Bodhi Desperately Needs to Move on to the Next Chapter in His Life but, Like a Millstone Around His Neck, the Abuse That He Suffered while Homeless on the Street Is Holding Him Back

 The Mean Streets of York Were Not Kind to Bodhi 

"Bodhi is a special little cat."
-- the RSPCA's York Animal Home

Running out on a cat is a god-awful thing to do under any circumstances. The only positive thing that can be said about such a heartless act is that it is still preferable to handing it over to either Animal Control, a shelter, or a veterinarian where the vast majority of them are liquidated shortly after arrival.

Nevertheless, life on the street can be, and usually is, hell for a footloose cat. Even those that are fortunate enough to eventually end up at shelters that are something other than thinly disguised slaughterhouses are already carrying around with them so much baggage that they are often unable to readily avail themselves of the opportunities, no matter how few and far between, that are presented to them.

This baggage can consist of physical abuse meted out to them by past owners, dogs, the public, and even other cats. As it most often is the case with cats and humans alike, physical abuse is usually accompanied by psychological damage in terms of a, quite justifiable, lingering fear of past abusers.

For instance, at the RSPCA's York Animal Home in the city of the same name, thirty-five kilometers northeast of Leeds in North Yorkshire, there is a five-year-old white tom with a black and white face, and a black tail named Bodhi ("awakening" or "enlightenment" in Hindi) who is attempting to come to terms with his troubled past and thus to get on with the remainder of his life. He has been at the shelter since at least sometime in June if not indeed longer and, as far as it is known, he still does not have any prospects.

Not much has been disclosed about his past other than that when he arrived he was in a "terrible condition." In particular, he was covered in wounds that the shelter believes were inflicted by other cats.

How that staffers were able to have made that determination has not been explained in that dogs, birds of prey, foxes, other wildlife and, above all, humans also attack cats. In fact, his ingrained fear of humans would tend to suggest that they were responsible for a good measure of the abuse meted out to him.

"Bodhi is a special little cat," a staffer at the charity told The Press of York on July 3rd. (See "Could You Give a Home to Ex-Street Cat Bodhi?") "He is looking for a home with extra special adopters who will take a chance on an ex-street cat who has been left with anxiety around humans due to the abuse he suffered while living on the streets."

What exactly staffers are doing in order to help him come to terms with his anxieties has not been detailed, but whatever the tactics they so far have proven insufficient. "He has come on so much since he first arrived at the RSPCA rescue centre, but sadly he still has a long way to go," the staffer continued to The Press.

According to its web site, the shelter cares for around fifty-four cats with that number expanding to seventy-two during kitten season, an equal number of canines, nineteen rabbits, and an undisclosed number of birds and "small furries." Under such crowded and stressful conditions, it is remarkable that staffers have been able to have made any progress at all with Bodhi.

Bodhi Has Been Languishing in a Cage for Months

"We feel he will improve so much quicker in a home environment," the staffer speculated to The Press. Malheureusement, the citizens of York and surrounding areas are not cooperating in that none of them has been willing to offer him a home so far.

A large part of the difficulty lies in the fact that the shelter is stipulating that he needs to be an indoor cat and that automatically rules out placing him in a managed colony. Secondly, he needs a home sans children and other pets.

Thirdly, would-be adopters need to be knowledgeable about previously homeless cats and willing to continue the rehabilitation process already begun by the shelter. Fourthly, the shelter is stipulating that Bodhi initially be provided with "a secure spare room" in order to hang out in until he feels more comfortable around his new owner.

"This may take up to six months to happen so they will need to be in it for the long haul," the staffer added to The Press. "Adopters will need lots of time and patience with Bodhi and understand the traumas he has suffered when he was living on the street."

Realistically speaking, the shelter is in all probability asking too much of the public in that most individuals do not have any interest in adopting abused cats any more than they do old ones. (See Cat Defender post of May 27,2016 entitled "Snubbed by an Ignorant, Tasteless, and Uncaring Public for the Past Twenty-One Years, Tilly Has Forged an Alternative Existence of Relative Contentment at a Sanctuary in the Black Country.")

That is far from being the end of the world, however, in that the shelter has other arrows in its quiver. Specifically, it might want to look into the possibility of placing Bodhi in foster care while it continues to search fulltime for a permanent home for him. 

For example, both Yorkshire Cat Rescue in Keighley, West Yorkshire, and Blue Cross's Rehoming Centre in Hitchin, Hertfordshire, have recorded some successes by utilizing fosterers in order to prepare cats for eventual adoption. (See Cat Defender posts of August 5, 2022 and July 15, 2022 entitled, respectively, "Igor Has Had a Difficult and Troubled Life but He Is Doing Everything in His Power in Order to Enjoy Each and Every Moment of What Very Well Could Be His Final Summer" and "Intentionally Blinded in Her Right Eye and Justifiably Scared to Death of People, Candy Cane Is Saved by the Combined Efforts of a Fosterer, a Shelter, and Her New Guardians.")

Almost anything that might help him to overcome his shyness and distrust of humans could make all the difference in the world. Besides, occasionally a fosterer will become so attached to a cat that he or she will eventually adopt it.

On the other hand, such an approach has been known to lead to some cats being bandied about from one foster home to another, subjected to one failed adoption after another and, worst of all, repeatedly returned to a cage at a shelter. (See Cat Defender posts of August 31, 2017, March 12, 2018, July 29, 2019, and October 27, 2020 entitled, respectively, "With His Previous Owner Long Dead and Nobody Seemingly Willing to Give Him a Second Chance at Life, Old and Ailing Harvey Has Been Sentenced to Rot at a Shelter in Yorkshire," "Much Like a Nightmare That Stubbornly Refuses to End, Harvey Continues to Be Shuttled from One Home to Another at the Expense of His Health and Well-Being," "Repeatedly Shunned, Maligned, and Bandied About from One Place to Another, Harvey Is Now Engaged in the Most Important Battle of His Life," and "Noble and Courageous Harvey Who So Desperately Wanted to Go on Living Is Instead Unforgivably Betrayed and Killed Off by His Foster Mother and Yorkshire Cat Rescue.")

