In memory of Toby ( June 2016 )
Toby was a very special cat that came to us in early February 2016 after his owner passed away. Toby himself was an older gentleman who had an inoperable tumour on his face & it was confirmed by the vet that although nothing could be done for Toby he was not in any pain or suffering.
After reading about Toby on our facebook page he was adopted by Lisa and her family in late February 2016 and Cats Protection Glasgow Branch cannot thank Lisa and her family enough for giving this wonderful gentleman a warm, happy, welcoming home where he was loved every single day of his remaining life.
Toby passed away in June and Lisa has very kindly sent this very touching letter which we would like to share with you:
We got Toby in February after we saw him on the CP’s Facebook page - we fell in love with his story and of course his beautiful face, and being an older cat with a terminal health problem, we thought that he may not have had a lot of people willing to take him on and we thought we could offer him a nice comfortable home for the remaining time he had.
The first day with Toby was mainly spent trying to coax him out from under the bed, then he finally set up home in our hall cupboard next to the ironing board and hoover, which we thought would maybe be the best we could expect, after all he was an old boy and was sick so we weren’t expecting miracles but after a few days his nose got the better of him and he started to wander out.
After a week or so he completely came out of his shell and you would have thought he’d lived with us all his life, it was really incredible. We completely fell in love with Toby and I think he kind of fell in love back! He was one of the friendliest and loving cats we’ve ever had and absolutely loved lazying on the couch getting claps and lying in bed with us at night and first thing in the morning - he also loved sitting up at the dinner table with us too and eating what we ate! (yes, we just let him do what he wanted!)
Most of our time with Toby was pretty much symptom free apart from his tumour visibly getting bigger - we took him to the vet for regular check up’s and he was always ok but a couple of weeks before we lost him his eye looked larger than normal and we noticed he didn’t blink much on it - we took him to the vets for eye drops which we gave him twice daily but it was a sign that his brain was now affected.
We then noticed his appetite waning - we tried every sort of food you can imagine and when he finally did decide to eat he was unable to keep it in his mouth and it kept falling out - eventually I was making him homemade gravy which was the only thing he was able to eat.
The tumour was closing over his throat and was making it too difficult for him to eat - after a couple of days of this we knew it couldn’t go on and we took the decision to take him to the vet , knowing the inevitable was going to happen. It was a heartbreaking day and although it was definitely the best decision for Toby, it really didn’t make it any easier for us, we were completely heartbroken.
Toby was a very special boy and we’re so glad to have met him and hopefully made the last few months of his life nice - he certainly made them nice for us.
I also can’t thank the Cats Protection enough for all their help.
Kind Regards
Lisa xxx
R.I.P. Toby run pain free over the Rainbow Bridge
Luciana was adopted from Cats Protection in 2013. She recently passed away due to Lily poisoning and her family would like to share their tragic experience with you to highlight the dangers of this plant:
“Two years and 9 months ago I adopted a beautiful Tabby cat named Luciana from the Cat Protection Agency. She turned my partner and I's house into a home. We had our own little family, Spoilt rotten; we couldn't even go into a shop without buying her something too.
She was always by our sides, be it following me into the bathroom and sitting there staring at me awkwardly, sitting on the edge of the bath attacking the bubbles or even helping the man of the house procrastinate when it came to cleaning. The amount of times I was told 'I can’t clean the house because I am playing with the cat'
We were ready to extend our family by adding an additional cat into the home when tragedy struck. Luciana became very quiet and distant, she was hiding under the bed in the spare room, of which she would not normally do. She wasn't in the mood to play with her laser pen, of which again was extremely strange.
I took her to the vet first thing on Monday morning and they scanned her, they noticed that she had not been releasing her bowels so they gave her an enema.
We took her home thinking this was the end of our worries, how wrong we were. Luciana began to drool uncontrollably from the mouth, I called the vet terrified that this was happening. She was brought back in the next day. Again they scanned her. She still had not released her bowels, another enema and a manual extraction was done.
I was hoping with every fiber of my being that this was going to be the end, I asked the vet about poisons, and if there was any way she could have ate something she should not have and if they could test for this. We were told that sadly there was no test they could do to detect any poisons.
I googled myself what was poisonous to cats...the first thing that came up – "Lilies" - on my living room table stood a beautiful bunch of Lilies.
That night, we lay in the spare room with Luciana and said our goodbyes.
She was crying in pain and would only close her eyes when she was on her dad or my chest, having her ears and head patted.
She couldn't move herself, so we had to do it for her. She had not ate in 7 days. We told her we loved her and that she had been fighting for the last week to survive, but she didn't have to fight anymore.
At 8am on Friday 4th March, we took Luciana to the Vet for one last time.
Sadly Lily poisoning will kill a cat within approx 4 days. It needs to be detected within the first 12 hours of consumption to be stopped.
I had my first cat for 21 years and had many Lilies in the house, unbeknown to myself of the danger they were.
Please share this post and spread the knowledge and even if this post saves the life of one adored cat then my Luciana will not have died in vain”.
R.I.P Luciana run free over the Rainbow Bridge