Sleepless Night

I have always said that I really want kids and for a second time I am now questioning that fully. Ok, how do I explain this? They say that pets are like your children and I am cat mad. In fact it has often been a joke at parties and at birthdays when I open the fifth cat related present or twentieth cat covered card that I am going to end up being one of those old women (?) who ends up alone in a bungalow, with a jungle for a garden and 50 cats.

Sadly today the idea couldn’t be further from the truth. I was going to sit down and write a blog about how lame pride has become, how brilliant I thought Dirty Books was and how much I loved being in a Pop band for 30minutes on Saturday at GAY, when sat with laptop on bed last night when I noticed my cat (Hoyden) had a swollen leg. I had to mentally track back all the 4 hours I had been awake before 9pm to think if myself or Mr S had trodden on her foot or she had done one of her stupendous (and stupid) jumps onto something that ends in a miss and a puzzled moggy on the floor. Neither of these had happened. The worry started, how had my cat broken her leg without me noticing? Bad parent/owner point #1

So an emergency call to the vets later I was told not to worry it would probably be a bite but if her breathing became erratic or her gums went whiter than normal I must call back. Rubbish parent/owner point #2 – I have no idea what colour Hoydens gums are normally. This morning after a night of practically no sleep (I slept with her in the bathroom for half the night worried about her breathing, so in fact I lay with her, I didn’t sleep) there was no change so called the vets and off we went.

The vet will be receiving a letter from me this week in how to talk to humans, it seems he can only speak appropriately to cats arses. It wasn’t a successful trip. The good news? No broken leg. The bad, it’s a tumour, or as the vet said ‘this is most likely a secondary tumour, there isn’t much circulation to this leg’ she has another in her tummy. My chin must have hit the floor. I nearly hit him when two seconds later he said ‘Mr Savidge does this look like a well cat to you?’ Now Hoyden is slim, she eats like a monster and so gets a bit of a potbelly, I have only had her since she was five (I got her and her sister from friends who had a baby the cats were trying to kill) and she had always been like this. Which I told him and the tale of the rescue of the baby killers from a fate worse than Battersea. Why did I feel I had to explain myself to this worm? By this time I felt like the most neglectful owner ever – rubbish parent/owner point #3.

The diagnosis isn’t good. In all likely hood she will probably have to be put to sleep. Now some people will think a 26 year old man being heartbroken like this is pathetic and in some ways I should pull myself together. They have done two hundred pounds worth of blood tests and as the receptionist said ‘the results will be in on Wednesday’ said vet popped his head through the door and said ‘Thursday, I am on holiday on Wednesday’ yes I am sure he is with the money I have just spent the f**ker! Just when I didn’t think I could feel lousier the receptionist adds ‘you must really not like this place, the last time you were here was to pick your other cats ashes up wasn’t it?’ Bad parent/owner point #4! And for once I was speechless!

Now after some very distraught phone calls and a big weep, Hoyden and I are in bed cuddling and she has a bag of Sainsbury’s goodies awaiting her in the kitchen. I have now been over indulgent after being announced the worst owner of animals by buying her all her favourites, Petits Filous (only the strawberry ones) a potato (she loves the peel) and various other things I probably shouldn’t have bought. Bad parent/owner #5. If I cant be a good cat owner then I am going to be one lousy father! But is it bad that I want the last few days to be the best she ever has? I’m not sure it is.