After door-dashing almost two weeks ago, my indoor kitteh returned tonight!
I've been beside myself and had given up hope. I put her kitty box outside, reported the loss to the Human Society of Boulder Valley, posted her photo on all the neighborhood chat rooms, and called her late at night, every night. Tonight at 12:30 a.m. while taking the dogs out, I heart a weak meow beside the house. She was hiding in the weeds and very happy to see me. Looks like she's lost half her body weight and is nervous, but otherwise seems ok. I'll take her to vet tomorrow. Before this adventure, the only times she'd been outside were a few other episodes of door-dashing in which she immediately turned around or fell over so I could pick her up and bring her back in. Sure do wish she could talk and tell me how she survived.
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every day through a garage window is that the poor thing talks to you and looks at you expecting to let her out any moment. The pain of walking away for the night. Now, the important question, is her "pillow" actually your head or just really close to it? 
The worst part of the ordeal for me was the night it stormed so hard. She is so afraid of thunderstorms and I knew wherever she was she was terrified. The pillow is a regular bed pillow above my head. I hadn't had the heart to even wash the pillowcase because it has her fur on it and was comforting to me even though she was gone.
I had a feeling she was not alive anymore but couldn't bring myself to pack away her things. Now she's back. People told me not to give up hope, yet I couldn't imagine how she'd survive.
That happened to me once, many years ago. We moved about 10 blocks away, and Sal, our gorgeous peach/butterscotch boy dashed out of our new place. Like I said, he was beautiful, but he wasn't the sharpest knife in the drawer, if you get my drift. In fact, he was the dumbest cat I ever had, but he was so sweet. I think his mom was malnourished when she was pregnant. She came to our house halfway through her pregnancy & we began to feed her. Momcat ended up bringing her lone kitten, Sal, to our house, and we adopted them both.
Anyway, we were frantic. We walked between our two places every day calling his name. This was way before microchipping, so we plastered the neighborhood with signs, called Animal Control & the Humane Society every day asking about him. After 10 days, I was almost ready to give up hope, but I gave it one more try. I went back to our old place calling him, when I heard a feeble "meow" coming from under the porch. He had made it back to our old place. I couldn't believe it. Like I said, he was mentally challenged, so I was flabbergasted he was able to negotiate city streets to find his way back. I was impressed, proud, furious, and intensely relieved all at the same time.
He never attempted to dash out again.
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I'm also hoping her "adventures" have cured her of door dashing.
Thanks!
Just got her back from the vet. She actually only lost 1.5 lbs. and two of her talons had been torn off, but that was the only trauma. He gave her some sub-cutaneous fluids and I brought her home to rest. So glad it's over. I'm hoping that has cured her of her door-dashing, too!
She is purring in my ear as I type.
