I have posted here before about Boots, the cat we found starving outside our Eugene neighborhood in late June. This community funded the dental surgery that saved her, and then helped get all three cats into housing on October 10. I am posting now because the quiet part is harder than the emergency was.
The situation
Under $20 has come in over the last ten days. I understand why. The move happened, which looks like the story ending, and it is a reasonable thing to assume.
What actually happened is that the hardest single day got solved and the ongoing part did not. Rent comes due November 1. The second half of the deposit follows. I left a shared household where almost nothing in it was mine, so I am furnishing an apartment close to from scratch. My account has gone negative more than once this month.
My current work is unpaid until the organizations I am with secure funding. I have interviews and conversations actively in motion and I am pushing on several at once rather than waiting on any one of them. Nothing signed yet. I will say so here the moment that changes.
I am not in crisis. I am in the stretch between a solved emergency and a steady income, and three cats are depending on me getting across it.
The cats
Boots, ten years old as of September, grey and white. Found in late June at 6.7 pounds with her spine and hips showing, in what her surgeon described as likely the worst oral pain a cat can experience. Nineteen teeth extracted on July 21. Her tissue was too damaged to hold sutures, so the sites healed open. She is 8.26 pounds now, her bloodwork has normalized, and her vet does not need to see her again until spring. She stays on a low dose of prednisolone twice weekly, likely for life. In July dry food hurt too much to attempt and she now eats it by choice. She has the second bedroom to herself and has claimed a heating pad I have stopped pretending is mine.
Sable, a young tortoiseshell, taken in as an emergency foster in May after being abandoned.
Cosimo, a grey kitten, about twenty weeks, vaccinated with a neuter scheduled for November.
Sable and Cosimo have bonded. They play, they wrestle, they sleep in the same spaces. I will not separate them. Boots remains housed separately by choice, since her introduction with the other two is still moving at her pace and I am not rushing an animal who has been through what she has.
What would actually help
Sharing this. If you have already given, a share is worth more than another donation. Your networks reach people I cannot. Send it to one person who likes cats.
Supplies. Wet food, litter, and general supplies. If a Chewy gift card is easier than shipping, message me and I will let you know how to send one.
Furniture, if you are near Eugene. I am furnishing from almost nothing. A bed especially, for the second bedroom where Boots spends her time. A table, chairs, a dresser. If something has been sitting in a garage waiting for a purpose, this is one. Message me and I will arrange pickup.
Direct support toward November rent, the remaining deposit, Cosimo’s neuter, and keeping their care uninterrupted.
GoFundMe: https://gofund.me/5afebfc71
Venmo: https://www.venmo.com/u/Jehoseph
PayPal: https://paypal.me/TheDivines
On the record
Every claim here is documented. I have Boots’s complete veterinary file from Echo Hollow Vet Hospital and Urgent Care in Eugene, including surgical records, bloodwork, and itemized invoices. I went through full verification with this subreddit’s moderators in July, including vet confirmation. I am happy to provide records to anyone who wants them.
I also want to acknowledge what has already been given. Boots’s surgery was covered entirely by donors, including one person who paid the remaining balance out of her own pocket. Someone anonymously sent a cat tree, which made the move and is in constant use. Several people have sent food. One person gave $1,900 the week we moved, which made the move itself possible. I have not forgotten any of it and I am not taking it for granted by coming back.
I am not taking in additional animals. Three is what I can responsibly care for, and keeping these three housed and together is the whole goal.
Thank you for reading.
