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Perhaps the second or third day he managed to
stand up and assess his situation. His mouth
burned from thirst. It didn’t look good. His jaw
was broken and it hurt so bad! His teeth were
embedded into the roof of his mouth, leaving
only a few intact. His left eye hung in its orb
and he looked quite fearful he thought.
On wobbly legs he advanced to a public building,
walking slowly along its perimeter. People
stopped and gawked but no one intervened. A
passerby threw him a piece of chicken from his
lunch. He sniffed at it and wanted to eat it so
badly but his jaw would not work and he could
not, despite his best efforts, get the food in
his mouth.
This probably went on for a while. No one knows
how long. Would the infections from his eye and
jaw kill him or would he die an even slower
death from starvation?
Finally, after an unknown amount of time with
very little water and no food, Round Rock Animal
Control was called. Mercifully, he was picked up
by their officers and given immediate medical
attention. This little cat’s luck continued. He
was then brought to Shadow Cats Rescue in Round
Rock where he was hospitalized at Central Texas
Cat Hospital. The doctors there labored over him
for hours working to reconstruct his face and
make some sense out of his altered anatomy. His
eye was removed. Packing gauze filled the empty
orb. A feeding tube was inserted into the
esophagus. His tongue protruded from his mouth
but his newly attached jaw opened and closed
more normally. More surgeries would be required
at a later time.
 He
spent the first night in a deep drug induced
sleep. The steady rise and fall of his breathing
encouraged those watching over him.
The next day, he was groggy and moving about,
but more pain medications were given to help
him.
On the second morning he slept peacefully, but
now we could see him making biscuits in his
blanket- even though he appeared to be asleep.
By that afternoon, he was walking slowly about
the veterinary hospital with his IV pole and
staff member in tow. And even though his
appearance was still disturbing, this little
Miracle Cat was proving he had a strong Spirit
and might make it.
Khan continued to improve each day and had
several more surgeries at Central Texas
Specialty Hospital in Round Rock, Texas and also
at Texas A&M University Veterinary Hospital at
College Station, Texas. He was adopted by
the most wonderful family in College Station,
Texas and lived with his new family where he
made himself quite at home and was cared for and
loved very much.
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From Khan’s
Adoptive Family:
My name is Cindy, and my family and I were lucky
enough to adopt Khan in August 2006. Sheila has
asked me to tell our story.
We first heard about him through Craig’s List.
We visited the Shadow Cats website to learn
more. After reading about his trials, and seeing
his picture, we knew immediately that we wanted
to go to Round Rock to meet him in person. I
first emailed Sheila (I was completely
unfamiliar with Shadow Cats, or Sheila and Roy
at this point) to ask if Khan was still
available. Her response so effusive! She said
that, “YES!” he was available and she invited us
there to meet him. She added, excitedly, that
she would tell Khan someone had asked about him,
and that he would be “so excited!”
The reason for Sheila’s enthusiasm was that
while many people had been touched by Khan’s
story, and had been generous with donations for
him, no one had expressed interest in adopting
him permanently. Fortunately he was with a good
foster family, but he needed a forever home.
 We
drove up the following Saturday and spent about
two hours at Shadow Cats, where we met Khan,
Sheila and Khan’s foster mom for the first time.
Khan was a little shy, but still very handsome
even though he was missing one eye. My
daughter—who was 9 years old at the time--bonded
with him (and with Sheila) right away. We filled
out the adoption paperwork, listing our
references and saying what other pets we had.
Sheila also asked me a lot of questions about
our history of pet ownership. She was concerned
that we had a dog, because Khan wouldn’t have
the strength to fight off even a well-meaning
dog, and ours is very energetic. But we assured
her that we had other cats who were not so fond
of dogs, and our house was designed in such a
way that we were able to separate them and allow
them plenty of personal space. We were impressed
with the intensiveness of the approval process;
we knew that this was a place that was careful
about adopting out their cats.
After we were approved, Sheila contacted us to
let us know that Khan would soon be arriving at
our door! One of their wonderful volunteers was
going to be driving our way, and would deliver
Khan to us. We were so excited, especially our
daughter, who couldn’t wait to have him with us.
 When
Khan and the volunteer arrived, we showed them
both around and put Khan into the master
bathroom with a fresh litter box, food and
water, so that he’d have a private area in which
to get acclimated before he met our other animal
companions. But I did not want him to have to be
by himself in the bathroom all night, so I shut
the other cats out of the bedroom and gave him
the freedom of the room until the next morning.
It was only a couple of days before he became
integrated into the family, and while none of
the cats had a problem getting along with him,
our cat Clementine seemed to take to him the
best. She began sleeping near him on a regular
basis.
--Clementine and Khan
 We
saw that Khan was not able to jump up onto most
of the furniture, especially our tall bed; so my
clever husband built a stepstool for him that
allowed him climb up easily. For most of his
time with us, Khan’s favorite place was on that
bed.
We began taking him to the Texas A&M University
Small Animal Clinic, to Dr. John August, who is
a feline specialist. We made sure that he had
Khan’s medical history, because we knew Khan
would probably need additional specialized care.
