How many lives does one cat get?

Ran across this picture the other day. This is Jake, our boy-named female cat with the sweetest disposition in the world. Unfortunately she has used up a few of those famous 9 lives she's supposed to have on tap, usually by eating something she shouldn't.


This picture was from the last but not the most serious of her illnesses. She is wearing a small baby onsie with the crotch cut out and the leg hole binding fashioned into a tie to hold the thing on. Underneath it is a feeding tube coming out of her side which, without the "shirt" would have been dragging on the ground and getting caught on things.


But no matter what we did, she managed to get out of it. It wasn't unusual to walk into the kitchen, living room or wherever and see a crumpled and empty "shirt" laying on the floor with no cat in sight.


Poor Jakie. She got sick and lost her appetite which caused her to lose a bunch of weight. It was the weight loss that triggered problems with her liver and the only way to get her better at that point was to force feed her because she wasn't eating on her own. For a while we did try holding her down and forcing food down her throat with a medicine syringe but that was horribly difficult for us - and for Jake. We eventually had to opt for the feeding tube to save her life.


Once she got used to the feeding tube she would settle quietly onto my or my daughter's lap and become quite content while we slowly pushed a measured amount of food into her stomach. We gave her water and medication that way while continuing to tempt her with regular food we thought she might eat. Once we had built her weight up a bit her appetite starting to come back and she started first drinking - and then eating on her own.


I am surprised that I cannot find evidence of the hole in her side where we fed her - the skin has closed up, the fur has grown back and if I don't look at a picture I would not even know what side it was on. She's a wonderful kitty, she's a little simple because of how sick she got with her first trip to the emergency pet hospital, but she loves attention and will let anyone pet her. She is quite plump again which may not be good for her but considering the alternative when we watched her lose a third of her body weight - her being full figured suits us just fine.


She's adorable, not to mention worth a fortune by now - if you judge by all the money the veterinary community has gotten from me. She's got to stay well because she is the cat favored by all and oh my gosh I simply could not afford it if she did it again!!!