I am so incredibly sorry. I can relate to the pain you are feeling right now. This winter we spent months feeding and trying to gain the trust of this little red tabby. It was such a cold and bitter and snowy winter here. It took a couple of months of her eating and running before she would slow down long enough for us to get a look at her. But once she did she immediately changed. She went from running like the devil was after her to running towards me when she heard me call for her. She absolutely panicked the first time I put her in our pole barn and shut her in. As soon as the door opened she ran. I didn't see her again for 3 days. But when she came back she was ready to sleep in the pole barn. This was in early March. I had first started feeding her in December. I made a comfortable bed for her on an old chair with comforters and a velux blanket. She seemed to happy to finally be warm. I called our local no-kill operation and they said they would put her up on the list and I might be able to get her into the shelter within the next week. I was so ecstatic.

I was calling her Miss Kitty by this time. She was so sweet and gentle. She was small...only about 7 pounds and so incredibly soft. She was a red tabby without any white on her at all. Her claws were like daggers but she never once scratched me..not even by accident. She loved sitting on my shoulder snuggling under my chin and purring. She would get so into it she would start to drool. Just a couple of days before PAWS would take her I went in to feed her in the evening and she had mucous pouring from her rectum. I took her with me in the morning and dropped her off at the vets. The very first thing the vet said to me when she called is what an incredibly sweet cat she was...that everyone was just falling in love with her. They were estimating her age to be about 5 years old since she was getting the freckles that red tabbies get at they age. So someone must have spayed her when she was young. Her nipples were the small underdeveloped ones of a cat that has never had kittens. Since she was outside for months in all sorts of horrible weather with wind chills below zero I am guessing she was a stray. The vet said she had a bad case of colitis. They were going to start her on Flagel. I asked them if they would go ahead and test her since she was there. The test came back positive for Feline Leukemia. It was so positive the result came back faster than the control.

I had to put her to sleep. I held here while she went over the bridge and my husband and I just cried. In fact i am crying now. She had found a place in my heart that will always exist for her. I am also so angry at the person that abandoned her. But at least she was loved at the end. They held her body at the vets for us until we were able to dig a grave for her. We buried her just last weekend. She is resting in our pet cemetary with my beloved Smokey and Killer Sue. I don't know which kitty is coming back from the RB to snuggle with me at night. I sort of hope it is Miss Kitty and she is enjoying being loved again.

So trust me when I say I understand the despair, frustration, anger and incredible sadness that you are feeling right now. But also know that you have given Caramel the best gift and love that he could have gotten. Life was unfair to him in so many ways but the fates brought him to you so that he didn't have to die alone and in pain. And he was loved at the end.

Denyce