Jack's story
Early spring of 2004, a tiny tortoise shell mother brought her family of 2 babies to our house, a gray female and black male. Surprisingly enough, another family of 3 babies came to our house that same year, and we had too many to take care of, even if they remained outside. My step father-in-law had just lost his wife the year before and he agreed to take both kitties, the gray and black cats if we had them neutered and declawed all fours. We agreed to do that with the condition that if he ever decided to get rid of them, he would give us the opportunity to take them back first. Unfortunately, that is exactly what happened.
Probably just as well. I heard he kept them in the basement and rarely spent any time with them. The few times we went over there, the black cat would dart in the spare bedroom and hide under the bed, clearly not socialized yet, the gray cat was super happy to see anyone, but sadly, he had not named either one of them.
I don’t remember when we took them back, but it was shortly before the stepfather-in-law remarried. The tv show 24 was popular at that time so we named them Chloe and Jack.
Jack did eventually become somewhat socialized. He would run from strangers but he was okay with his two humans in the house. He also seemed to get along with all of the other resident cats in spite of him being declawed, however, he started spraying everywhere, and we were never able to stop this bad habit after trying numerous suggestions on how to stop it.
He was banished to our basement, something that I will always regret. I spent time with him but it had to be a lonely existence being down there by himself, and I was not quite sure what else to do with him. One day when I was down there, I noticed the doors that adjoined his room looked wet again, so I made the rash decision to take him to the vet and put him down. I will never forget the fear in his eyes as I grabbed him and put him in the carrier. I think he knew his fate. They say if you get the males neutered at a young age, spraying is not a problem, but apparently that is not always true.
I still feel terrible and guilty to this day, the day that I had to put his sister Chloe to sleep. In fact, I have procrastinated on writing his bio because of the guilt, and then tried to justify that he did live 14 years longer with us, longer than he would have if he would have remained outside, but it is still a lame excuse.
I'm so so sorry Jack.
Special thanks to D. Frederick Birely for sponsoring Jack's page.
Early spring of 2004, a tiny tortoise shell mother brought her family of 2 babies to our house, a gray female and black male. Surprisingly enough, another family of 3 babies came to our house that same year, and we had too many to take care of, even if they remained outside. My step father-in-law had just lost his wife the year before and he agreed to take both kitties, the gray and black cats if we had them neutered and declawed all fours. We agreed to do that with the condition that if he ever decided to get rid of them, he would give us the opportunity to take them back first. Unfortunately, that is exactly what happened.
Probably just as well. I heard he kept them in the basement and rarely spent any time with them. The few times we went over there, the black cat would dart in the spare bedroom and hide under the bed, clearly not socialized yet, the gray cat was super happy to see anyone, but sadly, he had not named either one of them.
I don’t remember when we took them back, but it was shortly before the stepfather-in-law remarried. The tv show 24 was popular at that time so we named them Chloe and Jack.
Jack did eventually become somewhat socialized. He would run from strangers but he was okay with his two humans in the house. He also seemed to get along with all of the other resident cats in spite of him being declawed, however, he started spraying everywhere, and we were never able to stop this bad habit after trying numerous suggestions on how to stop it.
He was banished to our basement, something that I will always regret. I spent time with him but it had to be a lonely existence being down there by himself, and I was not quite sure what else to do with him. One day when I was down there, I noticed the doors that adjoined his room looked wet again, so I made the rash decision to take him to the vet and put him down. I will never forget the fear in his eyes as I grabbed him and put him in the carrier. I think he knew his fate. They say if you get the males neutered at a young age, spraying is not a problem, but apparently that is not always true.
I still feel terrible and guilty to this day, the day that I had to put his sister Chloe to sleep. In fact, I have procrastinated on writing his bio because of the guilt, and then tried to justify that he did live 14 years longer with us, longer than he would have if he would have remained outside, but it is still a lame excuse.
I'm so so sorry Jack.
Special thanks to D. Frederick Birely for sponsoring Jack's page.
