In Memory

Today was a sad day for our family. We had to have Joshua's sweet cat, KitKat, put to sleep today. She followed Joshua home when he was just nine years old. She has been such a great cat - never misbehaving - always a proper old lady.

(Okay, in her last year she did become the inveterate beggar cat.)

Even though she was Joshua's cat, for the years we lived in this house (since Josh was 13 and Morgan 5), KitKat slept on Morgan's bed until earlier this year when she could no longer jump.

She really wasn't a snuggly cat, but every once in a while, she'd jump on your lap for about five minutes of love. Then she was done, thank you very much.

Everyone who came to my house for scrapbook classes knew KitKat. She was a chair stealer. She loved a warm place. So whatever chair was recently vacated, there she'd move. :^)

Brooke's friend, C., loved KitKat best of all our cats. She will miss her, too.

At the beginning of this year, KitKat lost a lot of weight very rapidly, going from a robust 13 pounds to a very small 6. I brought her to the vet and she was diagnosed with diabetes. You can read my post about it here if you'd like. After this incident and the prolonged seizures (rendering her with impaired balance, which is why she no longer jumped on the chairs and beds - she was never a counter jumper), we just brought her home to be with us for as long as God decided.

The past few weeks, we could tell she was definitely declining. Her walk was increasingly wobbly and it would take her a few attempts to get up from lying down. But Sunday when Brooke woke up at 6 to feed the cats, KitKat couldn't get up at all. We spent the evening holding her on a soft pallet on our laps. I really didn't think she'd survive the night. But she was still with us this morning when we awoke. But not *really* with us. Joshua and I brought her to the vet's office and we both cried. We knew there was no other alternative, but still we grieved for our sweet kitty with whom we've shared so many years.

She might have been the smallest of our kitties, but she was definitely the head of the feline pack until her illness. Here she is guarding the litter box, making sure the younger kitties flush...er, I mean scratch.

We loved you, our Kitty Kitty KitKat, and we'll miss you forever.