Goodbye, Ollie
Our cat, Ollie, passed away today.
Understandably, we're both pretty upset at the moment. We'd had Ollie for about 6 years - we got him from a cat's refuge in Leek when Becky moved to London. So, as long as Becky and I have lived together, Ollie has too.
He was a lovely cat. He was playful and affectionate and loved to be around the two of us, moving into whichever room we were in. He always like attention but if you gave him too much, he liked to give you a wee nip. Because of this, I was always a little unsure if he'd be ok around Emily but he was never anything but gentle, despite a fair bit of provocation.
He'd been ill for quite a while, months. Not long after Emily was born, he started to lose weight and he stopped looking after himself. We took him to the vets months ago to see if anything was wrong but they couldn't find anything, despite doing blood tests. We just decided that he was a little depressed and he would right himself eventually. He never did.
This week, he went missing and turned up at the vet in Peebles. Someone had found him in the village and taken him to the Cat's Protection League, thinking he was stray. Luckily, he was chipped, so we got him back easily enough. I decided it was probably a good idea to have him checked by the vet again and this time they found that he had enlarged kidneys and that they were essentially failed, probably from a hereditary disease of some sort.
We brought him home for a day but he went downhill very quickly. His body had used up all his fat and muscle, so he didn't have the strength to even jump up onto the couch. With a heavy heart we took him back to the vet to spare him from any more pain.
The house seems a little emptier now without him. Goodbye, Ollie. We miss you.
