Sammy was adopted from Waupaca area humane society by my best friend Casey. He wasn't originally my cat. I wrote about Sam in my first post about not wanting to split up Sammy and Lacy when we moved. Sam and Lacy were great friends and spent many hours snuggling. Sam loved to snuggle. He would purr this wonderfully loud purr.
I remember one time when Casey and I lived together, in this horrible apartment, there was a mouse. Sammy caught that mouse and we were so grossed out. I, being the brave person of the 2 of us (haha) grabbed a bowl and a pizza pan and scooped the mouse up and went and threw all 3 things outside. The mouse took off running. I will never forget that.
When we moved out and went to live in different apartments, Sam seemed to be mad at Casey. I remember Casey came over once and had put his jacket on the chair. Lacy was curious but Sam stayed away at first. Then he slowly came into the living room of my apartment and smelled the jacket. He jumped up on it and fell asleep, ending all mad feelings. Sammy was Casey's cat. Casey was Sammy's human. Same thing with Lacy and me.
When Lacy died, Sammy had the hardest time. I think he went into a depression. She was all he knew and they were best friends. It wasn't long after Lacy died that I started looking for a companion, mostly for Sam. I knew I wanted a female and I wanted a calico. Basically, I wanted another Lacy. I went to one animal rescue and I didn't like the feeling I got there so I left. I went to another and told them what I was looking for. In rescue, we call that a "Mc Kitty". There was this tiny kitten there that would eventually come to live with us. Baby Annabelle. Bella. Sam was so annoyed with her. They were friends, but slow friends. Bella LOVED Sammy. A lot! She was always hanging out with him or trying to play with him.
Sam started to get sick. He stopped eating and it started to worry me. I took him in for a check to a vet. They had no idea what was going on so they sent us home with some clavamox. Basically that is amoxicillin for cats. He didn't get better. He was hiding more and more so I took him for a second opinion at another vet further away. They did some blood work and xrays and found a few damaged teeth and a throat infection and a gum infection... also known as stomatitis. He had to have some teeth removed and he was put on a very strong antibiotic and pain meds. He was good as new.
He was ok for about a year when he started to act weird again. I called and got him back on meds again. This went on for another year. I was going back and forth between vet appointments and meds to the option of putting him to sleep. I fought hard for him. I wanted to do every last thing in order to make him comfortable and decided when the options started running out or it got too hard for him, that I would make that decision.
The end of June I brought him to Dr. Russo at North Heights Veterinary Clinic because he wasn't eating. By this time, I was watering down soft food so he would just have to drink it, basically. Dr. Russo was so kind. Having been a volunteer in rescue, I remembered her from a foster cat I brought in to see her. She checked Sam over. She looked in his mouth. Things weren't good. She wanted to do some emergency surgery and booked us an appointment for the next morning. I would have figured out a way to pay for that. I went home and sat for a long time. I cried. I held him for a long time asking him to forgive me for keeping him in pain. He didn't seem to know what I was saying, because he was too busy purring. Always purring, that one. I called the vet clinic back to cancel the appointment and make another for July 1. The picture below is on our last night together. I took video so I could remember his purr forever and took a couple of pictures. He was great at hiding his pain and always wanted to be by his mama.
I got him some special canned food and fed him as much as he would eat. The next day was hard. I kept saying to myself that he deserved a better life than what he was having, even if that meant not living. He had a wonderful life. He put up with so many things and changes. I was happy to help him not be in pain anymore.
Sammy met Lacy at the Rainbow Bridge on the morning of July 1, 2014. He was 15 years old.
