Yesterday I was called into work on my day off and had to take Blackie to be pts. He'd not been right for the last few days and had got a lot skinnier over the past months and we decided it was time.
He came to the cattery nearly four years ago. His owner had died and we had no idea how old Blackie was, he had turned up as a stray ten years before. We soon found out he got on brilliant with other cats and when our resident cat Gypsy died we decided to pair Blackie up with her lonely brother Sam.
Blackie was definitely an outdoor cat though we still tried to make sure he was locked in at night he had a few happy nights snoozing behind the shed, out of reach. He loved sitting on the roof come rain come shine and that was how we found he three years ago, looking lost and obviously couldn't find his way down. A vet visit confirmed what we suspected - he'd gone blind. His retinas had detatched due to high blood pressure and he was severly diabetic. Once he was stablised we started letting him out again, it didn't phase him that he was blind, he just got on with it.
Last october we lost Sam and although they hadn't been curl up together close Blackie obviously missed him and only weeks later he had a stroke. Luckily it was only mild and he recovered quickly but he was still lonely so we paired him up with Valentino our cattery mascot. Vali died in August but near the end they would sleep in the same bed and on the day he died Blackie wouldn't leave Val's side.
Sadly we didn't have any other resident cats to keep Blackie company, there was a brief time we had an old girl, Iris, but she was soon adopted and didn't like him anyway. So he's been on his own the last few months.
At the vets we saw a locum as our regular vet was away and she was shocked at the state of Blackie. His teeth were awful (which we knew, we had been told he wouldn't survive an anaesthetic) and they were starting to cause abcesses and his kidneys were failing, the kindest decision was to PTS.
Although he wasn't so active near the end he will be greatly missed, he loved a lap and a cuddle and although he couldn't see he would sometimes look at me like he could see me. He did that last week and my colleague even commented on it and in the back of my mind I knew he didn't have long.
RIP Blackie.
