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Seems part of
loving animals is eventually losing them, and I have lost several. Snickers and Kit Kat
Snickers and Kit Kat were our barn cats. Being the Queen of the Barn was not a job Snickers took lightly. She kept the barn free of rodents, kept the yard free of ground squirrels, and tried to catch any other creature that moved as well. But when she wasn't working, she was my buddy, spending time following me around as I did chores, or curling up in my lap if I'd sit down, she always knew what was going on around here. She liked to sit with me on the swing outside and just watch the world go by...or prowl down by the pond, she was in no rush for anything as long as there was a nice lap to sit in. She also kept us company on the windowsills, where you could often catch me pulling a screen out just to give her a treat. She very much disliked other cats, so she never would have tolerated living in the home with us, but I pampered her as much as I could, and that was quite a bit! Snickers got pregnant in the spring of 2008, right before it was planned to take her in to be spayed. So..... I ended up with 6 kittens to find homes for.... but one of those kittens was a tortie like Snickers, and I knew the day she was born I just couldn't let that kitten go. I figured it was Snickers' only chance to live with another cat....by letting her live with a kitten of her own. I found homes for the other 5 kittens, and when the time came, took Snickers and her kitten in to be spayed, and a friend of mine named the kitten "Kit Kat." She grew up to be just as sweet as Snickers, although not quite as loveable. She was more the independent type, but just as good at her job. Mom taught her well! Although Kit Kat rarely left the barn....she much preferred to stay inside. Kit Kat was killed on the sometime during the night, we found her on March 15th, 2009. I always worried about the road, but took some comfort that Snickers was terrified of vehicles, and wouldn't follow me anywhere near the road, and Kit Kat so rarely left the barn. But, it still can happen, and did. The following day, I found Snickers had passed away in the barn, March 16th, 2009, of unknown causes. She had acted fine that weekend, spending time with me on the swing, hanging out in the garage, which she liked to do (I kept a litter box in there for her), and watching us Sunday morning as we were playing with horses. As you can imagine, it was a devastating couple of days, especially for me, who knew them best. Snickers was just the neatest cat. Kit Kat was sweet, in her own little way, and I miss her little whiney hello already. The barn is just not the same without them. They could never be replaced. And they won't be.
Kit Kat...from baby to
young adult.... (she would have been a year old in May) Xena
Xena was our 10 year old German Shepherd Dog, whom had been with me for almost 9 of those years. Dogs just don't get much better than this one, she was completely trustworthy with our cats (in fact she was very protective of them), and would sleep with them, groom them as she would her own pups, and just loved them. Taz took it especially hard after Xena left us, as he was very close to her, you rarely saw one without the other. Xena was euthanized due to very advanced heart disease in the fall of 2005. It was a very hard time for us, she was also just as trustworthy with our son, Alex, and all of his antics. She kept us safe at night, letting us know if there were ever any intruders in the night (like the occasional coon in the backyard!), she took her job as the family dog very seriously. Xena died with her head in my lap. Max
Max was my shadow. He rarely went out of my sight, and slept on my pillow with me at night. He was rescued as a kitten, he was an outdoor kitty down the road and had a broken foot. His foot was healing basically folded in half, with his weight resting on the top of the foot. He was so cute, a beautiful tuxedo cat, and I couldn't leave him. Immediately he went to the vet, who had to rebreak and cast his foot, and we had about a 50/50 chance that when the cast came off, he would walk normally again. He did. That foot splayed out to the side when he walked, but otherwise, you never would have known there had been a problem. Max and I were very close, and ended up with hepatic lipidosis, or "fatty liver disease," probably caused by the stress of a surgery prior to that (to remove urinary stones, which didn't exist). A warning to people who have cats.... CATS CANNOT GO WITHOUT EATING FOR A FEW DAYS! Having fed the cats free choice, I didn't know he wasn't eating right away....but after keeping a close eye on him, saw that he wasn't, and was trying to force feed him, reason with him, whatever I could do, to get him to eat. Max went to the vet the next day, who gave me a special diet to feed him with a syringe. Researching online, I was told this diet was not enough. Max was not eating enough. I then took Max to my horse vet, who also has a small animal clinic, and they agreed, and inserted a feeding tube in him. So for two weeks or so, I fed Max every 4 hours by feeding tube. I also had to inject fluids (inserting a needle into his neck and using a bag as you would get in the hospital) He was looking better, he was getting better! Occasionally I would offer him a little food by mouth, and he would eat on his own! It was a long road...but he was getting better, I just knew it. Well, during this time, Max acquired another problem. Actually, it was the same problem that caused him to have the unnecessary surgery in the first place, that snowballed into all of these issues. He could not urinate. Or, at least, much more than dribbles. Back into the vet he went, catheter was put in, and they kept him at the clinic. Once they removed the catheter and he was urinating normally, they sent him back home, still with the feeding tube, as we were not completely out of the woods. But it happened again, and although they don't normally do this, they catheterized Max and let me take him home with the catheter. I had to keep him caged up and clean it several times a day. It turned out Max's urethra was swelling to the point of blockage, and he would again need surgery, which would "fix" his parts back there and keep him free from blockage. I couldn't do it. He had surgery, then got the fatty liver disease. We were not completely out of the woods there, and another surgery would only cause more stress, and there was a possibility that the surgery may cause him to have no control of his urine. I let him go. I could not put him through any more, I had already wondered if I had put him through too much. But Max told me....he would let me know when enough was enough... there were nights I would lay with him, on the floor, both of us just staring into each other's eyes for hours, we were very close. Max died the spring of 2004. I still miss him very much. A little filly we called Angel
