Adventures in Cat Training......

I have a very special relationship with my feline companion Cleopatra ("Patra").

Faith, Love & Dignity: My Beautiful Chloe's Final Days

My dear cat Chloe, barely nine years old, finally lost her 18-month battle with mammary cancer on Sunday, January 31, 2010 at approximately 9am EST.

She died at home, on her own terms, and in her loving mommy's arms.

Sadly, had she been spayed before her first heat, she would have been far less susceptible to the disease. So I thought a fitting tribute would be to enter her in the Humane Society's Spay Day Photo Contest.



Please honor her memory by making even a $5 donation to this worthy cause before 10 P.M. Eastern Standard Time on Thursday, March 4, 2010.

Every dollar donated is a vote for her, and I am hoping that, with enough votes, she will attract the interest of the contest's judges and be profiled in the HSUS's magazine All Animals, as her story -- as those who have read my earlier entry about her and watched the video know -- is one worth sharing.

And as one might expect of a creature who transformed both herself and those around her during her life, her death -- heartbreaking though it has been for me -- proved to be more remarkable still, as she maintained her composure and sociable, affectionate personality right up to the end.

"She has a lot of dignity," observed Dr. G as Chloe peered up calmly from her carrier during what would be her final visit on Saturday, January 30th.

I had made it clear that I did not want to pursue the "clinical option," but I also knew that the progression of this horrible disease might be more than she or I could bear. Research warned about seizures, rupturing tumors, stinking sores, incontinence, weakness and ultimate immobility.

Unthinkable.

As it was, I felt guilty about force-feeding her Mother's Milk twice a day, squirting it into her mouth from a large syringe.

She'd twist her head at the unpleasantness, but she'd allow it anyway. Then I'd brush her silky coat, and she'd purr.

But the positive effects were undeniable: In the three weeks since she'd stopped eating solid food she had lost less than one pound ... but was still, however, a tragically thin five pounds.

My sense was that she tolerated this for me, and that if left to nature, she would have allowed herself to wither weeks before.

She had not merely lost her appetite; she developed a vigorous aversion to food. When I put a dish in front of her and begged her to eat, she'd turn away offended, ultimately walking away in disgust when I didn't get the hint.

I began to wonder if the loss of appetite is nature's way of ensuring death before cancer's full ravages take effect....

But we weren't there yet, and I was clinging to hope that with the chemo and increased nutrition her body would fight the disease and maybe, just maybe, force it into remission.

At least this was my state of mind during her mid-month bounceback, described in my Monday, January 25h entry.

Ironically, she went downhill the very next day.

To keep fluid away from her lungs and heart, we had her on Lasix, a brand diuretic. I refilled the prescription that weekend with a generic and, although the dosage was lower, I fear the strength was greater.

Or perhaps she just had too much of the stuff in her system.

Very late Tuesday night I found her in the bathtub, meowing piteously. But she didn't try to lap the droplets. Instead she jumped (yes jumped!) out -- and leaped headlong onto the toilet!!

She'd pawed her way down from the seat nearly reaching the icky pool before I pulled her out.

I closed the lid and brought her the water bowl. She pawed around it, splashing the floor. It wasn't big enough?

I filled a large square basin for her on the bathroom floor.

She leaned into it, dipped in a paw, then pulled back and looked at me again.

"What's wrong, sweetheart?" I pleaded, "What can I do for you??"

She turned longingly towards the toilet bowl.

Well, that was out of the question.

I closed the toilet lid and filled a Tupperware container; still too small ... or too square... or too plastic.

I rifled through the kitchen filling various unsatisfactory dishes and bowls.

And then I saw it: A wide, white glass pie dish.

I filled it with a quarter-inch of water and put it down in the bedroom. She stretched her entire bib over it and looked... content.

She dipped her paws and the side of her face into the pool. It wasn't just thirst: it was vanity!

During feeding, the Mother's Milk would ooze onto her sensitive cheeks and paws where it dried quickly like cement, matting her beautiful fur.

I scrubbed her gently with a warm cloth, and brushed the tender spots as best I could. She rubbed her face and pawed at her cheeks, but it was impossible to remove and our efforts left a raw, balding patch on her left cheek.

I felt awful.

The next day I used my expensive olive oil makeup remover and managed to dissolve some of it -- but not enough for her.

She kept returning to the pie plate.

I found her Thursday evening laying with her head in the water.

"Chloe?!!" I gasped, fearing inadvertent kitty-suicide.

She whipped her head up quizzically, splashing my face.

OK, I deserved that.

I dried her off and put her on a heating pad, but it was too late: all the water sports had given her a dismal sniffle.

She sneezed several times and I left a desperate message for Dr. G.

