Ajie

October 27. After a week of treatment that left us both exhausted, we went back for a checkup. The vet took a look and said the wound was still there. He gave me three options:

1. Surgery: the most expensive, and no guarantee it would work. 2. Removing the eye: the quickest way to end his discomfort, but the hardest to accept, because of how it would look. 3. More treatment: keep going with the eye drops. It could drag on for a long time and be painful for both of us, and if it failed, the eye would still have to come out.

"I hope you can decide soon, so we can plan what comes next."

The despair in that moment wasn't the dramatic kind, as if someone were about to die. It was realising that how someone else's pain gets shared out, which kind of pain, and for how long, and what he ends up becoming, are all for you to decide and to carry. And whatever you choose, you know you'll carry the consequences for a long, long time.

In the end, I told the vet: "Please schedule the surgery to remove it." And just like that, it was settled.

When I got home, I broke down and cried. I didn't know whether I had wronged him by making that decision, or whether he was disappointed in me, the owner who had let this happen to him.

On October 20, I took Ajie back to the vet for his eye. It was the first time I had seen him like that: yowling, clawing, completely losing it. It took the vet, a nurse and me together to hold him still long enough to look at the eye.

Even then he kept squirming, so the vet only got a brief look, enough to see that the conjunctiva might already have a hole in it (conjunctivitis). That clinic couldn't treat it and referred us to a specialist eye hospital. That was also when the cone went on.

On October 21, after work, I took him to the eye hospital. This time I knew better and gave him a calming pill before we left. The vet thought it was fairly serious: in the worst case, the eye might have to be removed. We decided to watch it for a week first, with antibiotics and eye drops.

As a brand-new cat owner, I had only just learned how to trick Ajie into taking pills (it works about half the time), and now I had to learn eye drops too. When he wouldn't let me put them in, I honestly felt hopeless and had no idea what to do.

In the end I took a week off work to stay home and look after him around the clock. I was exhausted, body and mind…

After a week of fairly casual medicating, I noticed Ajie's eye came and went: some days there was obvious discharge in the corner, other days there seemed to be none. So I assumed it wasn't serious and would slowly clear up on its own.

Most of my effort went into learning how to give him the dewormer, but his stools stayed soft and watery. I also noticed that when I got home from work, he usually hadn't touched the dry food in the automatic feeder, yet he'd wolf down canned food as soon as I opened it. So I decided to switch him entirely to wet food, Miss Good Taste cans, and put an end to the dry-food buffet.

By October 19, his eye had had discharge every day for three or four days in a row. It felt like things were only getting worse…

In the first few days after the adoption, Ajie was surprisingly affectionate and often came over on his own to rest on my lap.

But I slowly noticed that his right eye, which I had taken for a naturally squinty one, was starting to show some discharge in the corner. On October 8, I took him to the vet for the first time. As a brand-new cat owner, I couldn't even get him into the carrier. Luckily, my roommate next door is an experienced cat owner and stepped in, and we finally made it out the door.

The vet said Ajie's eye was a little inflamed and needed medication. The checkup also turned up an intestinal parasite, Tritrichomonas, so that needs treating too.

Giving medicine turned out to be a whole new challenge. For now, the only trick I know is mixing it into canned food. How much of it actually gets eaten is anyone's guess.

On the afternoon of October 4, 2025, I adopted Ajie from the Taipei City Animal Shelter in Neihu.

I had already made up my mind to get a cat, and even moved to a place that allows pets. I had no particular colour or personality in mind. I simply wanted some company.

That day was the first time Ajie and I met. I sat down on the floor, and Ajie walked straight over and curled up on my lap. That was the moment I knew.

Back home, Ajie came out of the carrier right away and started inspecting the new territory. I went out for dinner, and when I came back there was a big surprise waiting on my duvet. I completely lost it, and thought the days ahead might not be easy.

Since Ajie was adopted, nobody knows the exact birthday. Judging by the wear on the teeth, Ajie is somewhere between 3 and 7, so I just go with 7.