Her mouth has flared up terribly. They are going to be removing four abscessed teeth of Aug 15th. I have some projects in play that I hope will help to cover some of the expense. She is 14 years old and one of the nicest cats we have had here at the sanctuary. She is in perfect health other than those teeth. If you can send any monies- they would be welcomed. She’s been screaming at night and I thought she was fighting with other cats but that isn’t the case. There isn’t even any cat near her when she screams. The vet said the teeth are getting worse for her. 🙁

The improvised drop trap worked to trap him, but catching him inside of the trap proved a bit challenging. I finally got him, but not after he latched onto my knee cap when I was swinging him out of the trap. Thank God my tetanus shot is up-to-date.But he is safe inside of the deck enclosure and mad as hell at being captured. He has a bloody eye a wound on his head and his paw is extremely swollen. I don’t know if he got hit by a car or attacked by another animal.

I took him back to his home this morning. My heart broke, the home seemed to be full of young adults on drugs. But there is nothing I could do- there is no doubt in my head that he belongs to the woman and I know she loves him. So he is home and I wish him the best.

This must be the time of the broken/swollen limbs. Poe the little feral kitty outside I noticed this morning could not put his front leg on the ground. It is swollen three times the size it should be! I can’t get close to him, George is coming over later tonight we will design a drop trap to see if we can catch him. But he wouldn’t eat this morning at all- 🙁

Guys please pray for Coop. I have to lift him carefully under the neck and ribs to carry  him outside to do his business. He is on three different pain killers, an antibiotic and an anti-inflammatory. I feel so bad for him- his leg just hangs useless right now. He can’t even touch it on the ground without whining. 🙁

Brother’s owner has come forward and claimed him. She is moving in a few days to Idaho, so we are keeping him until right before she moves out of town. The reunion between the two of them was so moving. She has had him since he was a kitten and he has been gone 6 months. I am donating a large dog carrier for the journey and to help him stay contained and quiet for the remaining 7 weeks. Hoping he will heal and surgery will not be necessary. He is really anxious now and wants out of the cage, but he is safe and she is moving from on Thursday so it is just a matter of a few more days here to finish his meds.. Enjoy the photo

I’ve given my anger to God. Anger is not a good emotion to sit in for very long. I believe the reason I raged at Mike the other day IS because I care so very much about him. it was the first fight we have had in 30 years of marriage. I am glad the neighbors didn’t call the cops because I was out-of-control. 🙁 Not proud of it- but that’s what happened.  I can’t even imagine why he doesn’t care that much about himself (or so it seemed to me)> Then I did some research and found out that Diabetes eats the white matter of the brain which controls cognitive thinking. The experts say that elderly people with Type 2 Diabetes also have 87% chance of contracting Altzheimers. 🙁

So I have calmed down and will deal with the tasks at hand currently on my plate. Cooper’s surgery (going on right now PLEASE PRAY for vet and dog) Copper won’t be home until Tuesday or Weds depending on how it goes.and coming up with the funds to have Brother’s kneecap fixed so he can enjoy a normal life as a cat. Hand’s down, Brother is the sweetest kitten I have ever encountered. All he wants me to do is rub his belly endlessly and unlike some cats who go into attack mode if you belly rub too long- he just wants more and more and more. he deserves a chance to be able to walk across his cage without falling down because his knee is so shattered. I hope someone out there answers his call for help- and on this end, locally, I am doing all I can to raise awareness that this kitty needs surgery.

He’s pretty wracked between the pain and the medications- but here he is on cage rest.

Brother, the newest rescue from the psycho’s hunting ground, turns out that he has a possible either trick knee or a broken kneecap. He was the first to the vet. I wondered about him, because ever since rescuing him, he walks low to the ground and kind of slinky-like. He seemed to have an off gait, so I finally took him in on Weds and they believe that he either has a knee that slips, or that he might have a fracture. He wouldn’t let them really examine him and they didn’t do films. Unlike dogs, when cats have this condition (crucate ligament) they don’t jump into surgery. it is 6-8 weeks cage rest and medication before they will re-examine him and determine if it is fractured or not. The estimate for Brother’s surgery should it happen is $832.00.

About seven months ago, one of our tuxedo kitties Mercedes vanished. She has been her over fourteen years, she is an inside, outside kitty. She came back all of a sudden on Thursday night! I saw her at the feral feeders and did a double take. She left here weighing 14 pounds, she now weighs four! I don’t know where she has been or what has happened, and when I brought her inside, she lay down by her food dish, dabbed her paw into the canned food and licked her paws. She couldn’t eat normally. I had to wait until morning to take her in and it was discovered she has 3 badly abscessed teeth that will need to be removed if the antibiotics and steroids don’t take down the swelling and inflammation. Her estimate:$658.50  praying the meds work.

Then Mike comes home today. he is very weak, he is very pale but he is on oral meds with home health care workers to come in and change his dressings daily. Cooper was outside in the backyard, and I opened up the patio door to call him inside. He came in at a dead run. We have four rather stout wooden stairs before you get to the door- and Cooper leapt onto the stairs. He slipped, his back legs slid underneath the spacing between the stairs. He panicked- flipped on his back, thrust his legs up at an angle (they were still trapped in the small space) I heard this horrendous crack and he screamed unlike any dog I have ever heard. he was screaming, trying to right himself and I rushed down the stairs to help him untrap himself and when I touched his back, he bit me hard. Now you had not only a dog screaming, but me too. Somehow he got himself free and when he scrambled into the house, I saw his back left leg wrapped at a weird angle around his right one. He was screaming all the way. I followed him, got him to at least lie down- grabbed a blanket and went to wrap him up and get him in the truck, but I minute I went near him, he lunged at me to bite me again. 🙁  I jumped back which scared him and he ran three legged to his cage. I shut his door. Dragged the huge cage to the truck and with Mike’s help got the cage lifted up and in the truck. He screamed the entire way to the vet.