He called me back at work the next day telling me he could fit us in on Saturday. "If we get her on an antibiotic quickly, maybe we can prevent the cold from turning into something worse."

Worse. Pneumonia. Death.

I thought of her face in the bowl, and then I remembered -- the bowl!!

I had forgotten to close the toilet bowl lid!

I called my parents for help. My father offered to check on her -- not a small favor as they live several miles away and don't have a car -- but they were just as concerned for their grandkitty as I was...

My dad called from my apartment. "Everything's fine; the lid is closed. She even got up to greet me when I went to pet her."

That was what amazed me the most:

As weak as she was, she continued to be as much herself as she could. She greeted me at the door when I came home; she cuddled with me in bed; she even came to the kitchen at feeding time, but still disdained all food.

I had even put a stepstool to help her climb the 2 1/2 feet up to my bed. But she refused to use it.

Even on her last nights, I could feel her jump onto the bed -- scrambling just a little with her weakened hind paws.

When guests visited -- which was frequent as they'd come to give her some love -- she joined them in the living room and purred and purred.

But during that last week, she'd lost her purr.

Each night, I'd fall asleep to the soft, raspy gurgle of her breath...

"It's OK, sweetheart," I said during that week, "You can go when you need to. I love you, and I'll miss you. But you can go."

And then I cried.

But I still hoped...

And even as I planned with Dr. G on Saturday to help her heal, I asked, "What do I do... if she .... goes ... at home on a Sunday... when your office is closed?"

He said I could wrap her in a towel, put the towel in a sealed plastic bag and she'd be OK until Monday.

Yeah. She'd be OK.

Sunday morning I woke up extra early. This was the weekend of the Bellydance Evolution workshops and show.

I'd bought a pass to all the workshops, and though I'd missed one the day before, I was determined to take the rest on Sunday.

But feeding was a long process. I was increasing the amount, so I had to feed her in three or four sessions with at least 10 minutes in between. Plus it took nearly a half-hour to mix the stuff and clean the syringe, bowls, towels, mixers, etc....

But we were going to do this, no matter how much time or effort it took. She could get better....

When I got up around 8:30am, she was under a chair in the living room, but came to the kitchen for feeding.

I sat with her at my breast and gave her the first dose. She whipped her head and writhed a bit, but finally slurped it down.

I fed Simon and Julietta, then returned to Chloe around 9am.

When I picked her up, she let out a more urgent meow which, in retrospect, might have meant something like, "Will you quit feeding me you crazy woman -- I'm trying to die over here!!"

"Come on, sweetheart," I urged, "We can do this." I nestled her in the towel and gave her the next dose, and then another and another....

Suddenly she let out a horrifying yeowl. Her body spasmed, clenched and limp at the same time.

"Oh god! I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" I laid her on a chair, kneeling in front, desperately holding her fragile body. Her fur stuck out, her eyes flattened into sightless brassy discs.

"Please come back!" I cried, shaking her gently. I eased her mouth open and rubbed her chest.

Her face and eyes softened. She looked at me with a shuddering breath.

I held her close and lay back with her on my chest, looking into her calm, dark and still beautiful eyes.

"It's OK, Chloe," I sobbed, running my fingers along her smooth coat, "I love you. I love you..."

She breathed a few more times and let go.

And I wept. A lot.

Finally I carried her into the bedroom and laid her out on a towel. I prayed, cried, meditated, whatever I needed ... for maybe a half-hour give or take... until I felt something resolve in myself.

Strangely, the other cats completely removed themselves during the ordeal... I didn't see them again for nearly an hour.

I thought maybe they were frightened by the initial histrionics, but they'd seen me lose it before. And things were quiet for a while after....

After some soul-searching, I decided to go to the dance workshops anyway.

I'd be among friends, doing what I love ... and what better way to grieve a death than to celebrate life?

When I packed my dance bag I went back to Chloe's body and, with a final loving pet of her soft black fur, said goodbye and gently wrapped the towel around her.

This post and others like it is from http://tandavadance.blogspot.com ... please visit that link to make comments.

Kitty Update and Other Stuff

So, I had kind of made this New Year's resolution to blog more frequently ... and you see how that's turned out.

See... part of me likes to make this an official-looking newslettery kind of blog.

And the other part of me wants to be able to blog for blog's sake.

So consider this a blog-for-blog's-sake kind of entry. Perhaps I'll create a BFBS tag... we'll see.

Now. About Chloe.

This month has been rough.

I was despondent for nearly two weeks after she was diagnosed at the end of December; indeed during the first week of January, fluid in her chest caused severe labored breathing and I every day I thought I'd come home to an expired kitty... :-(

On Friday, January 8th, I spoke to our vet, the amazing Dr. Giangola, a legend of New York animal rescue.

