Heartbreak over deadly antifreeze

Susan Barwell has seen her two much-loved cats die agonisingly within two days of each other because of antifreeze.

"It contains ethylene glycol which cats love the taste of, but it is a killer," she explained.

"I'm begging people to dispose of their antifreeze in the right manner. It takes only a small amount of time to clean it away if it is spilt on a driveway or road.

"I would ask anyone who is changing their antifreeze this winter not to leave the container where cats and other animals can get to it.

"Better still, use the new antifreeze with propylene glycol instead of ethylene glycol. This is found in everyday products, such as toothpaste, and is not as toxic as ethylene glycol.

"This has been a very distressing time for our family and I wouldn't like it to happen to anybody else. It has been the most heart-breaking thing I have had to watch and there wasn't a thing I could do about it to save them both.

"I miss my cats so badly. There are no cats to lay on my bed in the morning, no meowing at me to feed them, no sitting on my lap in the morning while I drink my tea, no playing in the garden and no playing with my dogs.

"They were part of our family but I'm not going to have any more cats. I can't bear to go through all that again."

The anguish for Mrs Barwell and her four children '“ aged ten, 15, 22 and 24 '“ began late last month.

Nine-month-old Willow was the first of their cats to die. She wandered into their Rose Green Road home late at night as usual. But she looked drunk and could not stand on her back legs. Mrs Barwell thought she had been hit by a car.

She immediately took her to AlphaPet in nearby West Meads where the vets put her on a drip.

Willow, who had been with the family for nine months, was due to have been x-rayed when her condition stabilised.

Mrs Barwell (42) left Willow at 4.25am. She stopped breathing just before 10am before Mrs Barwell could return to say goodbye.

A post-mortem examination was held because there were no external injuries. It revealed she had drunk poison which had got into her kidneys and her bloodstream.

Just two days later, and the family's other cat, nine-year-old Suzie, who they had looked after since she was a kitten of eight weeks, was found by Mrs Barwell outside in the rain unable to move.

"I picked her up. She was shivering and displaying the same symptoms as Willow," she said.

"I let her out the night before as a healthy nine-year-old cat. Now, she didn't even look at me.

"I wrapped her in a blanket and got a hot water bottle and phoned the vet.

"I took her down there but I knew the outcome straight away and so did the vet.

"They battled to try to save her but the antifreeze had already got into her system and her kidneys.

"The outcome was to put her to sleep."

She urged any cat owners to immediately take their pet to a vet if the animal displayed any symptoms of seeming to be drunk and failing to respond.

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