Losing a Pet

If you're a pet owner then you've gone through the trauma of losing a pet. It's a painful experience and never gets easier no matter how many times you go through it. It had been years since I had lost a pet. The last one was Sasha, our German Shepherd/Wolf hybrid back in the early 90's. I still grieve for her but that's not the point of this particular post. No this is about losing two of my beloved pets in the span of a year, from July '06 to June '07.

My first loss was of my familiar Miss Pitty Pat. Now let me preface this with the fact that I am NOT a huge fan of cats. They're okay but just to darn independent for my liking. My kids had cats and they were fine but I, personally had not had a cat who I could really call my own. Enter Miss Pitty Pat.

Miss Pitty Pat was a little grey/brown tabby kitten born on Mother's Day 11 years ago to Tiger, the cat of my granddaughter Miss O'livia. You could say it was love at first sight. This little kitten attached herself to me and made it clear in no uncertain terms that she was MY kitty.

Miss Pitty would climb up on the counter in the kitchen and sit quietly and politely watching me prepare meals for my family. The only thing that would set her off to yowling was the smell of shrimp. How that kitty loved her shrimp. I swear she could eat her weight in the seafood. One of her favorite perches as a small kitten was on the edge of the tub where she would observe the human ritual of bathing. That all ended the evening she fell into the tub while I was running it full of hot water. I had left the bathroom to tend to some urgent need in the kitchen when I heard the most pitful cry coming from the bathroom. My son Rhett rushed in and pulled a soaking wet, extremely unhappy kitten from the hot water. Fortuantely she wasn't in there long enough to harm her, but it ended her time spent view the human bathing ritual.

When I decided to run away from home in 2000 at the age of 50 to move to Colorado, Miss Pitty was by my side. We started out from Amherst, VA with her in the cat carrier and I'm here to tell you she didn't like it one bit and let me know in no uncertain terms that if this was where she was to ride for the next two and a half days I would be hearing about it the whole way. Needless to say, we stopped and I took her out of the cat carrier, put her little kitty harness on her and proceeded on our way. Miss Pitty was quite happy now and rode on a towel placed on top of the cat carrier where she was close to me or on the dash of the Uhaul truck where she could see out of the wind. She was really good company along the way and when I was in panic mode because of traffic in St Louis or because of the fog in Kansas City she was right there on my shoulder with her little claws dug in, letting me know that she too was frightened.

She spent the next 6 years attempting to adjust to becoming an indoor kitty. There was never a time when the front door was opened that Miss Pitty didn't make a run for it. Once outside however, she changed her mind and immediately decided that maybe being an indoor kitty wasn't so bad. July 13 of 2006 Jonathan, my significant other, and I took a trip to SD for his birthday. We did a kitty count to make sure all 3 cats, his two and Miss Pitty were accounted for. Miss Pitty had the really bad habit of running into the coat closet when we opened the door and getting locked in there when we left, once for 3 days. All cats were accounted for and seemed healthy enough. When we came home on the 16th Miss Pitty met us at the door fussing at us for leaving her home alone. All seemed well. We had no idea that was the last time she would greet us.

The next morning we got up an prepared for work. Jonathan, as was his habit, fed the cats. We called for Miss Pitty because she hadn't appeared as usual to the tune of the can opener. Jonathan went upstairs to our bedroom where we last saw her and found a very distressed kitty. She had crawled out from behind our bed but was unable to stand. Jonathan called me in a panic stricken voice. His biggest fear in the past 6 years was he would lose my cat and woe be unto him should that happen.

I ran up the stairs to discover my poor little Miss Pitty Pat crying pitifully and unable to stand or walk. I picked her up as if she were a dishrag and carried her into the spare bedroom to lay her on the bed. I thought some how she had broken her back she was so limp but that wasn't possible. Neither Jonathan nor I could figure it out, yesterday she appeared to be healthy and happy and today she appeared to be dying. And that was it, my kitty was dying although at that moment I didn't know it. I called our vet, called work to tell them I would be in and rushed Miss Pitty to the vet's office. I had to leave her there alone and in looking back I wish I hadn't. I wish I had been with her at the very end but I remembered how painful it was to be with Sasha when she took her last breath and I couldn't do it. I went home and waited for the vet to call me with the verdict. It wasn't good. Miss Pitty's kidneys were failing. Apparently she had been sick for quite awhile but. as cats will, had hidden her illness. Fortuantely for me, Miss Pitty Pat made the decision for me and was beyond help. We put her to sleep and thus ended the life of the only cat in my life who was trule mine.

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