Goodbye Hermes, you ginger cat

2 days ago

This past week has been hard, especially over the weekend. Yesterday was really awful and we cried a lot. The reason? Our eldest cat, Hermes, had to be euthanized because his kidneys has given up. Hermes had just turned 18 in July, and we've had him 13 years.

There was no viable way we could get him better and, even though our vet said we could try daily subcutaneous fluid injections, she did say it wouldn't give him any real longer life and would be painful for him. We'd already had to do that with two of our previous cats (Orpheus and Eurydice) and it only really lasted two or three months before they were too far gone. She recommended euthanasia.

Hermes already wasn't in the best of health and we had been giving him daily methimazole tablets over the past couple of years because he'd suffered from hyperthyroidism. And indeed, in the past few months, our vet recommended also using a transdermal methimazole gel, which is a weird thing, since you administer it to the inner ear of the cat. I would apply it into his left ear on odd-numbered days and into his right ear on even-numbered days.

Even so, he'd been losing weight gradually over the past few months, to the extent I'd go and buy him treats (roasted chicken pieces and tuna) so that he would at least eat something.

But by last Friday, it was obvious that he was deteriorating quickly. His eyes were gooey, he wasn't eating (not even his treats), and he was wobbling even worse than before when he walked. Saturday morning, I took him to our vet as soon as they opened (even without an appointment), and they took a blood sample while they checked him. The vet told us that he was really dehydrated which indicated that he had kidney problems, and recommended we keep him in sight over the weekend in case something happened. And, we were to keep a bowl of water next to him where he slept so he could drink when he awoke. The blood test results came back on Monday, and indicated that his kidneys were done for.

We arranged with Home with Dignity for a vet to come to our house and euthanize Hermes at home yesterday morning. Yes, it was hard, but doing it at home meant that Hermes wasn't scared through being driven somewhere in a cat carrier. He was quiet and peaceful and we gave him lots of loving through strokes and kisses while the vet injected him to euthanize him.

Hermes was a ginger rescue cat. He'd lived with a family for the first five years of his life, but their son abused him, even sexually (which I never wanted to think about) and our vet took him in to rescue him. I saw him possibly a month later at the vets when I took in one of our other cats for a check-up, and a week or so later took Donna in to meet him. Whereas with me he just kinda looked at me, with her he went up to her and wanted strokes and loving. No contest, we took him in.

His name had been Moses, but that didn't fit in with our cat crew who all have Greek mythology names. We decided instead to name him Hermes, after the Greek deity who had winged sandals. When he was a kitten, Hermes had all his claws removed -- something I can't get my head around -- so it seemed somehow appropriate.

He settled in pretty quickly, becoming big friends with Musaeus, our tabby cat at the time. In fact, he kind of crowned himself as the Boss Cat of our home, ordering the others around. Even better, he was not going to be intimidated by our puppy, Sirius, when he came to live with us. No sir, I'm the Boss Cat, you walk around me, I'm not getting out of your way!

He was a cat who needed and got loving from us, resulting in big, deep purrs. He also got very used to their evening meals: when he heard the cat food tin being opened he'd get into the kitchen pretty much first, and would lick the others' plates clean after they'd wandered off. Over the past year, he also got into the habit of hearing the fridge door being opened, and then walking into the kitchen miaowing for some treats. I'd have to prep him a small plate of roasted chicken pieces, while I made a bacon butty breakfast for us.

He also had preferred sleeping places around the house, be it on his preferred pad, in a cat cave bed, in a fabric basket in Donna's craftroom, on the bed while we slept. Over the past month we've had a cardboard delivery box on the floor ready to be recycled, but he claimed it and slept in it for hours at a time. We just didn't dare recycle it.

It's only been a day, but we and the remaining cats are missing him. Goodbye, Hermes O'Kitten, we love you and miss you a great deal.