Cookie is Tortie of the Week

Our Tortie of the Week is Cookie, who is an incredible 20 years old and lives with her owner Paige in California.

Cookie has had some difficult times in her life as she was ran over by a car when she was young but made it back home with a broken leg. Fortunately the vet was able to fix it, and it hasn’t slowed her down since.

She always preferred relaxing safely inside, but unfortunately later in her life the house dynamic shifted and her main caretaker moved away so she was left neglected and put outside permanently.

She survived several years as an outside cat in the central California heat, with many other rough outside cats, and near a busy road (I believe she intentionally avoided the road completely after her accident realizing it is not safe)

She eventually lost most of her teeth and had trouble eating kibble and competing with the other outside cats for food. She became frail and less vivacious and the family believed she likely did not have much time left since she was about 18-19 years old

Cookie came to live with Paige and her family almost exactly a year ago. They heard she was going to be put down because she was old and too much of an inconvenience since the house was being sold. They couldn't stand that so they took her in, even though they already had four cats, which already felt high maintenance.

They originally thought we were taking in a rapidly declining kitty expecting impending heartbreak and would just try their best to make her comfortable for as long as possible.

One year later and she's gone from about 5.5 pounds to almost 7 pounds. She's tiny, but loves to eat her special senior food, premium wet food with sardines and mackerel, catnip breath treats, scrambled eggs, goat cheese, tuna or really anything the people are eating.

Her meow is loud and strong, and she is not afraid to demand what she wants. She has a raspy old lady meow, that's she's actually had her entire life, but it suits her even better now as a 20 year old.  

She gets the zoomies (although slowish) after using the litter box and meows loudly and runs as fast as she can from the room. She likes to play with shoe strings, take a single lap outside in the backyard around the perimeter then come back inside, and to occasionally sunbathe in the grass.

She ruthlessly insists to be held any time we are sitting down, and often complains loudly if there is no lap to lay on. She has thrived on love and attention, and we no longer think she is declining, in fact she seems stronger every day.

At a recent vet checkup they said she is impressively healthy for her age and shows no signs of arthritis,which is almost unheard of at her age. Hopefully she has many happy years yet! You can check out more pictures on our X, Facebook and Instagram pages.

Look out for the next Tortie of the Week next week!