Monkey
One cold Sunday in November of 2009, someone tossed 2 cute kittens into one of the dog kennels outside. These poor, cold kittens were 3-4 months old and most likely littermates. One of the kittens tested positive for feline leukemia while her sibling tested negative. The kitten who tested negative was adopted right away. Meanwhile, the other kitten, a beautiful short haired tortieshell, had to be quarantined and kept separate from the other cats at the shelter.
The kitten soon got named Monkey - and for good reason! Monkey was full of energy and had a very funny personality. She craved attention from people. As soon as her cage was opened (sometimes only half way!) she would jump in your arms and start to groom you. Next thing you knew, your face was clean and you had a soothing, purring bundle of love next to your ear (which also got groomed!). Monkey loved to love and be loved. She won everyone's hearts, and we knew we had to find a special home for her!
Finding the right home was not easy, but we were determined! It took almost a year, but we found a wonderful, caring lady from Wisconsin who adopts only FELV positive cats. She fell in love with Monkey immediately (who wouldn't?!). Monkey can now play with other FELV positive cats in her new forever home. She has a loving owner who has given her a chance to live her full life.
Since Monkey was adopted, Friends of Animals has been able to place several more FELV postive cats. Maybe you have the right home to welcome one of these loving kitties?! If you are interested in helping, please call us.
New Lease On Life
One Monday this spring a call came from a gentleman inquiring about our surrender policy. He was a veteran who had recently been diagnosed with a debilitating heart ailment. His next stop in life would be the VA hospital in the cities, followed most likely by spending his remaining days in the veterans ' home in the metro area.
He had two dogs that he had acquired as pups when he lived on the west coast.They now were four years old and had known only each other as siblings. Now he had the heartbreaking choice in life to turn their lives over to complete strangers.
Would we be able to adopt them out as a pair? We couldn't make any promises but assured him we'd try our best. It was clear that he loved his dogs and valued their lives as strongly as his own.
The female settled in quite nicely over the next couple of days, but the male had some fear problems. Who could blame him? One day he was with the only human he loved and trusted, the next he was living in a kennel with 20 other barking dogs of various breeds, sizes and ages. He clearly was not happy.
Early that first Friday afternoon the veteran called again. We assumed he was just calling to see how they were adapting to shelter life. But, no. He had been misdiagnosed! He was calling to inform us that he was coming home and wanted his dogs back!! He had received a new lease on life and now so had his two faithful companions.
We don't know who was more exhilarated - him or the dogs! They couldn't stop jumping up to give him kisses, chattering the whole time, while he just kept assuring them that he was never going to let them go.
The shelter staff couldn't have ended their week with a more fulfilling feeling in their hearts. It just doesn't get any better than that!
Happy Tail Waggin'
"She wants the puppy as a surprise for her son's 7th birthday."
Loading my foster pups into the car for their afternoon shelter visit, I headed home, phone number of the potential adopter, Karen, in hand. Once the babies were racing happily around the front yard, I picked up the phone. Karen and I had a good discussion. She had grown up with dogs, and now as an adult, finally had a home of her own. She had been waiting to have a dog again, and her son really wanted a puppy too.
When visiting the local shelters, she always had a tough time dragging him away from the dog cages. On the adoption form, Karen chose Jersey, my favorite of the litter for his even temperament and sweet personality. She planned to bring her son to the shelter the next day if her application for Jersey was approved.
I was at the shelter with Jersey and siblings by noon the next day. Soon the pups were snooping the toys in their run while I stuck around to see if Karen would call. The phone rang at 12:10; Karen learned that her application was approved to adopt Jersey and said she and her son would be there at 1 pm. I decided to stay to see how she planned to negotiate the surprise.
Karen and her son Kyle walked into the shelter and went to look at the puppies. Fifteen minutes later they were standing at the front desk. Karen asked "which one is your favorite dog, Kyle?" He replied, "the brownish one in with the gold ones". (That was Jersey!) "Would you like to take that dog home today?"
Kyle stared at her with big eyes. He wasn't saying anything! He finally nodded, barely moving his head, his eyes not blinking.
"Are you so surprised you can't say anything?", his mom chuckled.
Kyle replied seriously, "I'm more surprised than I usually am."
We all laughed, and he sat quietly. His mom began working on the adoption contract, so I decided to bring Jersey to the front desk with us. I sat down in the chair next to Kyle with Jersey in my lap. Kyle barely dared to look at the puppy. Finally his mom said, "you can pet him." Kyle still didn't reach over to the pup right away, but finally his tentative hand patted Jersey briefly on his back. Karen, half writing and half watching her son, "I only told him that we were coming to Cloquet to pick up his birthday present, that it was something that couldn't be wrapped." Kyle broke in "it would be hard to wrap up this puppy!"
