Mister Simba
When my heart kitty, Spot, died in July 2013, I was devastated. I wanted another orange cat, but I still had two cats, Socks and Jerry, and Socks in particular didn’t like other cats, so I decided not to get another cat as long as she was around. When Socks died in November 2015, Jerry seemed lonely, so I started looking for a cat to adopt.
I spotted Mister, called Simba by the shelter, on the Best Friends LA website in December 2015, and his little orange face really tugged at my heart. But it was three more months and another cat (Davey) later before I finally adopted him. In my “gotcha” post, I wrote:
I’d called about him, but found out he’d been sick from not eating, and was waffling about going to see him. On the one hand, I didn’t want to get caught up in yet another series of endless vet visits and treatments, after spending several years dealing with Socks’ and Spot’s slow declines. On the other hand, it was possible he was just not dealing well with being in a shelter and he might be just fine in a home. I waited a week or two and finally said, heck with it, I’m going to at least go and see him! So I drove all the way to Mission Hills (1hr 40min from here), only to find when I got there that Simba was in the clinic again, very sick, and it was not even sure he’d survive. I visited a few other cats, but came home empty-handed.
I kind of gave up on him after that, and eventually got Davey the kitten instead. But things were not ideal. Jerry never really got to like the kitten, and Davey is such a handful! He wants to play all the time, and pesters Jerry (and me) endlessly. I started to think that maybe a third cat — one that was playful enough to keep the kitten busy but not so wild that Jerry would be further upset — might help the situation.
And then, on St Patrick’s Day, I got an email from Best Friends with news of their March adoption specials. Not really expecting anything to come from it, I decided to take a look at their adoptable cats. And there was Simba! He’d gone into foster care and was doing really well. So I immediately thought, THERE IS MY CAT I MUST HAVE THIS CAT! and emailed them and set up a time to come and see him, which was this afternoon, and brought him home.
He walked around the house a bit and looked at the other cats. Hissed a bit but didn’t seem aggressive, just wary. Jerry ignored him. Davey immediately wanted to play, but I didn’t let them get together just yet. His foster mom said he got along well with all of her cats, played with the youngest, and cuddled with the ones that wanted to cuddle. So I expect he’ll get along with my guys once he gets used to them, and them to him.
I totally love him already.
Mister was always kind of a strange guy. He meowed a lot for no apparent reason, was anxious and nervous, hissed when most cats would howl. He either ate too much or not enough. His health problems — which I was hoping to avoid when I originally passed on him — were endless and varied. He tried to be friends with Jerry, but she wouldn’t have anything to do with him. Davey tried to play with him, but he hissed and growled and ran away. Eventually, they learned to get along, but there were always spats.
Mister loved his food, and would eat anything you gave him, but he had a sensitive stomach and couldn’t eat too much dry food or it would give him diarrhea. He had urinary crystals, bladder stones, hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, assorted UTIs and stomach upsets. Seemed we were constantly treating him for something. He was on meds for his anxiety and prescription foods for most of the time I had him.
Despite his health issues and oddities, he was a sweet, friendly cat, who would sit in my lap for hours on end and let me give him his various meds without much fuss. When he was diagnosed with HCM, I thought I wouldn’t have him much longer, since that was what ended Spot’s life, but it turned out to be less of an issue than his other conditions. I worried about taking him across the country in a trailer when I moved, but he survived the trip in good health, his only problem being that he hated riding in the travel carrier while we were on the move. I eventually had to leave the carrier unzipped so he didn’t feel trapped.
I noticed after we’d moved and I took him to his new vet for an exam that he was gradually losing weight, although he’d been eating fine and having no other problems. He continued to lose weight, and have increasing issues with diarrhea and vomiting. We tried numerous different medications and prescription foods, but nothing worked for long, and eventually he just got so skinny his body began to fail him. We were never sure exactly what the underlying condition was, but we think it was probably lymphoma, which would have been fatal eventually no matter what we did. He was down to 3.8 pounds (from his healthy weight of 11.5 pounds) when I finally had to let him go.
He was a good kitty and I miss him.