RIP Fleagle

I'm sorry I haven't been here for a while. I'm still getting to grips with a lot of things and haven't felt up to posting but I thought today it would be appropriate to post. My beautiful little scruffbag died yesterday. It was very sudden, a heart attack, preceded by a short period of panting. She was gone within moments. I knew something was very wrong and had managed to get her to the car for the vets but she died on the driveway, with me holding her, before i could start the car. I went anyway, just in case she was in a coma, but it was pretty obvious to everyone she was gone.

I am beyond gutted. I feel completely heartbroken this morning.

We rescued her in September 2004, a month after I moved in with Martin, from an elderly breeder that had lost control of the cats. She was eight weeks old and neglected by everyone. 

She was fighting out every meal time with seven adult cats, so wasn't getting much food, and those memories of being hungry stayed with her all her life. 

It was apparent to us as she grew that she was some type of odd breed because of her appearance and how large she was. She was the epitome of a gangly teenager, with enormous paws and legs. 

Later she developed a proper double water-resistant undercoat, which was hell to look after as she had not been taught to groom herself properly by her mother, so we were regularly brushing a triple coat full of greasy waterproofing. She had a neck ruff, fluffy inner ears with 'lynx-like' tufts on the top and a huge plume of a tail. We now know she was either a pure breed or hybrid Siberian Forest cat.

She grew into a beautiful animal.

She attached to me as I was home freelancing all day and was usually always to be found near me or on me in some way, inside or out.

If I got up, she got up. I went to the bathroom, she came with me. I cooked, she stood behind me. I remember sitting on the floor stripping a doorframe once and she came over and sat next to me on my skirt so she could be near me. She didn't care what I was doing, as long as she was near me.

She was very intelligent and talkative. She had a wide repertoire of noises, far wider than any other cat we've come across. It meant we could usually decipher what she wanted. It also meant she could huff at us if we annoyed her, which was usually when the word "no" was used. Fleagle was not a "no" cat. She actually seemed at times like a dog - we could play fetch with her if she was in the mood and we could find her favourite rattly mouse.

We'd occasionally find her watching TV, lounging back against the sofa cushions, completely at ease, her eyes following everything on the screen.

In later years she became obese, driven by her childhood fear of being hungry, and no matter what we did she always found food; stealing from other cats and dogs, breaking into people's houses, eating bird food left on people's lawns or food dropped by passers by. Nothing was off limits - she had no recognition of species-specific food or limits to the quantity she would eat. Diets only worked for the short term until she'd find a way to obtain food and then it would go back on again. She would eat rubber bands, feathers, ribbons and string so playtimes were very carefully supervised to stop her eating her toys. The vet thought it might be a mental illness of sorts. At her heaviest she topped 18.5lbs.

It was only when we moved to Lincolnshire we could finally get her weight under control. With no near neighbours the only food she could get would be what we put down for her, and over the last three years she slimmed down to 11lbs.

But age crept up. Her fur lost its lustre and became a bit scruffy, no matter how much you brushed. She slowed down and jumping was out of the question so I made her steps onto the sofa and bed so she could still get around. She took to quietly sitting outside for a while each day in the last few months, even bringing back mice every now and then for a cheese treat. She was never a mouser but seems to find enjoyment in it towards the end when she figured out mouse = treat. Ever Fleagle :)

She was my constant companion every day and I am bereft. I shall miss her dreadfully.

She's being cremated and then will come home to sit on my bedside table so she can be right next to me again always, just the way we both liked.

Love you baby girl.