Homer's Odyssey

FOREWORD

BY PATRICIA KHULY, VMD

WHEN I FIRST SAW THE KITTEN, HE WAS A MINUSCULE BIT OF BLACK FUZZ cupped in a young woman’s outstretched hands. No different from any other kitten, it would seem—that is, until he raised his head and emitted an impressive yowl for a creature only four inches in length, tip-to-tail.

Tiny though he was, he turned to the sound of my voice. That’s when I saw his eyes. This two-week-old foundling was clearly suffering from a severe infection that would surely take his sight, if not his life.

The well-meaning couple who’d found him practically begged me to euthanize him immediately. Despite their entreaties, I performed a careful physical examination as the kitten struggled, legs flailing, and mewled vigorously on the stainless-steel exam table. Finally, I announced that the kitten seemed perfectly healthy—if you discounted his ocular condition. Would they consider adopting him if I was able to treat his infection?

For a long list of reasons, the couple could not provide a home for such a young kitten. They worked. They had a dog. They didn’t have the money. And what were the chances that he would ever be able to see again, anyway?

Oh … none. No chance. I explained that I intended to surgically remove his eyes to save his life.

I’m pretty sure that’s when I lost them. Shaking their heads in disbelief, they elected to sign him over to my care. His pitiable cries probably pushed their decision along the path of rejection—they were convinced he was suffering terrible pain.

After his owners agreed to give him up, he was mine to treat as seemed in his best interests. I still had my doubts, but they were laid to rest once the source of his immediate discomfort was revealed: hunger. A small bowl of cat food mashed with milk replacer stifled his cries. He was peacefully asleep within minutes, sealing my decision to treat his eyes, never mind the blindness to come.

After all, I thought, this kitten had never had the benefit of sight. Unlike human babies, cats are born with their eyes sealed to the world for ten to thirteen days. This two-weeker’s relatively long-standing infection had almost certainly prevented any emerging vision. Once treated, he’d be blind without ever missing the sensory capacity for sight. Like many animals, kittens are capable of rerouting their neurologic faculties for successful survival through a process called individual environmental adaptation—my fancy term for “I refuse to put him to sleep.” How could I renege on my duty to alleviate suffering if I could maintain a life worth living?

Ask any young, idealistic vets, and they’ll likely confess to the same kind of sin I committed the day this blind kitten came my way. If the animal is afflicted yet healable—and even remotely adoptable—It’s meant to be, we reason. They’re the ones who always strum our heartstrings with their astonishing survival skills and irresistible ugly-duckling potential.

I knew there was no way I could keep a blind kitten in my toddler-, allergy-, and big-dog-inhabited household. Yet I certainly couldn’t let a vigorous kitten die over a pesky little issue like homelessness. Someone in my circle of friends and family will doubtless find him as appealing as I do, I rationalized. He’d find a home if I could just find someone with the requisite mix of eccentricity and empathy to take on a “special-needs” case.

What followed were a couple of weeks of rejection after rejection. I enlisted my family, an animal-loving clan who dutifully spread the word of the blind kitten in need of a safe home. I placed ads and sought out vet school friends with a penchant for the pitiful. None of it yielded any potential takers.

By this time I’d dispensed with all my rationalizing and self-flagellation. The kitten had bounded back to life after surgery—so much so that my staff and I were irretrievably in love with him. There were days I really couldn’t bear the thought of parting with him.

How could I help but be smitten with his scraggly little blackness, his tiny sunken sockets, his insatiable appetite for feedings, pettings, cuddlings, and play sessions? Yes, he even romped like a normal kitten, despite his eyelessness. In short, he was eminently lovable … at least by all standards except the one with which most humans preoccupied themselves: his appearance.

Finally, one young woman with two cats of her own who were treated at my practice promised to have a look. But when I finally handed my dark furball over to this prospective owner, I felt a twinge of trepidation. Would she look at him with disgust the way others had? Demur due to an inability to take on such a strange and disabled thing?

Instead, she whispered gently to him. She picked him up and held him. He purred in her arms. To my surprise and utter relief, she earned my eternal gratitude when she said, “I’m taking him home.”

Homer was the first “hopeless” case I’d taken on in my then-short career. Though I’ve had many more since, his was the seminal experience, one that ultimately paved the way for so many others.

Homer’s “odyssey” will doubtless mean different things to different people. But for me, Homer will always be an intensely personal reminder of what veterinary medicine can pull off when it’s infused with the idealism of youth. He’ll always remind me that there’s nothing a partnership between a veterinarian, a loving owner, and one fighting patient can’t achieve.

Homer’s story is one for all of us to live by.

PATRICIA KHULY, VMD, MBA

Dolittler.com

Miami, Florida