Although he did not advise another surgery, he suggested that it might be possible to "make her more comfortable" if indeed she did not have long.

I was afraid she might not be able to tolerate the trip to the Upper East Side (his office is on First Ave & 87th Street, and I live in Brooklyn), but he said that if I felt she could make it, I could take her in before 1pm Saturday without an appointment.

Some friends came to visit on Friday evening and gave her so much love and attention that she became more alert and active than she'd been in days.

So the next morning, I took her in.

Dr. G aspirated the fluid and gave her a diuretic.

She was so much better that she crawled out of the carrier on the cab ride home and enjoyed a thrilling ride down the FDR.



She stopped eating a few days later, but Phil and Joseph of the excellent holistic pet food store Whiskers recommended several liquid nutritional supplements (Mother's Milk, Seacure and a few others) which are keeping her strength up.

She's pretty thin now, but not weak and is still able to jump onto her favorite chairs and purr.

Chloe is also LOVING the attention of guests (Simon and Julietta are enjoying it too). So if you want to visit, please let me know. Weekends are best....

Now. Onto other stuff.

Well, there hasn't been a whole lot of other stuff ...

It's not that the extra care for Chloe takes so much time per se, but the thought she would die so quickly, and watching the way she suffered during that first week took an awful toll on me, emotionally and psychologically.

So I haven't had much energy to perform or even get out much.

But I did audition for and was accepted to two new bellydance troupes: Crystal's Unveiled Follies and Bellyqueen's Rising Sirens.

I haven't had much experience with troupes beyond PURE, so this will be a good next step for me.

And speaking of troupes....

So I did not get accepted into the Bellydance Evolution show which, at first, was a great disappointment.

But given the developments and traumas of the past month, it is definitely a blessing in disguise; I don't think I would have had the emotional strength to get up to speed on the eight (yes eight!) choreographies those ladies have to learn in only a few days.

And I know enough of my own limitations to think Jillina chose her dancers well.

Check them out on Saturday night!

And if you can't make it on Saturday, the out-of-town winners (and a few of us local contestants) will be jamming at Bellyqueen's Djam Under Je'Bon, which I will emcee! Yippee!

Not a bad way to end a very rough month.....

This post and others like it is from http://tandavadance.blogspot.com ... please visit that link to make comments. Thank you!

A Blue New Year: Coping with Kitty Cancer

If, on the night of a cerulean moon, we close our eyes and sit very still, take in great draughts of air, sigh deeply and open our hearts, we will be able to hear Lady Luna sing the blues. Broken-hearted, She watches down on our out-of-whack world, and She weeps.

And Her pain is our pain.

I read those words in Mama Donna's Huffington Post blog only hours after that bluest of Blue Moons -- the New Year's Eve blue moon, which occurs only once every 19 years -- and shed a whole lot of tears.

Very shortly before, I learned that my dear cat Chloe may be fatally ill.

The breast cancer (yes, cats can get breast cancer!) which we had treated with radical surgery the year before...



...had returned and would likely be fatal.

OK. Yeah. She's just a cat.

But I can't help bristling at the cavalier words of those who think indifferently of animal lives, who see furry companions as little more than animated furniture -- delightful, but ultimately expendable, replaceable.

"C'est la vie," said a well-meaning friend with a shuddering hug.

And that's true -- I believe strongly in quality of life, and have respect for a dignified, comfortable death.

But I am still very sad.

I love all of my three cats, and would be devastated to lose any of them.

But Chloe, who is the eldest and the first I adopted, shares a connection with me that has transformed both of us.

Perhaps I sensed this in the beginning when I had offered to foster a pregnant cat for my friend Kathryn, who runs what is now the Anjellicle Cats Rescue at Spoiled Brats.

She told me she had already found a foster for prego-puss, but that there was another cat that she "wanted to get out of the cage."

I realized what that meant when I found myself drawn to a small spooky black cat in the center cage. As I put my hand to the mesh, a razor-sharp claw raked through a fingertip.

"Wow!" said Kathryn, shuttling the frantic fuzzball into a carrier, "I see you've already met!"

The poor creature had been found a few weeks before around Fordham University and was wild to the point of being unadoptable.

But Kathryn had faith in me .... more than I had in myself.

I created a short video describing the events that followed... how, basically, love and steadfast kindness reached Chloe's terrified, traumatized kitty heart, here:



But what I did not describe is how this occurred.

As I say in the video, she was indeed "two little eyes in the back of the closet that occasionally came out to eat, poop and scratch me."

Usually, socialized domestic cats scratch only as a warning, claws not fully extended; but when Chloe scratched -- she meant it.

