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   Upon arriving home one night on May 23rd 2004, we (my mom, her boyfriend, and myself) walked into a bloody mess in the kitchen and in the middle of it, unconscious, was my 2 month old kitten, Mr. Sneakers. First, fearing the worst, I thought he was dead, so I picked him up, but as I picked him up he paniced in my arms. My mom and her boyfriend, John, rushed him up to the Emergency Animal Center (EAC) where they said that he more than likely had crushed his skull, and broken his jaw at least. Therefore if his jaw was broken he wouldn't be able to eat, to make a complicated matter simpler, we would have had to put him to sleep right then and there. The doctors took some X-Rays of his head/neck/shoulders. Came back with no crushed skull, no broken jaw, no broken bones at all. However, there's always a however, he was suffering from severe brain trauma, his brain was swollen, and still swelling. They put him on steroids to keep the swelling down, and had him in an incubator to keep his body temprature normal. Other than that there really wasn't much else they were doing for him.

  Well, while they rushed him to the EAC, I stayed home and kept myself busy cleaning u the glassy/bloody/cheesey mess... yes cheesey. Is what had happened while we were gone, was just this: We lock the kittens in the bathroom before we leave, Mr. Sneakers and his sister Snuggles, so they don't get hurt, or into trouble. Well, they had found their way out of the bathroom, and was wandering the house, and my mom's dog Baby Girl (keep in mind this is a damn Rottweiler) had sniffed out a glass baking dish on the kitchen counter with left over Cheesey Potatos still in it and jumped up on the counter to get the potatos. Mr. Sneakers was most certianly in the wrong place at the wrong time. Baby Girl knocked the heavy glass baking dish down off the counter, and it landed right on Mr. Sneakers' head.

  Well, now, that next morning, my mom contacted the EAC to find out how he was doing, and they told her that he still had not improved any at all, and they said that they didn't think he would, and that it would only be right if (again suggesting) we put him to sleep. However, there's that however again, my mom said 'No, I'd like to have a second opinion.' so, she called our family vet, Dr. Seng, to have him go to the EAC and have a look at Mr. Sneakers. Well, minutes later Dr. Joe Seng called my mom back and said, "No. Do not put this little kitten down, put him in my care, I think he's got about a 50/50 chance of making it." So, that's exactly what we did. We took him from the EAC early Monday morning (8am if you really want to know.) and gave him over to Dr. Seng.

   He stayed in the EAC for one night, and was in Dr. Seng's care for one night... then, he came home. He was still in critical condition, and still only had a 50/50 chance of making it through, but Dr. Seng wasn't doing anything for him that we couldn't do for him ourselves at home, where he would get more attention and be with people he knows and also so we wouldn't run up an uneccessary vet bill. He had to be surenge fed special food called A/D, given water via surenge every 2hrs, he had to take one pill a day to keep the swelling in his brain down, and his left side didn't work so, we had to keep his left arm and leg loose, and keep a special gel in his left eye called PuraLube, because he couldn't blink it. Also, we had to stretch his neck, like a chiro does, because he kept it leaned to the left side, so we had to work that out so her could look both ways.

   Well, about 3 or 4 days after we had him home, due to his inability to use his left side at all, he injured his left eye (Remember he can't blink the left eye). He scratched 4 of 7 layers of his cornia off. Therefore, he had to get his left eye sewn shut temporarily for it to heal. His eye was sewn shut for about 3 weeks while it healed from the scratches. Mr. Sneakers had also made lots of progress in that time. He had began to walk again, and move around more. He was much more responsive to us, and sometimes even tried to play. With regular check-ups with Dr. Seng Mr. Sneakers is by far better than he was the night of May 23, 2004! By the time came to get his eye re-opened he could walk, play, eat on his own, drink on his own, was cut down to 1/2 a pill a day and was back to trying to show his sister that he's still bigger than her.

   June, 23rd, 2004 he and his sister went to the vets, where he took a very small step backwards. They both lost their appitites, and were loosing weight at an unhealthily high rate. Dr. Seng concluded they had developed tape worms, which comes from fleas. Well, anything we seen on store counters were for 6mos and older, so we never could treat the 2 little ones for fleas, but Dr. Seng had some stuff for kittens and gave them that. The tape worms were causing them to have diareah (Sorry, I don't know how to spell that), so he gave them some medication for that. Then he gave them each a shot in the neck for the tape worms themselves, which is where we stepped backwards. He gave Mr. Sneakers the shot, and the kitten yowled, and yowled for nearly 2 minutes. The needle hit muscle... need I say more? I didn't think so. Also gave them a shot for something else, I think it was just anti-biotics. Then treated them for ear mites. When the needle struck that muscle in Mr. Sneakers' neck it threw him off, because it made him sore, and he was having troubles standing up again, and could only take 2 or 3 steps at a time before falling over again. After a day or so passed he was back to where he had left off, walking sideways.

