6/2022 Gio is a senior girl (11+) who was turned into animal control in Arlington TX by her owners in
this condition. She sat there for 3 weeks with hyperthyroid. She weighed 4.8 pounds.
Complete skin and bones.
Animal control would not let anyone adopt her, they had her as rescue only. We did not know
she was there until her last day before she was to be euthanized.
We told the person who contacted us if they could pull her from animal control and get her to us we
would take her. And then I contacted our fly Angel Davica. She works for American Airlines and has
flown many cats to us. She is truly an angel and will help any animal. She of course said yes and a few days
later Gio flew with Davica to Charlotte where I met them. I took her straight to my vet and immediately had
them hospitalize her. They pulled blood work to verify she was hyperthyroid and start getting her stabilized.
Hyperthyroidism is a horrible disease to suffer from, you starve to death no matter how much food you
eat. She is also blind. I don’t know if that is from hyperthyroid or hypertension which we are sure she
has too. We need to get the hyperthyroidism under control first. She is very anemic and has kidney
disease. We hope some of this will improve once we get the hyperthyroid under control. She is
also very hard of hearing.
She is very sweet and loving.
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Writing this letter really breaks my heart.
Gio came to us almost a month ago from a shelter in Texas where she had laid in a cage, blind and very sick with hyperthyroid for over 3 weeks. With the help of our fly
angel Davica and 2 volunteers in Texas, she was sprung from animal control and flown to Charlotte NC where I met the plane. She and I drove 3 hours straight to our
vet's office for blood work. I knew she was hyperthyroid but could not start treatment until we had verification in the morning.
Her blood work was such a wreck, she was severely anemic (that was because her body could not absorb any nutrition because of the hyperthyroid) she weighed 4
pounds, 8 ounces. That was her intake weight weeks before!. She also had terrible kidney disease, hypertension, and heart disease. All of these things were being
driven by the hyperthyroid. We immediately started treatment the following day. We hoped we could begin correcting things as we got hyperthyroid under control. She
also had severe diarrhea, which was caused by the lack of nutrition being absorbed.
She had a great appetite and was a very loving kitty.
Once we started fixing the hyperthyroid, she went into congestive heart failure and gain 2 pounds of fluid over 3 days. We took her to the vet, had the fluids removed,
and started her on Lasix. Her body had been starved for so long that you start fixing one thing and it sets off another problem.After 2 weeks her blood work actually was
improving, she was not as anemic, diarrhea had stopped but the heart and kidney disease were still there.
We scheduled her for a CT & ultrasound, which were done today. I knew she was gaining fluids again but at a slower rate than before. I knew this was going to be
bad, and it was horrifying bad. Her chest was full of fluid again compressing the space for her lungs. Her body truly had had enough. It was time to do the right
thing and let her go. She was suffocating by the fluid and was going to die a horrible death within days. My vet said absolutely no to removing fluids again, it was the
humane thing to let her go.
I so wish we had been able to help her 6 months ago, she would have had the treatment she needed and maybe a much different outcome. I wish she had been
able to tell us her story, all I know is she suffered for many months and so much wanted to live.
She was very very sweet, I heard her meow at me last night and was purring when I was holding her as she left this world. I just so badly wish she could have had much
longer with us. At least she knew love and was cared for for the time she was with us. Sometimes that is the best we can hope for. I am so glad we were able to do
that for her.
RIP 7/12/2022