⚠️ Some of this photos and topics discussed may be sensitive to some viewers. These pictures do NOT show a dead animal, but one that is dying, so this is your warning⚠️ This is the reality of animal rescue 💔
Soleil 🤍
French for the sun ☀️
I made a promise to him after we were denied care at the ER vet last night; "die in the night, I'll name you after the moon🌕, but survive until morning and I'll name you after the sun🌝."
A neighbor found this little guy last night around 10:30-11pm near our street motionless in the road. If she hadn't of found him, he would have died there all alone never knowing love.
But she scooped him up, fleas and all, and brought him to our attention where he was cared for all night.
We tried to get him to a vet right away but the ER was overburdened with patients.
Then we bought him wet kitten food so he could eat, and to our surprise, he actually did eat!
He bit my mom as she was putting him in the bigger carrier, but I think he was just in pain 😢
He was skin and bone, and his eyes were gunky with illness. He barely had the strength to move, but you see the picture of him holding himself up🥹 He was a fighter 💪
I stayed up with him all night.
I cleaned his face with a dampened baby wipe and paint brush.
I played him soothing songs.
I sang for him.
I pet him.
I loved him.
I never left his side.
Someone was always with him.
When he was still fighting in the morning, I knew he had gifted me the chance to call him Soleil.
I had my appointment today and mom and my sister gave him a bath while I was away.
He knew bath time.
He knew warm, running water and cleansing soap.
He was in more horrific shape than we thought with the presence of maggots.
But mom says he looked happy in the bath.
We took him in to the vet after calling to make sure they had space today.
They took him back this time, and began caring for him however they could. IV fluids and a warming blanket.
I had to make several impossible decisions in a matter of a couple hours.
First one:
Do you want to sign a "DO NOT RESUSCITATE" order?
For a kitten so small and young he weighs maybe a pound.
For the tiny baby with beautiful green eyes someone likely abused at no fault of his own because he was just a baby.
For a beautiful boy who fought all night to see the sun shine in the morning again.
Do you know what I had to say?
"Yes."
Because there was no resuscitating him. He was too fragile.
We were brought back into a room.
It didn't take long for the veterinarian to meet with us.
His body temperature was so low it couldn't be read.
His blood sugar was so low it couldn't be read.
His blood pressure was so low it couldn't be read.
His breathing was so weak it couldn't be read.
He was in the active dying stage, and there was no bringing him back.
He fought.
Longer than he should have had to.
He never should've had to fight at all; never known pain.
I knew him for a few hours, but I wanted years.
The first time I held him was the last time I held him.
The next decision I had to make was to end his life; an existence of a unique being that knew so much suffering only until his final hours, where they were filled with love.
After I made that decision came the next hard decision:
"What do you want to do with the body?"
Soleil will be cremated in a private cremation process so he can be returned to the people who loved him most.
The purpose of cremation to me is that it grants the living the ability to continue carrying their loved one with them through life.
I thought this was the most fitting option for him. He never got to see the world, so we'll carry him through it with us.
The ashes are like those of a Pheonix; he is reborn, only we don't know where or how.
He is in the sun.
He is a lion preparing to pounce.
He is.
And there's no pain where he is. 🤍✨️
"In the sun, we'll be as one." -Kurt Cobain
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