   June 27th, 2004 - He went outside and played with his sister for the first time since. He loved every second of it. He can jump short distances or small heights, like up one step, but not quite able to make it up on the couch yet. He's been long off the special diet, he eats about ever 5 or 6 hrs, and can eat regular dry cat food, but we give him canned 9 Lives anyways, because he's just spoiled like that. 

   June 29, 2004 - He didn't just climb over his barriers in the living room, he jumped over them, without hesitating, or missing his landing. He landed square on all four feet, and waddled off into the kitchen. He seems to remember where the kitchen is quite well. I wonder if it has anything to do with food? 

   July 5, 2004 - Things seemed to have slowed down significantly. The only real change is that we don't keep him in a cage anymore except wile we sleep. He has free roam of the house, while we're home, he stays on the porch if we go outside (or sometimes he goes outside with us), and he stays in the bathroom if we leave to go to the store, or to eat or anything else. Oh, and he jumped off of the couch today and made a descent landing. He didn't fall on the landing.

   July 8, 2004 - Mr. Sneakers is almost back to normal... he still has a little ways to go, but compaired to where he was May 23, 2004, I'd say he's got this thing beanten. Now, we're just hoping that he will not have any permanent brain damage. He can now jump up on top of our dog kennels wich are about mid-thigh in height, and jump off without falling. He's learned by heart the sound of his cat food can being opened, the sound of my finger nails clinking against his dinner plate (yes, he has his own dinner plate, and yes it is one of our good plates), he responds to his name again, lets you know if he wants attention by pawing at your foot, and will rub against you if he so desires. Needless to say these are small, yet progressive improvements. I wish I had further improvments to post, but alas, those will come another day.

  July 30, 2004 - One VERY small update, he hasn't seen the inside of his cage for about a week and a half. He sleeps with me at night rather than being put in his cage. ^_^

   August 5, 2004 - This update is comeing in a bit late, so firstly I appologize. Mr. Sneakers has been taken off his medications as of Monday, (Aug. 2, 2004) and we are to monitor him for a week, to see if he needs to go back on his medications or if he no longer needs them, and so far he's not acting as if he's "forgotten how to walk" as Dr. Seng put it. It will be a week since he's been of his medications in just 3 days! He still has a ways to go as of yet, but nothing the meds can do for him now. ^_^ Deffinatly a good sign!

   August 13, 2004 Well, hmmm... Friday the Thirteenth... was deffinatly unlucky. He was sat on by Baby Girl. (Same dog that dropped the dish on him) And I mean sat right on top of him. Ended up hurting his back left leg. He now limps on it.

   August 15, 2004 we haven't been having a very good day. I woke up this morning at about 9am, and noticed Mr. Sneakers was still sleeping. Kind of unusual, but it has happened before. (Mr. Sneakers usually waits for me to wake up before he gets out of bed. He wakes up earlier than myself) So, I started to play with him and scratch his back and talk to him, but when I touched his feet, he felt cold... and his ears and his tummy. So I kind of sat up and bundled the blanket around him but he wasn't even responding to me. I was trying to talk to him, saying his name and kind of shaking him like you would to wake someone up. His eyes were open so I knew he wasn't just in a deep sleep, so I tried to pick him u but he was just dead weight. Like a ragdoll. So, I laid him back down pulled the blanket over him and called my mom who had left w/ John for a little while. Told her what was going on, she suggested putting some food under his nose, see if that gets a reaction... nothing. Not even sniff it. Well,mom had John bring her home and let him do the rest of his running by himself. Then she called Dr. Seng and told him everything, what was wrong with Mr. Sneakers and so forth. Seng said to give him something with alot of sugar. Maple syrup is what we had on hand. (It was either that or Mt. Dew, and we feared the extremely high content in the Dew.) We syrenged some maple syrup down him (and some water to wash it down with.)A few minutes after the syrup, we offered him some more of his food and he ate a little bit. He at least showed some intrest in it. He could sit up and hold himself up if we actually sat him up, but wasn't walking quiute yet. Well, we had a few errands to run so, we stuck him in his C-A-G-E and put a heating pad in there for him. We were gone for a little while and when we came back he had moved himself to the back of his cage, and was quite a bit more alert. But, was again no longer interested in food. He can walk again almost back to where he should be. He even seems to be using that back left leg better, as well, from being sat on.

   August 16, 2004. We took Mr. Sneakers to see Dr. Seng today at 7 O' Clock in the morning to determine what had went so wrong yesterday. Seng said that he beilives we may have taken him off his medications a little too soon, and also that fleas may have been a slight factor in the problem, and that any small thing (such as fleas) may be able to cause Mr. Sneakers to act the way he was. So, Dr. Seng told us to start giving him his meds (steroids) again once a day, as before. Dr. Seng gave him a shot of anti-biotics, and todays dose of steroids via needle, and, even though Mr. Sneakers didn't have fleas bad, he then gave him a pill for fleas and put some frontline on him for the fleas as well. We are also still keeping Mr. Sneakers on his heating pad to keep him warm because he still won't hold his own body tempreature. He seems to be doing alot better, he still shows no interest in food, but can't seem to get enough water. He walks quite a bit better, but still not as well as he was, and he's still very tired and very weak. We were told to bring him back to Dr. Seng in a couple of days to see how we're doing, so we will probably take him back in on Wednesday.

   August 19, 2004 - He's just about back on track, we're just having troubles getting him back into the small habit of Eating! Oh, he has no problem eating ppl food, and I believe that's the problem, the doc told us to do whatever it takes to get him to eat, and now he won't eat anything but people food. He won't even eat his tuna, and that's his favorite (Or at least was, until introduced to McDonald's sasuage patties)! We are back to feed him via syrenge but only because he only wants people food, and we have to make him eat regular cat food. I know that sounds mean, but it's the only thing we can do. He doesn't need any more sugar buzzes, I mean syrup anymore, since he does show intrest in some sort of food. He just finished off a plate of lazagna, and had some seasoned med rare steak from TEXAS Roadhouse earlier. So, I think he's good to go. Just if only we could convince him that the stuff in that can IS better than what's on our plates, we'd be back to where we left off.

   August 28, 2004 - GAWD! He's back eating his OWN food! Also, he LOVES Peas, carrots, and corn so I've rescently found out. I got some really cute pics of him playing today. They are so cute! He has a favorite necklace that belongs to mommy, it has a little blue feather on it, and that's it, on a silverish chain. He plays with it for hours at a time. I don't think I've seen him that playful since he played with my ring! He is just doing alot better in general, all together, I haven't noticed him loosing his balance as often or falling over as often either. He jumps alot better; higher and farther! He goes through about 1½ cans of cat food a day... in just two feedings. However he still isn't growing at all. His sister is about 2 maybe even 3 times his size, and she is technicly younger than him even if it is only by a few minutes. ^_^

   September 1, 2004 - I forgot to mentino in the last update our concerns of his right eye. However, he had a vet apointment today for that purpose. We took Mr. Sneakers to the vet today to have his "good eye" (That would be his RIGHT eye) looked at, because it was lookin' a little blury or hazey. When we showed Dr. Seng the eye, he kind of frowned and looked at us, "He's got a cateract." He's going blind in that eye. Doc said there's really not much we can do to save that either. And that the only small chance we have of saving that eye is to take him off his meds. So, we are going to slowly take him off the Prednizone over a course of 2 weeks. The medication is slowing the healing of the ulcer on his left eye, (the one that had to be sewn shut). Taking him off the meds is a long shot for saving the right eye. Also, as I said, slowing the healing of the left eye. We also asked about his groth, because he looks like a 6-8 week old, when he's over 5 months. Seng said he'd probably get a little bigger, but not much more. So he's always going to be a small cat. Not only the the accident itself stun his groth but the meds are as well. Unfortunatly, it doesn't matter what we do in the lon run, Mr. Sneakers will eventually go completly blind in his right eye. 

  Today, September 24, 2004 - This is the most difficult and the last update I will be making to this page. Yesterday, Mr. Sneakers started to slip into anotherdibetic coma, as he has done once before in the past. However, this time we were unable to pull him out of it. Mr. Sneakers passed away early this morning, at about 4am. Mr. Sneakers is already dearly missed, but still loved just as much now as ever before. I love you, Mr. Sneakers, you were (and still are) my best friend. I miss you and love you very much. I've been crying all morning for you. But you're happier now that you don't have blind spots anymore, you don't have to endure the stress and torment of this physical world. I love you.

  Wednesday, October 28, 2009 - I have another heartbreaking update, Mr. Sneakers' only surviving sibling, [Snuggy Buggy] passed away due to a severe upper resperatory infection. She is now with her brothers, sister, and her mother on Rainbow Bridge. We love you all and miss you all very dearly.

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