Jack's story
Early spring of 2004, a tiny tortoise shell mother brought her family of 2 babies to our house, a gray female and black male. Surprisingly enough, another family of 3 babies came to our house that same year, and we had too many to take care of, even if they remained outside. My step father-in-law had just lost his wife the year before and he agreed to take both kitties, the gray and black cats if we had them neutered and declawed all fours. We agreed to do that with the condition that if he ever decided to get rid of them, he would give us the opportunity to take them back first. Unfortunately, that is exactly what happened.
Probably just as well. I heard he kept them in the basement and rarely spent any time with them. The few times we went over there, the black cat would dart in the spare bedroom and hide under the bed, clearly not socialized yet, the gray cat was super happy to see anyone, but sadly, he had not named either one of them.
I don’t remember when we took them back, but it was shortly before the stepfather-in-law remarried. The tv show 24 was popular at that time so we named them Chloe and Jack.
Jack did eventually become somewhat socialized. He would run from strangers but he was okay with his two humans in the house. He also seemed to get along with all of the other resident cats in spite of him being declawed, however, he started spraying everywhere, and we were never able to stop this bad habit after trying numerous suggestions on how to stop it.
He was banished to our basement, something that I will always regret. I spent time with him but it had to be a lonely existence being down there by himself, and I was not quite sure what else to do with him. One day when I was down there, I noticed the doors that adjoined his room looked wet again, so I made the rash decision to take him to the vet and put him down. I will never forget the fear in his eyes as I grabbed him and put him in the carrier. I think he knew his fate. They say if you get the males neutered at a young age, spraying is not a problem, but apparently that is not always true.
I still feel terrible and guilty to this day, the day that I had to put his sister Chloe to sleep. In fact, I have procrastinated on writing his bio because of the guilt, and then tried to justify that he did live 14 years longer with us, longer than he would have if he would have remained outside, but it is still a lame excuse.
I'm so so sorry Jack.
Special thanks to D. Frederick Birely for sponsoring Jack's page.
Early spring of 2004, a tiny tortoise shell mother brought her family of 2 babies to our house, a gray female and black male. Surprisingly enough, another family of 3 babies came to our house that same year, and we had too many to take care of, even if they remained outside. My step father-in-law had just lost his wife the year before and he agreed to take both kitties, the gray and black cats if we had them neutered and declawed all fours. We agreed to do that with the condition that if he ever decided to get rid of them, he would give us the opportunity to take them back first. Unfortunately, that is exactly what happened.
Probably just as well. I heard he kept them in the basement and rarely spent any time with them. The few times we went over there, the black cat would dart in the spare bedroom and hide under the bed, clearly not socialized yet, the gray cat was super happy to see anyone, but sadly, he had not named either one of them.
I don’t remember when we took them back, but it was shortly before the stepfather-in-law remarried. The tv show 24 was popular at that time so we named them Chloe and Jack.
Jack did eventually become somewhat socialized. He would run from strangers but he was okay with his two humans in the house. He also seemed to get along with all of the other resident cats in spite of him being declawed, however, he started spraying everywhere, and we were never able to stop this bad habit after trying numerous suggestions on how to stop it.
He was banished to our basement, something that I will always regret. I spent time with him but it had to be a lonely existence being down there by himself, and I was not quite sure what else to do with him. One day when I was down there, I noticed the doors that adjoined his room looked wet again, so I made the rash decision to take him to the vet and put him down. I will never forget the fear in his eyes as I grabbed him and put him in the carrier. I think he knew his fate. They say if you get the males neutered at a young age, spraying is not a problem, but apparently that is not always true.
I still feel terrible and guilty to this day, the day that I had to put his sister Chloe to sleep. In fact, I have procrastinated on writing his bio because of the guilt, and then tried to justify that he did live 14 years longer with us, longer than he would have if he would have remained outside, but it is still a lame excuse.
I'm so so sorry Jack.
Special thanks to D. Frederick Birely for sponsoring Jack's page.
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