Shelter Stories: Determined "foster mom" rescues feline siblings -- twice.

Karen Milstein, a volunteer with the Adopt A Cat Foundation, rescued two kitty siblings not once – but twice. And it wasn’t easy. She had to drive hundreds of miles to get back the two cats that she originally had fostered. Shotgun and his sister, Belle, had been adopted through the foundation. But their “forever family” apparently changed their minds and anonymously dumped the pair last October at a Kentucky shelter.

By then, Belle was very sick and the shelter was going to euthanize her. The cats were traced back to Adopt A Cat through their microchips and Karen decided to head north to get them. She talked the shelter into transferring Belle to an emergency clinic, and then, when the cat was well enough to travel, brought both her and her brother back to her West Palm Beach home. Today, they are well, happy and living there along with their sister Spitfire, aka Fuzzbut.

So Belle and Shotgun finally did get a happy forever home – with their “foster mom,” who never stopped loving them.

Here they are today (Belle is on the green perch). And here is Karen’s Shelter Story, in her own words.

How could I have done anything different?
After all, I was connected to these guys from the beginning.

I can still, very clearly, see their little faces, peeking out from the carrier. Four small kittens, two of them very ill, waiting for the right person to come along. No one had up to that point and they were slated to be returned to the shelter, where the two sick ones would have most likely been put to sleep. Everyone knows that shelters don't have the time to care for sick animals, even babies. I was their last chance.

So they came home with me and I nursed the two back to health. Together, the four of them grew into rambunctious, beautiful kittens, ready to find a home with loving families. One was adopted immediately, and then two went together, brother and sister. The fourth, having tugged deeply at our hearts, came to be a member of our own cat family, attaching herself to one of my daughters. All were supposed to be loved for a lifetime.

It wasn't to be. The two taken together one night ended up in a shelter drop box at the Lexington Humane Society in Lexington, Ky., their owners too cowardly to fess up to no longer wanting them. When our rescue was called about the cats, time passed before we could finally make the arrangements for them to be shipped home, so much time that one of the cats became severely ill. Flying was now out of the question.

The sick cat was taken to a local PetSmart Banfield clinic where they began aggressive treatment for a severe upper respiratory infection that went untreated at the shelter. At night, because they did not have the staff, she was transferred to an emergency animal clinic for monitoring and care.

Then, she went back to the Banfield clinic in the morning. But the problem remained on how to get the cats home.

There was no thought involved. On a hot, Florida afternoon, I got in my car and began the trip to Kentucky to get the cats, stopping in Orlando to pick up my son, who would accompany me. We made it to Kentucky in a day and a half, my thoughts always on the sick cat and in what condition I would find her. Would she be well enough to travel home? Or would I be faced with the possibility of having to allow her the respite of a peaceful, permanent sleep?

The first task after checking into a hotel right near the clinic was to visit with the cat. She was doing much better, though her condition was still grave. She had been pumped up with antibiotics and fluids, but would require intensive care and medication on the trip and once home.

Assured of her ability to travel, I then went to have her brother released from the shelter. Despite my disappointment and restrained anger at the way they had treated one of the cats, they were kind enough to give me a large carrier, blankets and other items to use on my journey back.

We left the next morning and again, made the trip in a day and a half. At home, the sick cat began to falter. So I took her to my vet and he admitted her to his hospital for the next five days. At the same time, one of my own cats was to undergo surgery for a broken jaw he'd given to himself by slamming into a window in the midst of racing through the house two weeks earlier.

It was five days well spent. She returned to my house, where she is recovering nicely and back with her brother. She is an affectionate and loving cat, as she was when I had her as a kitten. Her brother is skittish, but that should change with time as he learns once more to trust.

The cost of all of this, paid by me up to now, is irrelevant. The money for the bills will come in, one way or another, through donations or my working it off, but it really doesn't matter. Under the same circumstances, I wouldn't hesitate to do it again.

I gave four days of my life to give her the rest of hers.

How could I have done anything different?

Karen Milstein, volunteer, foster parent
Adopt A Cat Foundation, Inc.
October, 2007

Click here for more information about the Adopt A Cat Foundation.

Do you have a Shelter Story to share? E-mail dlade@sun-sentinel.com and we'll post it.