Frosty's kidneys had completely stopped working, he had terrible edema, and I barely recognized him. I don't know if he knew that we were there, but I like to think that he did. We spent some time loving him, and then we pet him as he went to sleep. It was a relief to hear his horrible, labored breathing stop and know that he didn't hurt anymore, but I WANT MY KITTY BACK!
For 9 years, he's taken care of me when I was sick or upset. He always purred when he saw me and would let me pick him up and hug him whenever I wanted to. He raised my kitten Siren, and puppy Maki. He loved everyone. He was an amazing hunter and liked to go for random walks with us.
Frosty came into our lives when I worked at my first vet clinic. He had a really bad urinary tract infection and his owners had wanted to put him down. I fell in love with the 3 year old beauty, and over the course of the next few weeks I tried to find him a home with my friends and family. No one was looking for a cat at the time, and after all the time that we had spent together at the clinic, I knew that I needed to bring him home. He was so happy that he purred for almost the entire first year that he lived with us. He also gained 5 pounds. It turned out that he was not used to have food always available to him and so he binge ate constantly.
He was hands down the Best Cat Ever.
I feel guilty, I know that kidney disease can be brought on by added stress, and I brought Shep into our house. His constant harassment of the cats has been a point of contention between myself and Kev, and I do wonder if the threat of being chased shortened his life. The vet said that his blood pressure was fine and that this was all caused by his kidneys being stuffed full of kidney stones, but my heart doesn't believe it. I feel like we made the right decision to take him in last week, but how can we know if giving him fluids somehow sped up his sickness. I know that we tried everything we could for him medically, but I would rather have spent the last four days with him at home, than in the clinic.
Here are some old blog post pictures with Frosty:
