A woman from England whose beloved cat left the house one day, never to return, was beyond shocked to get a call from a vet 20 miles away a staggering 14 years later. The cat had been found, a little the worse for wear, but a true survivor.
On being asked by the vet if she wanted the cat back, Ruth Armstrong, of Hinckley in Leicestershire, answered with a definite, Yes!
Cuddly black-and-white cat Elsa was adopted as a 6-month-old kitten alongside her brother, Benny, as her owner was moving away and couldn’t take them with him. The pair then acclimated to life with Ruth, 50, her husband, their two other cats, and two dogs. Elsa soon became Ruth’s shadow and enjoyed fuss at any given opportunity.
But when Ruth adopted another pair of kittens in need, Elsa objected.
“We tried to make sure she still felt loved and included, but she did not welcome the intrusion,” Ruth explained to The Epoch Times. “She began to go out for longer and longer, until one day she came home, peed on the sofa in protest, and never came back.”
Ruth, a fitness instructor and diet consultant, looked everywhere for her beloved cat. She hung posters, went door to door, scoured local fields and industrial estates, and even called the council to see if any cats had been retrieved from the road, but to no avail. She then registered Elsa as missing with the microchip company.
Fourteen years passed and Ruth assumed the worst. However, when a staff member from The Park Vet Group some 20 miles away called on the evening of Nov. 25, 2021, nothing could have prepared Ruth for what was to come.
“I couldn’t process what they were saying,” she recalled. “I just kept saying, ‘But all my cats are at home!’”
The RSPCA had found Elsa roaming on an industrial estate, one of the many that Ruth had ritually visited after Elsa’s disappearance. Their emergency vet scanned Elsa’s microchip and found out that she was registered missing.
“They asked me if I wanted to see her and have her back,” said Ruth. “I said I was surprised that they would even ask that, but they told me many people decide not to collect a pet that has been missing for a while, and just ask them to either rehome them or put them to sleep. I find that fact so very sad.”
Ruth’s husband drove her over as she wanted to comfort Elsa all the way home.
Park Vet Group veterinarian David said “he'd never heard of any animal being returned to its owners after so long,” Ruth marveled, and “was just absolutely elated that we had been reunited after so very long, and that I was committed to getting her well.”
In order to not overwhelm Elsa, only David and Ruth were in the room at the time of her reunion.
Elsa was in a poor state, with a large cyst over one eye, cysts all over her body, and a large open tumor on her side oozing pus and blood. Afraid that she would hurt her, Ruth refrained from cuddling Elsa and instead gently stroked her.
“I felt so sorry for her,” she explained. “She did look a mess, and so timid, but it was also obvious that she wanted human contact ... I have no idea if she recognized me; I did ask, but she refused to tell me. I was just so happy to see her again!”
It soon transpired that Elsa had not been entirely alone since her disappearance.
She was fed by two companies on the industrial estate that became her home. At one, a security guard named Ray let her into his cabin, where he kept a cat bed and food bowl for her. Yet, worried about the scruffy stray’s welfare during Ray’s week holiday in November, his colleagues called the RSPCA.
After taking her in, Ruth had Elsa’s cancerous tumor and the large cyst over her eye removed by her own vet. Knowing that the senior cat would struggle with further surgeries, they left the harmless cysts alone.
Ruth called David over the Christmas holidays to update him on Elsa’s progress, calling the whiskery warrior her “miracle girl.”
According to Ruth, Elsa is currently doing “fabulously well.”
“Just like she was when she was young, she follows me all over the place and wants fuss all of the time,” Ruth said. “As soon as I reach for her, she purrs so loudly; she sounds like she has a motor, she’s so loud!”
The now-16-year-old feline has found her new favorite snooze spot under the radiator, away from Ruth’s other pets, has gained weight, and is feeling so safe and comfortable that her fur is growing back after surgery.
“She will now be a much-loved and pampered house cat for the rest of her days,” said Ruth.
Although Ruth credits the microchip for helping her reunite with Elsa, her underlying message to anyone missing a beloved pet is simple: never give up hope.
