July 8, 2007 - October 12, 2008

Once in a blue moon, a very special little angel is born and our Amaro was one of those angels. This little girl touched the heart of every single person she met and it never ceased to amaze me how one so very tiny could make the entire world fall in love with her. From October 2, 2007, we knew our angel was living on borrowed time but we were going to make the most of every day of her life although 15 months was just not long enough, nowhere near long enough. Amaro may have been small but she had the heart and courage of a lion and this child had no problems holding her own amongst our own large cat family. Our fur kids adored her, I think they all knew she was a special child because none of them, not even our 2 Bengals would ever play roughly with her. During nap times, the rest of the fur kids would get into the bunk beds with her and snuggle up, keeping her warm.

Prior to Amaro's 1st vaccinations as a kitten, we had never offered her up for "adoption" by any new families because she had not had the best of starts in life. From the moment she was born, Amaro needed 2 hourly feeding for the first 3 weeks and unlike her brother who was in the same situation, Amaro never seemed to grow the same as the rest of her siblings. At the time, we were not unduly concerned as we have had small babies in the past who have gone on to be massive adult cats with no problems. When it came to 11 weeks of age, we were seriously considering keeping her here to add to our own cat family as we just loved her so much.

On October 2, 2007, Amaro, along with her siblings, was taken to our vets for her first set of vaccinations. It was at this point in time we found out that our darling girl had a heart murmur. In fact, our vet delivered a heartbreaking prognosis that in her opinion, Amaro would not live past 2 years of age. With that statement, the decision as to whether we would keep Amaro was made for us. In actual fact, our vet didn't think she'd make it through the first 8 months and even went so far as to ask me if I still wanted to vaccinated her, which of course we did! This girl was going nowhere and would have a home here for life. When I came back from the vets that afternoon, I let all the babies out of the carriers, Graham asked me "How it went?" and my reply was to burst into tears and tell him what our vet had said about "Sherlock" as she was then known. Graham said straight away that she "stays here and isn't going anywhere!". This statement spoke volumes as to the man that I married. It was a difficult 24 hours for us after finding out this news as it was the last thing we expected.

As a tiny baby, she was an extremely active little girl, never lethargic, never breathlessness however once she reached approximately 5 months of age she became extremely withdrawn, very lethargic, and we were desperately worried that our little angel was going downhill and her murmur was getting worse. You can imagine our joy when at around 7 1/2 months of age, Amaro suddenly turned into an extremely active, very playful little baby who ate like there was no tomorrow. I am certain that these changes came about because Kamora, and Afrikoko gave our angel a new lease of life. For whatever reason, Amaro attached herself to these 2 girls in particular and suddenly decided that anything they could do, she could do better.

Then at 9 months of age, it was not uncommon at all to see Amaro tearing up and down the stairs, in and out of the cat run, and playing like a lunatic with her 2 best mates. We were over the moon with her progress and I prayed that it would continue for many years to come however when Amaro reached 14 1/2 months of age, we started to notice that weight was dropping off her. She was no longer playing and did not even want to hang out with her her best friends. We made the decision to take her off the raw food, put her back on wet, commercial foods but even that did not help with the weight and after a couple of weeks our little angel was a mere shadow of her former self. To see these changes just broke our hearts and we both knew that unlike the last time she declined, there would be no coming back from this and we knew she did not have long to go.

On October 9 we moved her into our bedroom where she could be monitored throughout the night and where she would know we were there if she needed us. She had 3 little beds in there so she could choose which one she wanted and we did everything possible to make her as comfortable as we could.

Amaro decided that on October 12 the time had come, her tiny little heart could not take the strain any longer. I know that our angel is now in the care of her grandmother, my soul mate, Tia Maria. Giving her up was so very, very hard but knowing my Tia as I do, Amaro could not be in better care as her grandmother will love and care for her in the same way we did. This little angel will be in our hearts forever and our lives have been made all the richer for having shared 15 months with such a very special child. We took Amaro to Companions Rest Pet Crematorium in Witney are are currently waiting to bring her back home where her ashes will rest alongside our beloved feline family who were waiting to greet her in Rainbow Bridge.

Not for one moment, not for a day do we regret giving this little girl a chance and for the majority of her very short life, she lived life to the full, enjoying the sunshine in the cat run, playing chase and snuggling up with her best friends, playing with toy mice and tearing huge chunks out of raw chicken wings.