First Trip To My Denver Veterinarian

8 years ago a small black cat showed up on my front porch in Denver, Colorado. It was skinny, thirsty, and lost. My husband and I's first thought - feed it! After a delicious dinner of chicken and milk (which we later found out to be a big no-no for cats), the cat was here to stay.

Of course, we tried our best to find it's owner. We contacted the Dumb Friends League, put up flyers, and alerted neighbors. We assumed the cat had wandered a block or two too far from home and that we would quickly get a call from a relieved neighbor. A week passed with no calls. Soon, we all came to realize that "Maddie" wasn't leaving and stage one in the adoption process was taking her to our Local Denver Veterinarian. We were new to cat-parenting and knew nothing about the array of vaccinations outdoor cats require. Yet our Denver Animal Hospital walked us through everything from ring-worm to feline leukemia. She informed us that Maddie had had a litter and that she was probably about a year old. We learned about a shampoo we needed to wash her with, we learned that cat's love milk but milk doesn't love them, and we even left with a little cat nip the veterinarian had grown herself. From the secretaries to the nurses, all the employees were friendly and great with Maddie. We left the vet comfortable that this was the Denver Veterinarian for us.

Upon returning home, Maddie was let into the house for the first time. She was apprehensive in the beginning, but soon grew comfortable with the indoor environment. We couldn't have been more excited to welcome a new member of the family. We hand't talked much about the idea of getting a pet, but finding Maddie was the perfect way for it to happen. I personally had always considered myself a dog person, but Maddie certainly changed my opinion. As we tell the story now, "Maddie adopted us - not the other way around."

Because of the delightful experience we had at our first visit to our Wheat Ridge Animal Hospital we returned a week later with a list of questions about Maddie and about taking care of cats. We wondered about how much to feed her, what kind of cat food to use, and how to train her to use a littler box. Most importantly, we were curious about the peculiar shape of Maddie's tail. It appeared to be in a complete knot and it looked as though she had two tails. We had tried finding the cause of the tail deformity using Web MD's Pet Site but found no clear answer. We asked the vet what she thought might be the cause of the tail loop and she said that there were two possible causes. 1) A birth defect and 2) An unfortunate encounter with a door! After an hour-long meeting, we left our vet (which is actually a Wheat Ridge Veterinarian) once again completely satisfied with the service we received.

Maddie is about 9 years old now and still going strong. She spends the days out doors and remains playful and energetic. She enjoys following us around the yard and tormenting the two terriers next door by slowly strolling across the top of the fence. We are lucky enough to have a cat who is extremely social with people (but a bit "catty" towards other cats). She watches TV with us and even has a high chair she sits on during family dinners. She still occasionally has to take a trip to the old Denver Veterinarian and we still see the same doctor.