Pets come and go from our lives for many reasons. Sometimes, they die young; sometimes, they run away; and sometimes, we lose a pet in a breakup.
One woman had an extraordinary reunion with a cat she hadn’t seen for seven years since she broke up with her ex, with the pet somehow ending up at the pound as a stray.
“I’m very glad that my information was still attached to Caiman’s microchip and is still current,” Amie Condon, 33, from Anchorage, Alaska, told Newsweek. “I don’t know how he ended up as a stray.
“He was always an indoor cat, but he used to bolt out the door occasionally, and we’d have to go catch him,” Condon added. “He’s still surprisingly fast for a 22-pound, 11-year-old cat. So he may have zipped outside and gotten lost, but I would really like to know exactly what happened.”
In a video posted to her Instagram on August 10 with over 683,000 likes, Caiman, a beautiful white-and-ginger cat with blue eyes, can be seen ‘making biscuits’ on a blanket only two hours after being brought home.
Courtesy of Amie Condon
“He definitely recognized me,” said Condon. “As soon as the kennel tech took me back to identify him, he came up to the cage door and started purring and rubbing his head up against my hand. I was nervous going to pick him up. I wasn’t sure if he’d remember me at all, so I was very happy that he did remember and was happy to see me.”
Around 7.6 million companion animals enter shelters nationwide every year, according to the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, and 3.4 million are cats, of which 1.4 million are euthanized.
“It was also great to see him settle in so quickly since I was expecting more of an adjustment period,” Condon said. “It’s kind of like he was never gone. When I got him home, I gave him a bath since he was a little dirty from being outside, and he’s a little too chubby to clean himself very well.
“I was going to give him some time to adjust and settle in in his own area in the bathroom, but he didn’t seem nervous at all so I let him come hang out with me in my bedroom,” Condon added. “He made himself right at home and started purring and making biscuits right away. It was adorable so I posted a quick video, but I definitely did not expect it to blow up like this!
“He had lived at my house for a few months back at the end of 2016, beginning of 2017, but he still seemed to remember it. He likes to check for food where I used to keep the food bowls. He spent most of the first day sleeping next to me in bed while I did homework,” Condon said.
“But I was also not sure if I’d have him for long since I was expecting to hear back from my ex, so it was a little bit bittersweet. At this point, though, he’s happy, I’m happy, and I don’t think he’ll be going anywhere.”
Condon said that she passed on her ex partner’s information to the shelter before she went to pick up Caiman and sent messages saying he was at the pound. “There was also a post showing him as a ‘found’ pet at the animal shelter on one of the local Lost and Found Facebook pages. I’ve been watching that page for any reports of him being missing, but, last I knew, she wasn’t active on social media.
“My ex always took great care of the cats and was the type to keep them until they died of old age, so I’d at least really like to let her know that he’s safe,” Condon added. “Hopefully, everything is OK with her.”
Condon said that, despite the small blip, Caiman is now doing really well. “He naps next to me during the day when I’m on the computer and, at night, he curls up as close to my face as possible, which is like trying to sleep next to a freight train when he starts purring. The biscuits make a good back massage, though, and he’s such a sweet boy that it makes up for the slightly disrupted sleep and the mouthful of cat hair every morning.”
Users on Instagram were thrilled about the reunion.
“Oh I’d be crying my eyes out, I’m so happy he’s safe,” wrote one user, “Oh how happy he is. Microchip is the best thing ever,” posted another.
Do you have funny and adorable videos or pictures of your pet you want to share? Send them to [email protected] with some details about your best friend, and they could appear in our Pet of the Week lineup.