Giving little Squiggle the very best chance

In August, a tiny, fluffy powerhouse arrived at our rescue. Found in a field alone and malnourished, Squiggle had already overcome so much to survive. Now we need help to give her a chance to pull through.

With her mum nowhere to be found, Squiggle was not only starving and having to eat solid food when she should have been feeding from mum, she also had wobbly cat syndrome (cerebellar hypoplasia), telling us mum had a serious condition.

That wasn't the end of her fight. She was handed in to a vet practice by the people who found her, and sadly the vet was of the old-fashioned opinion that wobbly cats should be euthanised. As a rescue specialising in them, and with five healthy, happy wobblers of my own, obviously I strongly disagree.

Thankfully, little Squiggle had a champion in Sophie, the vet nurse at the practice. She fought hard and was eventually allowed to bring her to us. We tried introducing her to a mother cat who'd lost most of her kittens, but sadly Alice didn't want to adopt her, so she came to Moggy Manor to continue her recovery.

From the minute we met her, we fell in love with Squiggle's endless energy and zest for life. Just this week, despite being absolutely tiny, she climbed all the way up the stairs and up the side of my bed so she could bite my nose in the night. She's hilarious.

Sadly, she's been hit by a bolt from the blue. On Wednesday morning she was happy and crazy as usual, by afternoon she was sleepy, and by evening she'd stopped eating. She spent all of Thursday in the vet hospital and then transferred to the out-of-hours emergency hospital. We don't know for certain what she has but it's some kind of serious infection, likely panleukopenia (the same condition her mum will have had to give her the wobbles). The hospital is doing everything they can but it's very worrying, particularly the fact that her white blood cell count is down to almost zero.

We have one beacon of hope: Poppet. She came to us last year as a kitten with a missing eye, and has somehow grown to over 5kg in the intervening year. Since she's young, fully vaccinated, and huge, she's a great candidate for a blood transfusion to try to save Squiggle's life.

We took her in at 1am this morning and -- thank our lucky stars -- they're the same blood type. She is now being prepared to donate, but it will take a while to get the fluid into Squiggle as she's so tiny.

As you can probably imagine, this is all costing an absolute fortune. I think we've run up a bill somewhere in the region of £5,000 today, and as a tiny, independent rescue, we're struggling for cash as it is. We've paid a deposit but not the full amount yet, the estimate for the transfusion is £2,700. We know it's a lot to ask for but we think it's the very best chance to give Squiggle enough time and strength for her body to beat the virus so she can get back to her happy, crazy self.

The vets are doing everything they can, Poppet is giving everything she can, and we're putting everything we have into helping her. Now we need to ask if you can help us cover some of the costs for Squiggle's treatment. I have to be honest, there's a significant chance we may still lose her. But this fierce little kitten has overcome absolutely every obstacle in her way, and I would so love to see her climbing our legs and nibbling our noses again. If anything's going to work, this is her best chance, and she really deserves that after everything she's been through in her short life.

If you need any proof or information I haven't provided here, or you have questions or ideas, please feel free to contact me (Holly) at Holly's Merry Moggies rescue. We're crossing everything for our wobbly girl, and will keep you updated as often as we can. Thank you for caring about this tiny, precious powerhouse with us.