Dr. August started him on injections of Adequan
every 5 weeks for joint pain. He also discovered
that Khan had very bad infections in both ears,
and concluded that they had been long-standing
(probably since before his accident). He also
had polyps growing in both ears and on his ear
flaps. Dr. August had his colleagues check Khan
out, and that also brought to light that Khan
needed oral surgery to remove some damaged teeth
and roots, which was scheduled not long after.
 In
addition to removing the bad teeth, the doctors
recommended surgery on his ear canals. We had to
decide between having them remove the polyps and
“resection” the ear canals to allow better
drainage, or to do total ear canal ablations
(remove the ear canals). The second option would
result in complete hearing loss, but the doctors
said his hearing was already 80% compromised by
the infections. After consulting with Sheila and
Roy about it, we opted for the ear canal
resectioning on both ears. The surgery was done
in September of 2006, and he came through it
with flying colors. However, while the right ear
showed much improvement after surgery, the left
ear still needed daily cleaning, ear drops, and
oral antibiotics to stave off infection. We
tried for nearly a year to maintain it, but by
that time the left ear was starting to show
signs of new infections as well. In Dec 2007, we
had the ablation surgery done on his left ear.
This led to another blow; when the tested the
removed ear canal they found cancerous cells,
and told me that there was a 95% chance that the
cancer had already spread. An xray showed an odd
spot in his lungs, but they couldn’t be sure if
it was cancer. He didn’t show any other signs,
but we remained watchful.
 In
late 2008, despite our efforts to try to save
it, Khan had to have the ear canal on the right
side removed as well. I dreaded the loss of his
remaining hearing, but in truth, after the
surgery he seemed so much more comfortable that
in retrospect I wished we had done it sooner. In
fact, the hearing loss was a non-issue for Khan;
the problem was me! I would continue to call his
name when I wanted him, forgetting that he
couldn’t hear me. I also had to learn to
approach him from the side on which he had
vision, and not to accidentally come up from
behind him or on his blind side, because with
limited sight and no hearing, he startled
easily. But he soon began to read our hand
signals, and would come to us when we signaled
to him. Overall, he seemed happy.
Then, tragically, things took a sudden turn for
the worse. For reasons we don’t understand, 3
months after the second surgery, Khan stopped
eating. It’s one of those things that, with
other cats in the house and a habit of free
feeding, we didn’t notice right away. But we did
notice when he began to withdraw from the family
and hide under furniture. We knew something was
wrong.
We took him into the clinic immediately, on
December 2, 2008. Blood work and an ultrasound
led to a diagnosis of pancreatitis and
cholangiohepatitis (liver diseases). They
couldn’t tell me why those conditions had
developed, and it seemed not to have anything to
do with cancer. But after everything else he had
been through, it just seemed unfair. We wanted
to at least give him a fighting chance at life.
 We
had to have a feeding tube surgically inserted
into his stomach, and we began feeding him small
meals 5 or 6 times per day. We used a large
syringe to push food through the tube after the
food had been mixed with water in the blender to
make it thinner. We were also grinding up his
medications and adding them to the food, or
injecting them into the tube (mixed with water)
using a small syringe. Some of his pills were
due in the morning, some at night, some 3 or 4
times per day. Each feeding took about 45
minutes, because pushing the food in too fast
would cause him to vomit. The schedule became so
complicated that I decided to type out a chart
and hang it on the wall, so that we would know
when to add/mix specific medications. I had
recently been forced to resign from my full time
job, so I happened to be home all day at that
time, which allowed me to do most of the daytime
feedings. My husband would often do one when he
came home for lunch, and the evening meals, to
give me a break. We kept trying to tempt him to
take in some food orally, but he no interest.
We kept up the feeding/medication for a month,
and we kept hoping that tests would show that he
was getting better, and I kept thinking that I
saw signs of improvement. But the tests didn’t
agree. Finally, his veterinarian suggested that
maybe it was time to let him go. We held on for
a few more days, so that we could come to terms
with it as a family, and spend a little more
time with him. On January 2, we brought him in
for the last time, and said goodbye. My husband
and I were there with him, petting him, when he
passed. The sweet little guy did not stop
purring until he took his last breath.
We’re so glad that we had the time that we did
with Khan. Those 2 years and 5 months passed
very quickly. We also made lifelong friends at
Shadow Cats.
I hope that Khan felt cared for and loved while
he was with us.
 Khan
and other cats who had passed during the last
year were remembered in a beautiful ceremony a
few months later at Sheila and Roy’s home. It
was well attended, and each person was given the
opportunity to read aloud a list of names (of
the cats being remembered). David Murphy played
lovely songs on Native American flutes, and
there was a display with photos of the cats (and
other animal companions) being honored. We
brought with us some us Khan’s ashes to spread
in the memorial garden so that part of his
spirit would always remain there.
EDITOR'S NOTE: Cindy, thank you and
your family for opening your hearts and home to
Khan. There is no doubt in our minds that
he indeed "felt cared for and loved" while he
was with you. |
