friend. If you don't know me well, you should know that I spend more time with my cats, and consider them better friends, than most any other human beings. I bond with cats much quicker and easier than I do with humans, and it pains me to know that this was our fault, and not hers.

All I can say is this: Patches, I love you, I miss you, and I am so, so sorry this happened. You were the best mother of any of the cats we've ever had the pleasure of knowing. And you were never happier than when you were raising your kittens. (I hope the picture below catches that fact well.) We buried you next to Mick in the backyard, I hope you may rest in peace.



Patches with her son (from the first litter). We love you. RIP

6 comments:

Brittany said...

I'm so sorry Jorgen, that is so unbelievably sad and unexpected. My heart is with you and Paige.

Kaycee said...

I'm so sorry to both of your guys! That is such a terrible thing to lose a loved one. I wonder what happened?

Jorgen said...

Thanks. I should now point out that No More Homeless Pets has contacted us (after Paige left them a message telling them what happened), and they offered many apologies, a full refund, and a free autopsy (although we've already buried her).

Kaycee said...

Well that is nice of them to take a little responsibility. Was it because of their negligence or just a horrible side effect to the surgery? Either way, it's terrible. I'm sorry.

Jorgen said...

Kaycee, based what we've read online, we're pretty sure that it was an adverse reaction to the anesthesia - which apparently affects only one in every thousand cats. Which makes me feels so bad for her, because if that's the case, she was just very unlucky.

core said...

I am sorry that I didn't say more last week when you told me about Patches. I mourn with you. I don't know if a better tribute to Patches could have been made then to speak of her love as a mother. It takes courage and strength to be a mother and Patches expressed that. Thank you for sharing that part of her life with us.