Animal Stories from All-Creatures.org

Milo: This is What Love is Like Sometimes

From Dallas Rising
Facebook posting, October 13, 2022

We loved him as long and as well as we could. We’re grateful we got to be his parents...  Oliver LOVED Milo and when I showed Oliver Milo’s body he was obviously saddened, looked at me and laid down on the floor by his brother. It’s a sad day for our family but this is what love is like sometimes.

Milo died this morning. He was 14, we adopted him when he was 11 months old. I remember sitting at the an animal rights conference with Brandon listening to a presentation by someone from AlleyCatAllies talk about how many cats are killed in shelters every year. A huge percentage compared to dogs. I looked at Brandon and said “We can do one more.” With Max, Warren, and Taz at home, Brandon agreed we could do one more. Milo was the one.

I looked for a cat who could deal with other cats and dogs. Milo had been available for adoption for nine months and no one had taken him. He spent three months at a pound, three months at a humane society, and three months in foster care. Then he came here and stayed with us for 13 years. We called him The Kitten for his whole life...“Kitton” - “kit-tahn.”

It took Taz dying for me to see what an amazing cat Milo was. He was the greatest cat with dogs. We fostered a bunch of them and then switched to dog sitting when it became clear that i wasn’t going to win Brandon over with my “one more” line again. He was affectionate and quirky - demanding “tall time” from his dad (being picked up and held over the left shoulder and rocked or walked), eating anything that wasn’t nailed down (beagle-style), and leaping into our arms from ledges and counters in his prime. In his later years he savored lounging in the backyard (supervised) and laying in his catnip patch, rolling in the dirt (“Gritton” - “grit-tahn”) and peeing in his favorite raised bed.

He had a rough summer, sick and eventually diagnosed with small cell lymphoma, but had a complication with an abscessed tooth... he just deteriorated quickly. He was strong and sensitive. We loved him as long and as well as we could. We’re grateful we got to be his parents. Oliver LOVED Milo and when I showed Oliver Milo’s body he was obviously saddened, looked at me and laid down on the floor by his brother. It’s a sad day for our family but this is what love is like sometimes.

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