I woke up on Saturday to something quite unexpected.
Twice a month I have to go to work on Saturday afternoon, which takes an hour to commute, do a 10 minute speech to parents of students and/or stakeholders, then travel back an hour home. It's super annoying. I wish I had a way out of it.
Well, waking up this weekend, I was informed that my wife's friend's cat had jumped out of the 6th floor window and was, well, crippled and its life was in danger. Since I have 3 cats, I was asked if they could come over and donate blood!
I took two of the three cats. The time it would have taken to get the third into a cage would probably have done more damage than good. He's a freedom fighter and would take me a good 45 minutes battling him into a cage!
So yeah, the two cats:
Smash, an especially ugly 9-year old, overweight cat (6-7kg), and Chompy, a beautiful 7-year old, ideal weighted cat.
It turned out Smash was too old, something I did consider on the way over. He came for nothing and just sat in his box staring at a wall for the entire duration.
Chompy, however, was actually a perfect 4kg, and a suitable age. They tested her blood first and voila! She was the correct blood type. What were the chances?? (answer: quite high. she has common street cat blood).
It didn't sound pretty. Falling from the 6th floor is brutal. In fact, it's the worst floor to jump from, so they say. Not enough time to prepare to land, but too much height that it ain't a soft landing. The cats bladder had exploded on impact, as well as multiple broken bones and more. It was in a coma after operation, not waking up on schedule as it should have. The blood was to be used soon after - if it didn't die on the table. So we waited.
The cat pulled through!
She was taken to the blood donating table, shaved at the neck and pierced right around the throat. The blood came seeping out. Like a champion I never knew she was, she was patient and steady, with her head being restrained against her will, her body wrapped in a towel, she took it like I doubt I even could have.
But it wasn't enough. One tube was filled, they replaced it, started filling a second tube. Then, to get more blood, they injected AGAIN on the other side of her neck.
She stayed steady.
The whole thing took at least 5 minutes. I'd never seen her so steady and obedient, not even in previous vet trips! But it wasn't over. Since they took a fair amount of blood, they went to her spine and set up another series of injections of nutrient fluid and they packed her body with that stuff. In fact, so much was crammed under her skin, she had a big bulbous blob of fluid jiggling around her back when they were done - so we gave her a temporary new name, Jellycat.
But even this, which also took a good 5 minutes or more, she tolerated, almost as if she understood she was doing something altruistic and brave.
Finally, job done, I got her back in the cage and home, at which point she burst out and ran into the bedroom and hid under the bed for about 2 minutes. Then she came out with her jiggling fluid body and was none the worse for wear.
This whole process gave me the perfect excuse to get out of my pointless journey across the city to work for a speech nobody cared about, so at least for me, it was rather beneficial!
I was feeling a bit soulful, I must admit. Although I didn't even take a glance at the cat, I saw the two owners go in and out of tears, or forcing themselves to sleep to avoid expressing feelings (the male version of emotions). They would come in and say how he's not waking up with panic I felt reflected in my own little animal tragedies in the past. For their sakes, I hoped hard the cat made it.
I'm happy to report the last news I heard, it was in stable condition! They asked me to give them Chompy's favourite food so they can gift her as a thanks for the blood that - aside from the surgeons themselves... and all the science and medicine - saved a life!
My reward, I suppose, is the reparation to my soul. Some kind of karmic balance for my past failings.
Chompy herself, well, she will be going to kitty heaven, whether or not she was a willing participant XD
Pff, she was going anyway. She's adorable and has only one goal in life: to snuggle up warm & comfortable.
