I have every intention of writing further posts about the ICS Chaplains and Families Conference and my recent visit to family and friends in the UK. But first I have to write a rather sad post regarding our Senior Cat Oscar.
On the morning of Friday 23rd May, just as I was waking up at the home of my sister June and brother-in-law Garry in Bournemouth, I received a text message from Sybille in Prague, asking me to call her ASAP. I knew it must be serious as I believe it is only the second time when I have been away from Prague, that Sybille has contacted me and asked me to get in touch.
When I called, Sybille explained the situation. Oscar had been trying to pass urine but was unable to do so. He was also wincing in pain and had then proceeded to be sick several times over. She wanted my agreement to call the Pet Medic and to ask for Oscar to be put to sleep. Knowing Oscar’s age and how frail he had become, we both knew there was no way he would survive any further operation. It is almost certain that his kidneys had failed so no intervention would have helped. An hour later, I got a another text message to say that ‘Oscar was now with Sam‘.
At seventeen years and two months, Oscar has lived far longer than most cats. He has been a wonderful companion to us since we adopted him from our friends Mike and Nikki Geelan, in April 2007. We are both so thankful that we did hold a little party just a couple of months ago, to mark his seventeenth birthday. The two photographs accompanying this post, were taken by Sybille during the last two weeks of Oscar’s life and help us both to remember his companionship for the past seven years.
On Friday 21st March, Senior Cat Oscar celebrated his seventeenth birthday! Aided by his tin openers, aka Ricky and Sybille, he invited a small number of his human friends, to attend a birthday party held in his honour, the following afternoon.
It was unfortunate that the Hellam family, who have previously looked after Oscar on a number of occasions when Sybille & I have been away, were unable to attend because of illness. However, Oscar’s two adult American friends, Karen and Sherry, were able to be present. Karen always refers to Oscar as ‘her buddy’, whilst Sherry always addresses him as ‘Mr Oscar’. Oscar very much approves of both designations 🙂
As was to be expected, most entertainment was provided by Šárek, the ginger kitten we adopted last August, who is rapidly becoming a fully-fledged teenager, with all the associated behavioural problems. For Sherry, it was her first opportunity to make Šárek’s acquaintance.
According to a chart on the wall at our local Veterinary Surgery, in human terms, Oscar is now aged somewhere between eighty-five and ninety years of age. So how much longer he will be with us is an open question. But whilst he did sleep through most of yesterday afternoon’s celebrations, he did happily pose for these accompanying photographs.
It is three and a half years since I wrote a blog post about the third member of our family – Oscar the cat. Other than an occasional passing mention, he hasn’t since really featured here very much. So I thought it was time he once more deserved his own post.
These days, we refer to Oscar as our ‘senior cat’ as he is now nearly sixteen and a half years old. This is a very good age for a cat and in many respects, it is quite remarkable that he is still with us.
Whilst Oscar has never been a large cat, we began noticing earlier this year, that he seemed to be getting thinner. We tried feeding him cream and other goodies, in an effort to fatten him up. He also was failing to groom himself as he did in the past, with Sybille resorting to catching him and brushing him herself, to try and keep his fur in order. And increasingly, his breath smelt somewhat unpleasant.
All of this we put down to Oscar getting old. However, whilst I was in the UK for a few days in early July, Sybille managed, without losing blood 🙂 , to get a closer look at Oscar’s mouth and realised that there was a major build up of tartar on his teeth which needed attention and was clearly the source of his increasingly bad breath. So on my return to Prague, I made contact with the vet, who fortunately speaks fluent English and German as well as Czech, to ask whether he would be willing to treat Oscar’s teeth – treatment which would certainly involve giving him a general anaesthetic, bearing in mind his advanced age.
In his reply, the vet said that they would first want to carry out a complete geriatric profile, to assess Oscar for treatment. But if that was satisfactory, they would then carry out the necessary dental work. All this could be done the same day, meaning only one journey to the vet’s surgery, bearing in mind how much Oscar dislikes car travel. So Oscar was booked in for his profile and possible treatment, on Thursday 25th July.
The geriatric profile was comprehensive, involving a clinical examination, the taking of blood for a series of tests, an abdominal ultrasound and a thoracic X-ray. The X-ray revealed abnormalities in the shape of Oscar’s sternum which the vet thinks are due to old fractures. We can only think that these might have occurred when he went walkabout for two months in the summer of 2007. Fortunately, there was nothing revealed to prevent the administration of a general anaesthetic, so one was duly given and five rotten teeth were then extracted.
However, what the blood tests did reveal, is that Oscar is suffering from an over-active thyroid – in fact a very over-active thyroid! This is the explanation as to why he had become so thin. Therefore three weeks ago, he started taking a prescribed methimazole tablet twice a day, to help bring his ‘T4 values’ back to more normal levels. The results have been phenomenal, so much so, we now have a very healthy ‘fat cat’ as you can see in the photo I took of him yesterday, sitting on the mat by the door to the main balcony, enjoying the sunshine.
Anyone who knows Oscar, despite him mellowing in recent years, will realise that getting him to swallow a tablet, it no easy task. But Sybille has discovered the foolproof method – wrap it in a small piece of ham! It then goes down a treat 🙂 Bearing in mind that he will need this medication for the rest of his life, we are clearly going to also need a constant supply of ham. And judging by the healthy cat we now have, who is also once more grooming himself far better than before, it looks like Oscar is going to be with us for a few more years yet.
As I have written previously on this blog, not only did Sybille and I move to Prague in September 2008, so did our adopted cat Oscar. From time to time we get enquiries as to how Oscar is adapting to his new life in Prague. So I decided it was time to devote a blog post specifically to Oscar.
Like most cats, Oscar spends the vast majority of his time either sleeping or eating. I took the photo on the left this morning, when he adopted a rather interesting pose whilst sleeping on the double bed in our guest bedroom. Of course, as far as Oscar is concerned, it isn’t the guest bedroom, it is Oscar’s bedroom! Whenever we have visitors to stay overnight, we have a major exercise in advance of their arrival, removing cat hair from both beds in the guest bedroom.
The big difference for Oscar between living in a detached Rectory in North Oxfordshire and living in a second floor flat in the suburbs of Prague, is that he can no longer go outside and explore and supplement his diet with field mice and baby rabbits. Instead, he has become a ‘flat cat’. Overall he has adapted fairly well to this change, helped by the fact that in cat terms, he is now quite old. He will celebrate his thirteenth birthday next month. However, it must be said that quite frequently, his behaviour is what you might expect from a far younger cat. For example, he still quite regularly chases his own tail!
If you want to know more about Oscar and his life history, then I am instructed to provide a back link to Oscar’s own blog. It does need some updating but then, like everything else in Oscar’s life, he relies on his human slaves, (aka Sybille and me), to do it for him.
One of Oscar’s most recent habits has been, not just to sleep on top of the duvet on one of the beds in the guest bedroom, but under the duvet. Sometimes there is little more than a large bump in the duvet with a small amount of black and white fur protruding. The two photos below are good examples of this latest trend. You have to admit that he does look remarkably cute!
