Another Sad Goodbye

Just a few short days after losing a young cat, Ferris, to FLV, PFA sadly bid goodnight to another beloved foster cat who was claimed by the same terrible illness.

Sweet Edwina was a young black female who was rescued by the PFA feral team last fall and placed into foster care with her sister, Ellie. Edwina did not find a forever home, but she was happy and loved in her foster home. Her foster mom wrote a moving tribute to little Edwina.

I consider myself very lucky to be able to foster numerous wonderful cats. During the past week, one of my little girls showed signs of illness; vomiting, bloody stool, lethargy, loss of appetite. Trying to figure out which cat (out of 6) was ill took a bit of sneaking around but I narrowed it to my Edwina (Edie). She and her mother came to me a year ago, she was 6 months and her mother was about 1 year. I took her in to the vet for tests; I though she may have eaten some houseplant altho’ all my plants are non-toxic, maybe she had a stomach bug, maybe she didn’t like her food.

The vet took blood samples and the results were positive for Feline Leukemia. She was very ill with almost no chance of recovery. FLeV (F-Leuk) is almost always fatal and Edie was very, very ill. I had her humanely euthanized and her passing was peaceful. She is now frolicking in some great catnip field.
She was a solid black, very small-boned, shy little girl. She wasn’t big on being held or cuddled but slept curled up with her big foster brother Teddy every night. She had a special place in the front porch and gleefully submitted to vigorous scratches on her lower back . She’d twist like a little worm in the sun and purr up a storm. She was a master at chasing and catching her laser light and her favourite toy was a long wand with feathers (made by a PFA volunteer)
I don’t know if cats mourn the loss of a member of the ‘pride’ but I know I do. She was a wonderful little cat who deserved so much more.

“Put the rubber mouse away.
Pick the spools up off the floor.
What was velvet-shod and gay
Will not need them anymore.
What was warm is strangely cold.
Whence dissolved the little breath?
How could this small body hold
So immense a thing as death.”
Edwina will be very much missed by her foster mom and feline friends.