Kima was a good mother, always keeping her kittens fed, clean, and out of trouble. For the most part, anyway -- there were too many of them to keep under control at once, and they were kittens, so some amount of "getting into everything" occurred, and was to be expected. She was suitably exasperated.

About 3 weeks after she came to live with us, we noticed she was lethargic and didn't have an appetite. She didn't even have the energy to tend to her kittens, which was especially alarming. We didn't know it, but a long, hard battle was ahead.

The vet suspected she had a post-partum Pyometra -- a uterine infection that we'll call life-threatening and leave at that, because the details are rather unpleasant. When the vet went in to spay her and investigate this problem (so she'd only need anesthesia once), though, they found that her uterus was fine.

Instead, she had an intussusception -- basically her intestine had slid into itself -- and most of her large intestine had to be removed. Among other problems you can probably imagine, this meant that she would never again be able to absorb most of the nutrients from her food. At the time, the vet described her prognosis as "poor."

After this we decided to adopt her ourselves, as we knew it would be very hard to find her a home. For a few weeks she seemed okay, but as time went on we noticed that she ate and drank and ate and drank all day, but wasn't gaining any weight at all.

This time, the vet tested her and found that she was diabetic. She was treated with insulin for a few weeks, after which her blood sugar was fine and never again a problem. It was probably a transient case brought on by stress.

It seemed as though she'd beaten the odds twice, and was going to be fine. Many happy months passed by. In December of 2003, her kittens all found good homes. One of them, Mary Sunshine (now known as Pansy) went to live with Matt's mom.

In May of 2004, Kima began having a problem with weakness. She returned to the vet, where we got a since-forgotten-but-innocuous diagnosis. She seemed to get better yet again, and we just assumed she was going to beat the odds for a third time.

Later in the month her condition took a turn for the worse, and we ended up at the Veterinary Emergency Clinic, where they gave her little chance. We were given the option of letting her go, or trying a blood transfusion. She'd made it so far, and we wanted to give her every chance, so we went with the transfusion. It helped for a short while.

We took her to another vet, where she was diagnosed with Immune-Mediated Hemolytic Anemia. Ever the fighter, she hung in for a while longer, even going on a road trip with us to visit both our families.

We lost her on July 24, 2004.

Kima was a loving cat -- always interested in what you were doing (particularly if that involved food in any way). We loved her and enjoyed every minute we got to spend with her.

We'll always remember her like the last picture on the left (taken in bed one night with Matt's cell phone camera) -- always in your face and wanting to know what you were doing (and whether she could help).