A sad day here...

A sad day here...  When we came home late Friday night, we noticed that Boots (our oldest cat) had very labored breathing.  That's her at right, in one of her happier times – sitting in the sun, with a dog (Mo'i) as her companion (she especially loved Lea, our female field spaniel).  About four years ago she was diagnosed with pleural effusion, and the prognosis was for a few months of normal life followed by rapid onset of increasingly difficult breathing.  At her age (12 or 13 at the time), there was no realistic treatment option.  Boots was a feral rescue who we captured as an adult, so we don't know exactly how old she was.  We've been very lucky with her – our vet called her the “miracle kitty” because she survived so long with the pleural effusion.  But when we saw the labored breathing, we were immediately afraid that her luck had finally run out.  Then when we couldn't get her to eat at all, we were pretty sure.

Our wonderful vet, Dr. Christine Wilson (aka “Dr. C”), let us come in today (on a Sunday!) to check Boots out.  She confirmed the labored breathing and the bad short-term prognosis, and added that she could go into respiratory distress (in other words, start suffocating) at any time.  We decided it was time to say goodbye, before she started to suffer.  Dr. C gave her some oxygen to make her breathing easier, and Boots shoved her little face into the mask to suck up that air; it clearly made her feel better.  We held her and talked to her as she went, very peacefully.   A little later, I buried her under our pines with some of her former companions.

It will be sad around our house for a while.  Boots was the third kitty we've lost to the complications of old age in just the past six months...