My very special Arabian mare was in foal for a spring of 2002 baby. I was SO in hopes for a filly, someone I would have even after Kissy was gone. A part of her. Kissy had had a colt the year before, very beautiful, very sweet, but I would have liked for my special piece of Kissy to be a filly. Unfortunately, Kissy gave birth to her foal at 295 days, 6 weeks early. Now six weeks early for a horse usually is called an abortion, as the foal is born dead. Kissy aborted a live foal. It was a little girl, and to make her even more perfect, a little BLACK girl! Kissy was not under strict watch yet, and she had her out in the pasture. I saw Kissy standing over something....and I went out to investigate (a foal just didn't hit my mind first....) and there was the filly. Mares are usually very protective of their foals, and Kissy stood guard over her, but as soon as I got there, Kissy left. That was a big sign to me. Kissy knew I was there to watch the foal, and she walked away. She knew something wasn't right. The foal could not get up. She could not sit up. She could not even call to her mother in any way that sounded like a horse. She sounded more like a sheep, but very raspy and deep. I will never forget the sound. I carried her into the barn and put blankets on her, she was very cold, and called my husband, who came home from work, but brought me a heating lamp. Of course the FIRST phone call I made was to our vet. They came out, and were amazed. Foals just aren't born alive at this age very often. The filly's ears were not standing up, but were shriveled up, as she was not fully developed, she was not ready to be born. I has several phone calls and farm visits with vets that day, trying to decide if we could do anything for her. We had radiographs done of her knees and hocks, hoping upon hoping that there was some bone formation in there, that might give her a better chance, but it was all cartilage. Kissy was brought into the barn with her foal, and I milked her, the vet tubed the foal and we tube fed her some of the much needed colostrum. She perked up. She even sat up on her sternum a couple of times. She was calling for her mom, although again, not in the typical horse manner. We ended up letting our little angel go that day. She was with us throughout that day, and seemed to be a fighter, but we were informed she would need to go to the vet school and be strapped to this foal table/bed for 6 weeks as not to do any damage to her forming bones in her legs...that is, if she hadn't already done damage. I could not see putting her through that, and it also would have been an extremely expensive process, we were quoted $8,000-$10,000. It was a very hard decision to make. This little filly was the answer to my prayers. A black filly. It was my dream foal from Kissy. Kissy has not been bred since, and will not. She retained her placenta, and once we got it out, saw it was not a healthy looking one. She also has a cucumber sized cyst in her uterus. I am not willing to risk Kissy's life. As much as I wanted a baby out of her to keep. I can't do it. Molly
I cannot say enough about Molly. She was my first horse, she came into my life when I was 8 years old, my grandparents had bought her for me from an Amish family. Molly was my big, black beauty. She taught me to ride, she taught me everything I needed to know to take care of a horse, and to stay on! I didn't have a saddle, so it was always bareback, often barefoot (for me) and galloping through the fields in a halter and lead rope, or just a piece of twine string tied around her neck. She helped me grow up. There will never be another horse like her. She would stand and walk patiently while myself, and maybe three or four of my friends would all climb on her back and ride. Yep, up to 4 kids, bareback, on one horse, going down the road. Or she'd let us sit in a wagon, hold onto her tail, and pull us down the road. That horse was just amazing. My grandparents sold pumpkins, and Molly would be there to give rides to the kids who came. She was trustworthy with anyone. Nothing bothered her. Well, except colic. Somehow, one day in August, 1992, Molly colicked. Of course we called the vet out immediately while we helped her get back onto her feet and walked her. The vet came and treated her, did what he could, and told us to watch her closely the rest of that day. Later that afternoon, Molly seemed good as new. My hopes were high. She perked up, nearly looked like she was ready for a ride. I still walked her and kept a close eye on her. Towards evening, Molly had gone down, she was worse again. Vet came back out, and it was determined that Molly had twisted her intestine, surely while rolling earlier in the day before we realized something was wrong. My Molly was euthanized. She was 20-21 years old (we never had an actual birth date). My big, black, nearly 16 hand beauty was now laying helpless on the ground. She died with her head in my lap. Thankfully later my mom and grandma came back to where she laid and cut off all the tail below her tailbone. I still have it. Still in the same bag it was put in, still with a couple of burrs in it Molly had picked up before she got sick. Someday I will do something special with it. I would like a tassel made, something I can clip onto my tack to bring Molly with me when I ride. And a bracelet perhaps. But, that will come eventually. I am very thankful they thought to do that for me, because on that day, it was the last thing on my mind. I will never stop missing my Molly. She taught me so much. She never really did like other horses...but tolerated them when I took her to the Dane County Fair one year, and for our trips down the road. There were lots of horses down there then. I don't think there's ONE horse down there now. She was a bit arthritic as she got older, but she took very good care of me, and did whatever I asked. Since I rode bareback most of the time, and usually tearing through the field at full speed, I had many falls, where she'd come back, and stand over me patiently until I got up, swung myself back on, and took off again. She was one amazing horse!
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