He has broken his left shaft leg bone and completely broken his femur, The head to the femur is jammed into his upper leg bone and his surgery will be on Monday morning first thing. He’s at the vet on happy drugs and he finally stopped screaming. His estimate for this intensive surgery is $1,500.00 🙁  CATS still owes on the original vet bill $812.00- so adding these two possible surgeries and then Cooper’s surgery- the bill is again going  in the OMG range.  I can’t catch a break this week- no pun intended. If someone is just sitting there with $5.00 and doesn’t know what to do- could you send it our way? I am hoping the meds will kick in for Mercedes and her dental won’t be necessary- but Brother, his knee is quite painful and I don’t believe it is a “trick” kneecap. It keeps popping out of place even when he is on cage rest.

Thank you for anything you can send and please pray for Cooper on Monday morning- the surgery is going to long and difficult for dog and vet.

And just to clarify- any monies received within this 6-8 week confinement would only go on the cats. Cooper is our dog, we love him so much and he is our financial responsibility to handle. It would be unethical to use CATS money in this way and would never be done. I went to see him this morning, and I had to leave quickly because he was so glad to see me I was afraid he would fracture his tail he was hammering it so against the small confines of his cage. That’s all I need, for him to break yet another bone!

He came home from his Alaska trip septic. He is in the cardiac unit of OHUS on continual IV antibiotics and painkillers. For a man who used to be a trained paramedic, I do not know what he was thinking. he had long lines of red running from the insect bite (that went septic) on his right arm. Even first time nursing students know this is blood poisoning! he also has a brand new ulcer on his good leg that wasn’t there before. It also is infected. We are waiting for the bloodwork to come back from the cultures they took when they cleaned the wound out at the hospital.

When he got home he smelled bad. It was midnight and he just dragged himself to his chair and fell asleep. NOT ONE word about “Honey can you take a look at my arm and see what you think?” Or |I have this new ulcer on my leg- could you look at it. All I knew is he smelled like a garbage truck and I put it off to road rot. You know, two old men going down the highway- blowing off showers and personal hygiene on their man trip? I should have known because Cooper was growling at him and acting really strange.

In the  morning, he wanted a hug and I told him to go in and take a shower because he smelled so bad. Again he said not ONE word about his injuries and he was dressed in his robe so I didn’t see anything. About 20 minutes later, Cooper went on alert at the gate between the kitchen and living room. His ruff was up and he was whining and scratching. I thought the cats were acting out, as I went into the kitchen the bathroom door was open and I saw Mike slumped on the floor! I ran to him and asked him why he didn’t call out to me that he had fallen. He said he was just trying to get up. Against his wishes, I dialed 911 and the paramedics came. There was blood all over the bathroom floor and as they were attempting to lift him up, he cried out in pain. That’s when the “bite” was discovered. He refused to go to the hospital, said he wanted to take a shower- signed the release form so they had no choice but helped him into the shower. I stood by the door after they left making sure he was okay but he insisted he was “just fine tired is all.” Coming out of the shower, he fell again- another 911 call this time I told the paramedics to help me get him dressed and I would get him to the hospital myself. That’s what I did- I was there almost all day yesterday while they worked on him and the orthopedic surgeon told me that had I not brought him in when I did- he would have lost his arm in 24 hours! There may still be a possibility of that because the cultures aren’t back yet. I wasn’t smelling road rot- I was smelling necrotic tissue, gangrene and nastiness. 🙁 the bite on his arm had swollen to the size of a baseball but it was underneath his wrist which is why he was successful in keeping it from me- sigh. He told me later, he didn’t want to ever go into the hospital again!

He is no longer septic, he is still in the hospital and as far as I am concerned they can keep him there. I am so mad at him right now, I could spit nails. I’ve cried so much my head hurts and bless Ms. Molly and Cooper they haven’t left my side. I told him last night before I left him to go home that for an educated man he was sure an idiot and I hope the price he is paying for this trip was worth it! I still don’t know what is going to happen to him, the vascular team still has to look at this new ulcer on his leg. Gad! Welcome to my life-

This afternoon, Soot went to the Bridge. I am unsure what happened. She was fine yesterday and when I went in to do the noon feeding, she was open-mouth breathing, hot as the devil and moaning. I raced her to the vet, but arrived too late to help her. I came home and checked the rest of the kittens but they all seem fine. Soots had a swollen belly and she couldn’t walk straight. The vet is putting his bet on FIP. It is not as contagious as first thought when it was named Feline Infectious Peritonitis but continual exposure 24/7  to the secretions can cause it to spread. I am crossing my fingers that it isn’t FIP. We are doing a necropsy even though I know that sometimes this is just a waste of money and leaves more questions then answers about cause of death.

Soot, I am so sorry I couldn’t save you after all~ Fly free now- you are out of pain.