And she would be unpredictable: Even as she was warming up to human contact, if you touched her the wrong way, came too close or stayed too long, she would let you have it in full feline fury.

She began to like sleeping near my pillow; I wore a face mask because I was afraid she'd lash out an eye in the night. (She has never scratched me during the night, by the way.)

I'd come to work with lacerated, battle-torn hands and arms. I bought New Skin in bulk.

"A cat did that to you??" gaped an astonished co-worker after the spaying episode (described in the video). "And you still have this cat???"

Yes. Though I came close to giving up.

But something about her inspired me to believe she was reachable, and once reached, she would be remarkable.

And that is how she transformed me.

Now.

You can't punish a cat in the knee-jerk ways people punish, say, children.

You can't yell, hit back or be aggressive in any way.

This just terrifies the animal more, and makes it more likely they will injure you when you least expect it.

But somehow I had to let her know that she couldn't do this anymore ... that, most importantly, she didn't have to.

So I did this:

At the moment she'd swat me, I'd grab her -- firmly but gently, taking the razor blows as she dealt them -- until I could sit and hold her between my knees, facing me and tilted back in the "surrender position."

I'd hold her paws folded into her chest and firmly, but calmly, tell her to look at me, directing her head forward with my thumbs.

And I'd say things like: "That hurts mommy when you do that. Your mommy loves you and will never hurt you or let anyone hurt you."

Then I'd feel her body relax just a little, and I'd let her go, pet her and give her some treats.

All was forgiven. Until the next time.

And within a month or two, there were no more "next times."

She stopped scratching altogether.

She became warm, affectionate, trusting and trustworthy. I brought her two siblings (Simon the big-eyed tabby and Julietta the grey-and-white flirt), whom she guards, grooms and sometimes bullies playfully.



She nuzzles my face, purring and affectionate, and sleeps on my head nearly every night -- no face mask necessary.

She is warm and loving to family and guests, but loyally cuddles with her mom, no matter what cushy pal is in the fold-out bed.

She is a unique creature, and my dear, beloved, beautiful friend.

And now I may be losing her.

Men Behaving Badly

Actually, I think many women behave worse.

But we are not the ones who sit with our legs spread as far apart as possible on the subway.

And I've given a few spreadeagled guys a hard time ("I'm sure your balls are huge, but do I really have to smell them??" Giggles from fellow passengers are usually enough to shame the guy into exercising his noodley inner-thighs).

But today, the problem wasn't a leg-spreader; it was a seat-stealer.

I had to take my cat to the vet this frigid morning. So I carried her in a bulky Sherpa shoulder bag, held close to my body -- a sweater around the cat inside, and a blanket draped over the outside.

And I had a heavy knapsack of stuff for the vet on my back.

So there I am, on the DeKalb platform, train pulling in.

I hobble onto the moderately crowded Q and head towards the remaining empty seat.

About two feet from my Formica Valhalla, a smirking twentysomething shoots me a look and dives into the seat.

I sidle up to the pole in front of him, positioning my foot near his, figuring a good jolt would give me the opportunity to crush his metatarsals.

But no -- too childish, I decide (actually, the train operator didn't drive like a cabbie, for a change... so no convenient jolts).

So I'm standing there wrestling with myself, wishing I'd said something when he first sat down.

But now that the moment is gone, what do I do? Seek petty, childish, eminently satisfying passive-aggressive revenge?

I glower down at him for the full seven minutes across the Manhattan Bridge. He notices this at first, but sniffs a little scoff of victory and feigns sleep behind his tinted glasses.

Canal Street comes and the person sitting next to him gets up.

I plop down next to him, cat carrier on my lap, and turn my head to face him full-on.

"You got a problem?" he sneers.

"Yeah." I sneer back, but still can't bring myself to speak directly.

All the way to Union Square, I turn the words over in my mind. I'm not going to be passive, I decide. He put me through discomfort, and I'll return the favor. And that will be that.

Finally, as we pull into 14th Street, I get up, face him, and say:

"You knew very well I needed this seat more than you did. But you went and plopped your fat, ugly, lazy ass in it anyway." (He actually wasn't fat, but that's always a useful ephithet -- even for men.)

"But what goes around comes around. And karma is a bitch, and so am I. And with the way you act, I won't be the last bitch who bitches at you. And you'll deserve every bitchy word, you selfish, pathetic douchebag."

I head towards the open door, but turn back one last time: "And Merry Christmas."

He scoffs again, turning to the woman sitting next to him as an ally against the crazy bitch yelling at him.

But she's seen the whole thing and turns away with a little scoff of her own.

And I scoff too ... and, finally, step off.