I first had the pleasure of meeting the lovely Ms. Valen when Judy decided to bring her indoors and put a stop to her freewheeling days along Clearwater Beach. Valen was a seventeen-year-old calico kitty with the sweetest disposition and a purr so loud it could wake up the neighbors. Valen’s original family had just gotten bad news: the elderly cat had developed feline lower urinary tract disease (FLUTD), which meant her kidneys were failing, and she had also developed cancer. They were told she only had weeks to live and that at this late stage of her life the kind thing to do was to put her to sleep. But Judy had grown too fond of this special cat to give up their ritual of watching the sunset on the beach together, and she somehow felt that it just wasn’t Valen’s time.
Poor Valen was feeling so bad at this point that she had simply stopped eating and took to hiding in the closet. Her painful and frequent trips to the litter box, where she was unable to relieve her bladder, were as miserable for Judy as they were for her Valen. Sadly, far too many cats succumb to this potentially deadly disease, but Judy believed in her heart that it was no death sentence. I urged her to read as much as she could about kidney failure in Anitra Frazier’s The New Natural Cat, and Judy was as eager a student as I have ever known.
Judy had observed my work with animals and had seen for herself that so many pets had been healed, often with a simple change in lifestyle. Because Judy was inclined toward alternative health herself, my suggestions of homemade food and herbs fit nicely with her belief system.
Patience and determination paid off. Valen began to eat her homemade, healthy chicken broth and regained some much-needed energy. I suggested using only the broth to quickly boost Valen’s strength without taxing her already stressed digestive system. As her entire body began to heal, so did her kidneys. Her trips to the litter box became less frequent, and she no longer strained to urinate. Once she appeared more stable, solid pieces of the chicken stew were added to her daily fare, along with various vitamin supplements to support her body in fighting her cancer. I also recommended a holistic vet, who chose a specific homeopathic remedy for her particular symptoms, and Judy used an eyedropper to give Valen daily infusions of horsetail grass tea. This approach worked, as Valen obviously felt better with each passing day.
To this day, I firmly believe there is nothing about the body that cannot be improved or changed when it’s given the right nutritional support. Beautiful Valen went on to live another eleven years after I met her, which made her twenty-eight years old when she finally passed away. Judy was right. She instinctively knew that they had another lifetime of sunsets to share.