Bodhi Is Waiting Patiently for the Arrival of His White Knight

Considering that Bodhi is a mature cat, it might be worthwhile for the York Animal Home to explore the possibility of placing him with a pensioner. Of course, such an individual would need to have some familiarity with homeless cats as well as the prerequisite patience in order to work with him until he has conquered his anxieties. (See Cat Defender post of March 26, 2018 entitled "A Dedicated and Compassionate Kilianstädterin Has Found at Least a Partial Solution to the Tragic Plight of alte und obdachlos Katzen.")

"Staff at the centre believe he will make a great pet if someone will take a chance on him," the staffer predicted to The Press. Whereas that is unquestionably true, that does not in any way alter the reality that Bodhi's life rests in the hands of staffers at the shelter.

They accordingly must be willing to continue to invest the time, effort, and money in him in order to rehabilitate him and to secure a proper home for him. Above all, they must never weary of the herculean task before them, give up, and throw in the towel on him.

He is a handsome cat who has been put through Hell but that in no way alters the fact that his life is preeminently worth saving and that he richly deserves another chance at life and happiness. It most assuredly is not his fault that The Fates have been unkind to him.

Although the York Animal Home maintains on its web site that it is "sponsored by and works in partnership with the RSPCA," it nevertheless insists that it is not only independent of it but primarily self-supporting. That is important only in so far as it refrains from committing the same despicable crimes against cats and their owners that the RSPCA has perpetrated for years. (See Cat Defender posts of June 5, 2007 and October 23, 2010 entitled, respectively, "The RSPCA's Unlawful Seizure and Senseless Killing of Mork Leaves His Sister, Mindy, Brokenhearted and His Caretakers Devastated" and "The RSPCA Steals and Executes Nightshift Who Was His Elderly Caretaker's Last Surviving Link to Her Dead Husband," Daily Mail articles dated December 30, 2012, November 6, 2014, March 28, 2016, and August 14, 2016 and entitled, respectively, "Revealed: RSPCA Destroys Half of the Animals That It Rescues -- Yet Thousands Are Completely Healthy," "RSPCA Forced to Apologize for Wrongly Putting Down Cat Belonging to Family It Accused of Cruelty in Bungled Prosecution," "RSPCA Killed a Cat for Having Long Hair -- Then Tried to Prosecute Owners for Cruelty," and "RSPCA Is at It Again! Cat Saved Then Put to Sleep," plus The Chronicle of Chester, August 11, 2016, "Distraught Saltney Family (sic) Blast RSPCA after Their Cat Was Put Down.")

Even on those very rare occasions when the charity even so much as bothers to stir itself in order to prosecute cases of cruelty to cats, it does so with a wet noodle. (See Cat Defender posts of March 9, 2012, March 13, 2012, and August 31, 2015 entitled, respectively, "An Amateur Ornithologist Guns Down Hartley with an Air Rifle, Feigns Remorse, and Then Cheats Justice by Begging and Lying," "The Sick Wife Defense Works Like a Charm for Cunning Patrick Doyle after He Traps a Cat and Then Shoots It with an Air Rifle while Still in Its Cage," and "Beaten and Entombed Above Ground for Several Weeks, a Forever Nameless Cat from Colchester Is Finished Off by the RSPCA which Refuses to Even Investigate Her Death," plus the Daily Mail, August 10, 2022, "Man, Forty-Four, Who Trapped and Poisoned His Neighbours' Cats Is Handed Suspended Jail Term in Landmark Case.") 

Clearly, when it comes to respecting the right of all cats and kittens to live and punishing their abusers and killers, the RSPCA's name is mud and it accordingly would be much better for its own reputation if the York Animal Home were to sever all ties to it. It additionally might want to consider dramatically reducing its exorbitant £120 adoption fee.

It surely is more than capable of improvising an alternative fundraising scheme that does not involve holding cats for ransom. Besides, with so many individuals abandoning cats right and left, it is difficult to imagine that the charity is going to be able to adopt out many of those that it has taken in so long as it continues to charge so much for them. (See the Manchester Evening News, July 10, 2022, "'Watch Out You'll Be Sorry': The Cat Rescuers Facing Abuse and Threats from Desperate Owners Dumping Cats," the BBC, August 16, 2022, "Pet Bills: The People Reuniting Families with Their Pets," Bloomberg, August 18, 2022, "Food Bank for Pets Show United Kingdom Inflation Reaching Cats and Dogs," and the Daily Mail, August 20, 2022, "Abandoned: The Cats Their Owners Can't Afford to Keep as Cost of Living Crisis Bites -- after Helping Them Through the Loneliness of Lockdown.")

Unfortunately, neither of those expedients are in the cards and therefore of any immediate benefit to Bodhi. By way of default, that leaves his fate ultimately in the hands of fans of the species.

Therefore, anyone who would be willing to give him a home can contact his gaolers by post at the RSPCA's York Animal Home, Landing Lane, York YO26 4RH, by telephone at 44-01904 654949, by e-mail at reception@rspca-yorkhome.org.uk, and through its web site at www.rspca-yorkhome.org.uk. Concerned individuals also can make a donation for his continued care until a suitable adopter comes along and that just might very well be sufficient in order to save his life.

Photos: York Animal Home.