I found a very frail and dirty cat walking around in the rain outside my apartment complex one night – I assumed he belonged to someone in the complex, so I made him a dry place to stay outside on the patio with food and water. One day passed and he was still there, begging for attention from literally anyone that would walk by. It was heartbreaking to see people shoo him off like an annoying nuisance.

I made the decision to take him in to a vet in the area to see if he had a chip – and he did! They said his name was James, he was 11 years old, and he’d been adopted from HSHV a few years prior. I was so excited that the owner would be contacted and brought reunited with their beloved pet. I waited in the office only to see the vet reach out multiple times, with no answer. At this point I was thinking he could be abandoned, as I remembered an HSHV cat carrier (you’re supposed to bring those back!) and a cat tree sitting by the complexes garbage about a month prior. I shook off the thought, because who on earth would abandon an 11 year old declawed cat? After about 15 mins of trying, the vet said “they aren’t answering right now – do you want to just leave him here?”

There’s no way I was going to do that – this cat had been through enough stress. I took him home with me and set him back up on my patio with food and water. Within about 10 mins of being home, I found out who the cat belonged to and what apartment building and number (not from them answering – just from reaching out to a neighbor). I walked over to the apartment and looked in the window… only to find it vacant. This person had moved out and was most likely the one that discarded the cat carrier and cat tree. I immediately started crying – who could do this? Especially to SUCH a sweet cat. I took him into my apartment immediately and bathed him – I set him up in one of the bedrooms (as I have 2 other cats… one from HSHV – a ragdoll named Alice Monroe now named Pancake) as I didn’t want to run the risk of spreading disease and needed to get a clear bill of health from our vet before acclimating him. I scheduled his appointment right away and the vet updated his vaccinations and said he was in good health! That was great news.

Over the next few months, Toast (Formerly James) and I became very attached. He’d politely paw at you to ask for pets, he’d sleep on me every chance he got, and he was just an overall loving cat. Shortly after I found him I bought a house and he loved finally being able to have his supervised “outside time” in the backyard. He was a very healthy cat for almost a year, but very recently he had come down with a cough – just to be safe I made a vet appointment. They told me they wanted to do an ultrasound and I agreed. They found 400 ml of fluid in his lungs and asking if I wanted to do a “chest tap.” I’d never heard of that but I agreed on their recommendation, especially given that it was such a large amount of fluid and was making it difficult for him to breathe. They sent out for test for lymphoma first, and they came back “most likely negative.” I took him home after his procedure and noticed he was struggling. I made him comfortable and started researching “Chylothorax” and what could cause it (as that’s typically a side effect of something much worse). The vet recommended “rutin” and said he can sometimes help drain fluid if it builds up again. I bought more than one kind after researching pet owners that have been through this, and I finally found one he would eat. He’s incredibly picky, so I went through can after can of different kinds of wet food before I found one that he consistently would eat.

The vet recommended doing an ultrasound for heart failure, and that was the next step. Up until the appointment I made sure he was comfortable – I even set him up with my iPad and played bird videos and calming pet music. He perked up when watching the bird videos and that really made me happy, because after his drain he wasn’t doing well. We had a few good days where he’d jump on my bed like normal and sleep on me and we’d go have outside time, but it went downhill very quickly. He stopped eating because he was so weak – he’d try to jump on my bed or cough and just fall. It was gut wrenching to see my now 12 or 13 year old man go downhill so quickly. I was heartbroken. I talked to the vet and they recommended euthanasia… hearing that word just made me break down to the point where the vet couldn’t even understand me.

I took a day to think about it and I called them back. After MANY TEARS I decided to make that decision for him.. He barely made it through the chest tap, and going through more surgeries would only put him through more misery for ultimately the same result. I found a different vet that offered “in home” euthanasia and scheduled the appointment for the next day – sadly he didn’t even make it to the appointment and decided to go on his own terms about 4 hours prior. I was devastated. All in all I’m very happy that he picked me to spend the last year of his life with – we made it a great one. It’s been a very hard week since his loss, but I’m just glad we found each other so I could love him unconditionally during his last days. He was a great cat. Once I’m able to heal from this, I’m going to adopt a senior cat (from HSHV) in his honor. People often overlook senior cats, and that’s heartbreaking because he was such a great cat. I want to be able to help more cats like Toast.

James now Toast