Hi everyone, we’re Laura and Ben and with our feathered and furry family we make up Brighteyes Sanctuary.

We rescued one of our “retirees”, our beautiful boy Junior, from a lady who was giving him and his sister away for free online to the first person who came for them. They were 15 years old, and it was the only family they had ever known.

Junior is one of the most adoring, kind natured cats, and we bonded with him very quickly. We think he knew pretty fast that he was safe and loved in his new home.

He has been treated for Hyperthyroidism for 2 years now. He’s responded to medication really well in that time, but his health has sadly taken a nose dive recently and we’re desperately getting him the care he needs.

After noticing his breathing getting heavier, we took him to the vets who are concerned it may be congestive heart failure. As we’ve caught it earlier, they are hopeful that with the right treatment, he can live a happy life with his loving sister Maisie, and best friends Nola and Freya (the collies!).

But we are extremely anxious as this treatment doesn’t come cheap. He needs more blood tests (on top of the £290 we paid for his T4 thyroid blood test last week), an X-ray, ultrasound, meds, and possible sedation and drainage of fluid.

His vet bill is £1900 for just the first round of treatment and, with the vets bills we’ve recently had at the sanctuary for the other animal babies, it has completely cleaned us of our back up funds. He unfortunately isn’t insured as due to his age and original health conditions, it was too difficult to get him a plan.

We don’t ask for money lightly, as we know how hard the cost of living is for everyone, and other sanctuaries. But we rescued Junior to give him the best possible retirement, and we want to keep that promise which we made to him when we first met.

If you can help us to lighten the financial burden that feels very heavy on us right now, we would be eternally grateful.

We will share receipts and details of treatment as we get them. From all of us at Brighteyes, thank you. From the bottom of our hearts.

Any extra funds raised will be used towards Junior’s future treatment, and the overall running costs of caring for the other animal residents at the sanctuary.