Watering the Cat or The Bravest Cat I Know

Ari Katz is at it again. What a brave boy cat he is! This time it's age and his kidneys. He's not staying hydrated, cramping, getting uncomfortable and starting to lose weight. Dr. Karen tried special diet food (ha! Ari likes tuna, only tuna and nothing but the tuna, thank you!) and monitoring closely. But now she wants to hydrate him. Everyother day, 100 cc's, directly under the skin.

Now you may not have heard the story of Ari's attempt to play Super Kitty and fly out of the 4th story window a couple of summers ago. Yep. Alberta went out shopping and came back to distressed neighbors saying there was a cat in the courtyard that appeared to have fallen out of a window. It turns out, Ari snuck out of the apartment when she left and got an inkling to fly.

The result? A broken front paw (requiring screws), a broken jaw (requiring wiring shut), and various cuts and bruises. He was in the hospital for a few days, then had to be caged (yes -we are talking about a cat!) for almost 10 weeks while his paw and jaw healed. They had to put a feeding tube into the side of his neck and for that entire time, Alberta had to feed Ari twice a day through the tube!

But, trooper that he is, he recovered and only has a slight limp every now and again to show for it. Of course, this all happened after the apartment fire, in which Ari woke Alberta up with a paw in the mouth, just in time for Alberta to see flames moving into the bedroom from the living room. Ari and his brother suffered a little smoke inhalation and had to be fostered at a friends house for quite a while, since Alberta was out of her apartment for several months while they fixed the damage.

So Mr. Katz is off on a new adventure. Alberta puts him in the sink, hangs a bag of fluid by a hanger on the cupboard knob, then has to insert a 20 gauge needle into Ari and give him 100cc's of fluid. So far Ari is cooperating and seems to know that it's there to help him.

He really is a brave boy. And I can only pray that this helps him live on a little while longer, happy and in fairly good health. Life is catching up with him, but for the runt of the liter, he's achieved much and had some tales to tell! Someday I'll tell you how we used to play Hide-and-Go-Kitty together!