Oscar dying performance!

I am a huge cat lover, they give me a sense of comfort – they give their love unconditionally and always there when you need a cuddle. Looking after them has given me a purpose on those days when I could not find a reason to live. So I smiled when I saw this article in The Sydney Morning Herald about Oscar

“OSCAR the cat makes his grand entrances just as life is about to leave.A hop onto the bed, a fastidious lick of the paws, then a snuggle beside a nursing home patient with little time left. Oscar’s purr, when keeping close company with the dying, is so intense it is almost a low rumble.”He’s a cat with an uncanny instinct for death,” said David Dosa, assistant professor at the Brown University School of Medicine and a geriatric specialist. “He attends deaths. He’s pretty insistent on it.”

In the two years since Oscar was adopted into the dementia unit of the Steere House Nursing and Rehabilitation Centre in Providence he has maintained close vigil over the deaths of more than 25 patients, nursing staff and doctors say….When death is near, Oscar nearly always appears at the last hour or so. Yet he shows no special interest in patients who are simply in poor shape, or even patients who may be dying but who still have a few days. Authorities in animal behaviour have no explanation for Oscar’s ability to sense imminent death. They theorise that he might detect some subtle change in metabolism – felines are as acutely sensitive to smells as dogs – but are stumped as to why he would show interest.”

When death comes having someone there to care and be there, is wonderful – for some Oscar is their comfort.