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Christy
This
little girl weighed just a pound and half
when somebody thought it would be fun
to
toss her out onto highway 183.
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As
a bruised and battered little kitten huddled
on the road an alert driver spotted her.
He swerved in the nick of time
and missed hitting her by
inches.
But she was still flung to the side of the road
by the draft of the car.
The kind driver stopped and ran back to pick her up where many people
would have just kept on going. He and his wife took her in to a
vet clinic that didn't seem to want to do much for the poor
kitten. They were not in a position to keep her so they brought her to
us and we took her in to our vet. Her
paws were badly scraped and so swollen she could barely stand. Her
claws were torn up and in many spots completely gone. Every inch of her
little body was
covered in cuts and scrapes. We weren't sure if she was a male or
female
because her little bottom was so swollen.
Our vet gave her antibiotics to prevent infection from her many wounds
and an anti inflammatory shot for pain and the swelling all over her
body.
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The
first few days she was with us she just cried when she was alone and
cried when we picked her up. On the bright side, though she ate
constantly! She was severely underweight and ate both wet and dry food
all the time.
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Our
vet advised us to give her a daily bath in baby shampoo to help soak,
clean and heal the wounds.
Here she's back to eating while she dries off after her bath.
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Since
Christy was so sick and weak, we kept her in a small cage
when
we weren't with her.
It had a very soft bed, constant food and water and a small litter
box. Since her paws were so badly injured we got special litter
that wouldn't scrape her wounds. The first few days she couldn't even
get into the litter box so she just soiled her towel every time. This
was inconvenient, but helpful in a way, as we wanted to check her
stools and urine for blood from possible internal injuries. But this
also meant that besides the daily bath she got four or five mini-baths
a day! Her little cage kept her from possibly injuring herself
and kept the other kittens, who might play to roughly, away from her.
We
would let her out to exercise as she got stronger and noticed a
wonderful behavior in the other kittens. While they would wrestle and
bop each other around, when they came up to her they were very gentle.
They seemed aware of her injuries and would just lay quietly next to
her, lick her gently and then go right back to jumping and wrestling
with their healthy roommates! It seems like the kittens are
smarter than the people!
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Little
Christy is making a remarkable recovery and has joined her kitten
friends to play and romp. They are still more gentle with her than with
one another as she heals. But she's feeling good enough now to do some
bopping of her own!
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Little Christy continued to get stronger but didn't put on any weight
although she was eating well. She got daily supplements in addition to
her regular food.
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Keeping
a close on eye on Christy, she rode around part of the day while Alan
did other chores.
We
could tell she was getting stronger when she didn't want to ride
anymore.
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It
took another four months of intensive care before Christy started to
put weight on normally.
She had visits to her vet nearly every two
weeks just to get checked over.
Our vet, (the best vet in the world)
Dr. Roy Smith of Central Texas Cat Hospital in Round Rock
{512-388-1299}, assured us that she would come around with time, love,
and lots of food and supplements. Her body had sustained major trauma
and she was repairing inside before she could worry about putting on
weight on the outside. The picture above shows her with her pal
Marco a couple of days after Christmas 2004, exactly 6 months after she
came to us.
The best news for Christy came in early January 2005 when she was
finally ready to be adopted into a new home. A wonderful couple who had
adopted from us before were thinking of adding another cat to their
family. They decided on Christy and she decided on them.
Christy went to her new home to join her other TJR brothers on January
11, 2005
nearly seven months after her ordeal began!
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