The Six Million Dollar Cat

This is a picture (to the left) of my wonderful wife Carla. You can click on it to see the larger version of the picture. This is the sort of face she presented to me when I suggested we might want to put Shadow to sleep. Let me elaborate.

Shadow had gone missing for several days, and when we finally found him, he was laying on the front lawn. It was obvious from the way he was laying that something serious had happened to him. So we scooped him up and headed off to see the local veterinarian.

Upon examing and x-raying the poor cat, the doctor brought out the x-rays and showed us where Shadow's right rear leg was shattered. You could literally see the bone fragment shards in the picture. No wonder Shadow was in considerable pain. Should we do the smart thing and put Shadow to sleep? That was when my wife gave me the horrified face similar to what you are viewing. Any way, it became quickly obvious that putting poor Shadow out of his misery by simply killing him was completely out of the question.

Fortunately for us, the veterinarian loves complex 3-dimensional puzzles and viewed the rebuilding of Shadow's leg as an enjoyable challenge. So... we let him proceed to rebuild Shadow's leg. And the costs began mounting up. Ultimately, with paying for anesthesia, being in the pet hospital over night, the doctor's skill and everything else involved, the bill came to almost $1,400 dollars.

Now I realize that is a bit shy of the Six Million mentioned in the title above, but all I can say is that Shadow had just better not ever run in front of a car again.

When Shadow came home, he also had a pin that ran the length of his upper leg. The doctor showed us the x-rays he took after he had reassembled all the shards and pieces of bone and reassembled them. He did do an incredible job. And then he wrapped four wires around the bone fragments and twisted them all tight together. I was pretty amazed. There were no fragments left over, and apparently he got them all in the correct places. But he left the pin sticking up because he wanted to be able to remove it later.

He stitched up Shadow's hip very nicely and we took Shadow back in about 2 weeks later to have these stitches removed. Oh... did you know, this is another office visit and another charge. The total bill was now OVER $1400.

Well, soon after he removed the stitches, I briefly observed that Shadow had a piece of skin on his thigh that was lifting up and was open on two edges over the pin. Okay, we needed to take Shadow back in and have him examined. But... Shadow had other ideas. He hid. We had put him in the empty house up front. (another long story about how this house came to be empty... I will tell you that story some other time)

The next day when I was planning to take him to the vet, I could not find Shadow. I knew for a fact that he was in the house, but I could not see him anywhere. There are hundreds of little holes and crevices through out the house due to the fact that it was lived in by a pack rat. And even though I did not want to, I had to finally give up. The next day we took off for a short vacation and I hired somebody to feed and water the cats.

She never saw Shadow either, but his food and water kept disappearing. Since he was the only cat in that house, I knew he must be still alive. But of course that open flap of skin could not feel too comfortable. I think Shadow associated us with all the pain he was experiencing because he refused to be found. After several weeks of not seeing Shadow and watching his water and food disappear, I decided "enough is enough." I was determined that no matter what it took, I would find Shadow.

I bought a super bright flashlight and began upstairs, checking under the bed, behind the dresser, under the dresser (there was just barely enough room that he could have crawled there) and behind bureau drawers and inside of fake fireplaces. Finally I felt I had exhausted all possibilities upstairs.

So I went down stairs. Just about this time, Brad showed up and I told him what I was doing. He started helping too. He went into the front pantry room off the kitchen and as he rolled a round stone table so we could look under yet another dresser, we heard Shadow's MEOW. He was indeed hiding behind the stone table under the dresser. The only reason he meowed was that he did not like the fact that Brad--a stranger to him--had come close to him. Brad is a smoker and Shadow did not like the way Brad smelled and wanted to run away... except he couldn't on his bum leg.

I grabbed Shadow and dragged him out. Was he ever dirty! He had been hiding with spiders and dead flies and all sorts of dust under that dresser in the corner for about a month now!! And I immediately put him into a carrier and off to the vet we went. Even though it had not been a full two months, the vet took x-rays and determined that he was healed up enough to remove the pin. And of course he stitched down the flap of skin again. Fortunately for everybody, Shadow did not get a major infection in his open wound. I am sure that Shadow started feeling a whole lot better after the pin was out. But he could not rejoin the other cats for 2 more weeks.

I wasn't sure that the leathery skin would reattach (It had basically dried out being supported up in the air by the pin in his leg) but it softened up a bit and the stitches held. And Shadow did not try to go off and hide any more. After a couple more weeks in isolation to let the stitches heal, we brought Shadow in the house again. Oh was he glad to be a part of the family again! He ate heartily and wanted up on "his" tower. His leg was too weak for him to climb up, so we lifted him up.

Well, it has been over a month since he was brought back into our house, and Shadow's leg is healing nicely. I sure am glad, because removing of the pin cost another $200. We are almost up to $1600 total now. Maybe over. But Shadow's leg has gotten much stronger. He can climb up the tower now. And he started jumping in and out the window again. In fact, other than the scar on his hip and the short hair that is still growing back in, you would hardly know Shadow had shattered his leg.

I don't think Shadow is going out in traffic again -- and he just better not. I cannot afford another $1600 -- I am still paying for the first time. And I don't want to see my wife make her distressed face again.

So... that is how Sammy came to be our six million dollar cat.