Please help me get better!

I was born in September 2003. You can see some pictures of me and my brothers and sisters here.

Once I was old enough to leave my mother, I was taken away by my new owners to start a new life elsewhere. They looked after me OK, and I was happy there. But, in December 2005, they decided that they couldn't keep me any more, so they took me back to the house where I was born and left me in a catbox on the doorstep with a note asking my previous owner to take me back in. He was going to find a new home for me, but during the night I escaped from the house and ran away as I didn't know where I was or what was happening to me.

For the next nine months, I lived wild on the housing estate. I caught small birds and animals, and fed on scraps from people's houses. A few people tried to catch me, but I was always too quick for them. I kept myself clean and tidy, and I like to think that I did quite a good job of looking after myself.

This September, though, I started to feel really ill. I could hardly see, because of of the infection in my eyes, and I couldn't eat because I'd lost my sense of smell. I wandered around in a bit of a daze, not knowing what to do. As it happened, I found myself in the garage yard behind the house where I was born, and, on the afternoon of 15th September, my first owner was outside in the yard taking a walk - he was at home, rather than at work, because he and his wife had just had a new baby and he was at home on paternity leave. He recognised me because of the collar I was still wearing - the one that the people who'd taken me when I was a kitten had given me, and left on me when they dumped me back at my original home. I'd had it on when I escaped, and never been able to take it off.

I tried to run away again, but I was too weak to go far, so he caught me and took me inside where he cleaned me up a bit and then took me to see the vet. The vet says that I've got lots of infections, and it's going to take a while to get me back to full health. The good news is that I'll be OK in the end, because I don't have anything that can't be treated. The bad news is that the treatment is going to cost money, and money is in short supply at my current home - with a new baby in the house, looking after a cat isn't really the top priority even though they really want to see me get better and go to a good home where someone can look after me properly.

So, if you want to see me make a full recovery and get the best possible treatment, then please consider making a donation towards the costs of my veterinary care. All you need to do is click on this button and donate, either by credit card or from a PayPal account. Every little helps, and all of us - me, Mark, Emma and baby Eleanor - will be really, really grateful.