Kodi

Kodi

Kodi came to us in the last set of foster kittens I took in 2002. Because of his incredibly big head, I named him Bugsy. He didn't like being locked in the kitten room, so he used to sit by the door and cry. About a week after coming to live with us, he came down with a nasty case of URI. He became listless and uninvolved with life. He continued to eat, and played a bit, but in general he would just sit where ever you put him and if you were patting him, he'd purr.

There were two major things about Kodi that I fell head over heals in love with. One was his size. He was a huge kitty, and gave every indication he was going to be a humongous cat. I love big cats. His paws were amazingly large, as was the fur around his head. The other thing that I really loved was the fact that Kodi LOVED to have his belly rubbed. You only had to touch it once, and he'd flomp over and throw his legs wide. I called him my little belly slut. I love patting kitty bellies, not only cause they are soft, but because you know that you have the cat's complete trust when he allows you access to it.

Kodi never did get over his case of URI, but with some stronger antibiotics, it became less noticeable. We had him neutered and adopted him. He became more playful on the new antibiotics, and seemed to be doing well. When I took him into the vets for his check up, we talked about his URI. The vet I was going to recommended that we take him off the antibiotics. After a few days, Kodi went right down hill. I rushed him back to the vet that the shelter uses, and they recommended he go back on antibiotics, and took some tests.

Unfortunately Kodi came up as positive for both FIP and Leukemia. The stress of all the vet visits in the short amount of time didn't help. I brought him home and put him back on the antibiotics, and isolated him, and he seemed to perk up. I was even thinking that I would be able to find him a new home to live out his life. Unfortunately though, despite everything I did and tried, he went down hill after a few weeks. I had a scheduled vet visit due to the fact that he had started bleeding into his eye, but the night before I was patting him and could feel that his kidneys had enlarged. I knew that it was time, and that he could not recover from this.

A number of years ago I took in a stray, and had to put her down due to her being quite ill from leukemia. I was there for her death, so I felt I needed to be there for Kodi. It was one of the hardest things I have done in a long time. The medication they gave him made him shudder as he died. I will never forget that. I miss him terribly. Its amazing how even after the time that has passed since he was a member of the household, it still feels like there is someone missing when all the kitties gather in one place. Part of me hopes that will fade in time, part of me doesn't.