Adoptions

Moving to the town home, I’d found a new vet, largely because Annie got car sick and I didn’t want to subject her to long journeys. When we moved yet again, it was only a short distance which was fortunate because the new veterinary clinic, run by a married couple, turned out to be wonderful.

We were there often and one day I picked up a copy of the Mutt Messenger. I liked reading the animal stories in it and my eyes always strayed to the “Homes Needed” column.

With a house full of cats, did I really need another? But I came upon a story that particularly pulled my heart strings because it concerned a Himalayan.

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His name was Georgy. He was an elderly cat that had been rescued off the street in dreadful condition, his hair so matted he could scarcely move and it had to be shaved. Georgy had been living rough for some time. He was malnourished and had been abused. He was also missing an eye but that seemed to have been an old injury.

Georgy’s rescuer was appealing for a home where he could live out his days in peace. She could not keep him herself because of her own cats.

In the confined quarters of previous residences, I’m not sure how much peace I could have offered, but we now lived in a large house and my upstairs gang were a congenial lot. So I emailed the lady with details of our situation to see what she would say. In due course she stopped by and not long after Georgy joined us.

He was understandably shy at first, but I left him to unwind and after a couple of days he came to meet his new family of friends who greeted him with great civility.

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Apart from the fact that he was Himalayan with a sad story, I wanted to offer Georgy a home because he was an old cat and they are hard to place. I didn’t want him wasting his precious remaining days waiting for the possibility of a home when I could take him right away. So what if I would only have him for a short time?

Getting involved with animals, you have to accept a contract, the balance of joy and sadness. If you find the latter too painful, you have to forgo the former. I knew that taking in down-on-their-luck cats and having to give them over to adoption would be hard. The moment they came into my care I fell in love, but I had to love them enough to give them up, because they deserved better than to live in a crowded foster suite.

The alternative of not getting involved was simply not an option.

That would have been far more painful.

The only part that was really difficult was deciding if a potential adoption was suitable. We put together a standard questionnaire and we did home visits to ensure that our cat would go to the home that was described and not to a laboratory. We asked for a fee which could not be prohibitive and really never offset the costs.

We delivered the cats to their new homes and drove away with mixed emotions, happy that they had a home but anxious about it and sad at having yet again said goodbye.

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When agreeing to an adoption, we always emphasised that if it didn’t work out for any reason, at any time, we would take the cat back, no questions asked.

One couple listened. Strangely, that was the adoption we had felt happiest with. I was stunned to hear from them some two years later, but very grateful never-the-less.

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Joey was stoic. He’d come to us sporting an awful wound that required antibiotic medication which he took without complaint. He was a sweetheart and he’d settled in to the home we found him, bonding well with the other cat. How could it have gone wrong?

We didn’t press for the story but bits were volunteered from which we could surmise what may have happened. The husband was a musician who tended to spend time on the road. In the months before Joey was brought back, he’d begun spraying on the man’s guitar and eventually on his side of the bed.

The real shock came when we took Joey out of his carrier. We’d been told that he’d developed some sort of skin complaint which turned out to be a food allergy. But he also had a quite nasty wound. Next day, the vet gave us the opinion that he had been kicked.

Which accounted for the shamed look on the man’s face when he dropped Joey off.

But at least they had done the right thing, bringing him back. Others did not.

Joey got a new, wonderful home where he lived out his life in pampered bliss with two little girls, a corgi and another cat.

That family was our role model.

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The lady who rescued Georgy had a friend who needed to re-home her cat, I’ve forgotten why.

Needless to say, Lea ended up with us. Pretty cats are much more in demand, but you still can’t be sure the adoption will be suitable.

We immediately liked the lad who came to meet Lea. He had such a nice nature and he obviously fell for Lea in a big way.

Next day we drove out to do the home visit at his apartment where he introduced us to another resident, which he called “a chinchilla with a plan”. We’d never met one before. It was busy dirt-bathing, a beautiful, amusing creature and clearly well looked after.

Lea had a medical condition that required periodic medication but this was not an issue and she was very well cared for and loved. I was able to see pictures of her on Facebook which were always a delight.

It was another ideal adoption. That lad was only 19.

These were just the early days of Yeti’s Kitty Suites…

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