I began talking to Kyle about house training, safe toys for the puppy, and how, if he is always nice to the pup, he will have a friend for life. Kyle was taking all this in because he began asking good questions: "will he whine if he has to go outside?", "does he have a favorite toy?", "has he eaten today?". And I told him that Jersey had eaten breakfast and lunch but that he would have to feed him supper. "Oh!" exclaimed Kyle, "so every time that we have to eat, the puppy does too!"
"Is there anything the puppy really would not like?" So I answered all of his questions, and we all talked, and finally the paperwork was finished and it was time to go to the car. I went with them, still holding Jersey. Kyle buckled into the back seat, and I set Jersey on his lap saying "Have a good home, puppy. Congratulations, Kyle." He still didn't seem to quite believe this was all happening. As his mom said, "it's like he's in shock." Climbing into the driver's seat, Karen turned to snap a picture of Kyle gingerly holding onto little trembling Jersey. I watched them drive away, then headed for home myself, feeling good about the adoption.
Karen called me later to say that the homecoming went well. "And you know what else? Kyle really had been excited. I think he was holding it all in - he cried all the way home!"
Weeble Wobbles and She Does Fall Down
I had lost one of my babies, a 13 year old terrier mix, to kidney/heart failure only a week before I stopped into the shelter to visit my coworkers. As I was talking with the vet tech, I looked over to see a black and white kitten in one of our kennels in our medical room. I asked her why it was in there and she explained that she was a feral cat that had been trapped as part of our Trap, Neuter, Release (TNR) program but something was wrong with her and no one was really sure what. She explained that along with roundworms and ear mites she was very wobbly, fell over, and seemed to have difficulty walking due to it. Because of her condition none of us felt comfortable releasing her back into the wild, she was lucky enough to have survived as long as she had out there like that. At the same time though, we knew it would be hard for us to find someone willing to take a cat with issues into their home.
The little ball of fur piqued my interest, I asked for permission to take her out of the kennel and hold her. As I held her she squirmed around nuzzling her head on anything she could touch, purring all along. I had previously adopted two senior and special needs dogs from FOA both of which I loved dearly and only had for a short amount of time before it was time for them to move on to their new home at the Rainbow Bridge. As I held the little cat the vet tech said "Too bad we don’t know someone who adopts special needs cats." And all I replied with was "Yeah, hmm." I’m not sure if she knew or not but my wheels were already spinning. I put the kitten back in her kennel and said bye to everyone.
A few days went by and I found myself still thinking about her, so I began doing some online research. I went to Google and began typing things like "wobbly kitten stumbles, falls, and can’t walk straight". I figured I would get a lot of random links to things that didn’t really pertain to what I was looking for, but to my surprise I got many links all pertaining to one thing: Cerebellar Hypoplasia (CH). I read numerous stories about people who owned cats with CH and watched countless videos of CH cats who walked very similarly to the cat who I was so curious about. I read how this condition occurs and affects the cats that have it. It happens most commonly when a female cat that is pregnant gets Feline Distemper which affects the babies’ cerebellum growth. That portion of the brain controls motor skills and balance so when they have CH it makes the cat uncoordinated causing them to walk wobbly, fall over, and have jerking head motions when they try to focus. All of which this little kitty was doing. These cats live completely normal lives despite walking around differently. They are not in pain, they play, eat, and drink just fine, the CH itself will not get worse, and they are born that way so they don’t know any different way of life. It was at this point I considered taking this kitty into my home a little more seriously.
I spoke to a few veterinarians regarding CH and the cat. After getting their opinions on the whole scenario I felt confident that I could take this cat into my home, handle her special needs, and love her forever. This was going to be an adventure because not only was she going to be my first young special needs animal that I’d adopted, she was also going to be my first cat that I had ever owned. I searched all over for names to give her and eventually decided on Weeble because it was cute, unique, and it certainly fit her. At first, Weeble was kept separate from my dog because of her parasite issues; I wanted to be sure they were gone before she met him. Once everything was cleared up I let them meet he wasn’t her biggest fan to begin with, but nowadays it’s not uncommon to find her curled up with him napping the day away. 
She amazes me daily with the things that she can do, how she goes about doing them without fear, and how she never gives up that’s something that I admire her for. I’ve always been a dog person, but Weeble has wobbled her way right into my heart. She’s a very unique little lady and I am grateful to the world for letting her survive in the wild so that she could eventually live with me.
