Levi's story is an extra special one to me. And it goes like this... 

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March 2019, I went to West Palm Beach, Fl. for a long weekend to visit my parents. They spend three months a year during the winter there. Don't ask me why, but when figuring out the itinerary, my mom kept mentioning how I needed to see Peggy Adams Shelter 15 minutes from their house. My parents stumbled upon this shelter months prior, and had been telling me about it ever since. I'm not too sure why my parents had faith that I could visit a shelter and leave empty handed.......

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They knew me better than that!

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Needless to say, that Friday afternoon we took a drive to Peggy Adams shelter. We walked up and down the dog kennel aisles and said hello and gave treats to a ton of smiling faces. Then we headed to the cat room. There were a few social cats that had free roam of the cat quarters, and then rooms with clear glass that homed a few cats each. My parents and i walked around and had a blast playing with everyone. I looked down and saw a cat, fast asleep in a small circle bed. I bent down to pet it. At that time I saw that the collar around it's neck was blue. He was a boy. I bent down to pet him, and he looked up at me. I immediately was taken aback by his appearance. He had one small cauliflower ear that was half the size of the other, and his eyes were half shut. It was hard to watch him trying to look back at me. But what a sweetheart he was. He was a purring so much as I pet him, that his whole body was vibrating.

 

I fell in love.

 

I swore to myself that I would NEVER have a third cat in my home. I was never even planning on having two! So my parents and I left the shelter that day. The problem was, I couldn't get him out of my head. Mercury was his name at the time. Saturday came and went, and I knew I needed to know more about Mercury and his story. I wanted to know everything about his medical history. I wanted to know if I could help. Sunday arrived and I told my parents I wanted to return to the shelter and find out more. After filling out an adoption form to find more, I sat down with a lovely woman from the shelter and found some back story about our boy. He had come in as a stray, and had been at the shelter for about 3 years, and was estimated to be about 8 years old. Unfortunately, he had spent most of that three years in the medical center, dealing with chronic eye and ear problems. Being that I had veterinary ophthalmic experience and a great relationship with veterinary eye specialists back home in Westchester, I knew I could help this boy. Unfortunately, I couldn't take him back to NY with me the following day without speaking directly to the veterinarian, in case there was more I needed to know. I knew once I spoke to the vet to get all the info, I could always fly back to Florida to get my boy.

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Monday arrived and I'm packing to catch my flight. The unexpected happened. My phone rang. The call from the vet that I wasn't expecting for at least a few more days when I was home in NY, came in. After a few minutes of discussing that my boy's only issues included chronic eye and ear infections, I was 100% in.

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I was adopting Mercury!

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With only 2.5 hours until my flight back to NY, I literally ran to the pet store, bought a carrier, bought him a flight with me on Jet Blue, picked him up from the shelter, and booked it to the airport. We made the flight just in time!!! 

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His new name was Levi. He fit in with the pack at home like a glove. I got him an appointment with the eye specialist a few days after we got to NY. Turns out that Levi had entropion, which is a condition where his lower eyelids roll in towards his eyes and causes discomfort, hence the squinting. The eye specialist also confirmed that he was definitely oldefr than 8 years old! Didn't matter to me. I still would have adopted him if he was 18 years old! We immediately started on eye gel drops to alleviate the discomfort and scheduled a surgery date to correct the entropion. 

I also brought him to my job so my vet could give him a thorough exam. Unfortunately, she discovered a heart murmer. Before going forward with general anesthesia, I needed to do chest x-rays because of the murmer. The x-rays showed that Levi had an enlarged heart. The next step was to get a cardiac ultrasound done by a specialist to see why his heart was so big. The ultrasound confirmed that Levi has Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy. This condition puts him at a high risk of throwing a blood clot. I immediately started him on two different heart medications, and they help decrease his risk of throwing a blood clot.  He's been on the medications for a while now, and is doing well. I had to cancel his eye surgery, because he cannot be put under anesthesia due to his heart. There was a solution to his eye entropion though...

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His eye specialist recommended a newer procedure, where collagen is injected under his eyes to help the lid unroll. It worked! His eyes are doing great, and he's been a happy boy living in the babe cave with myself and his two fur sisters. I love him so much, and I couldn't have asked for a more perfect addition to my family!