Making the Rounds with Oscar the Cat
If family members can’t make it to the nursing home in time, Oscar’s presence offers immeasurable consolation, ensuring that the patient didn’t die alone. “People were taking great comfort in this idea, that this animal was there and might be there when their loved ones eventually pass. He was there when they couldn’t be.”
There’s no hard scientific explanation for Oscar’s gift. Dosa likens it to certain dogs’ ability to detect cancer, by sniffing out ketones, the biochemicals given off by dying cells.
For a second opinion, here’s Manhattan psychotherapist Dr. Laurie Nadel, lifelong cat lover and author of Sixth Sense: Unlocking Your Ultimate Mind Power: “Oscar is reading and responding to very subtle biological changes and energetic shifts that take place when a person dies.”
Of course, put the words “death” and “cat” in the same sentence and the feline haters will come out in droves. There are, sadly, many who have expressed fear and loathing of this feline phenomenon, even going so far as to label Oscar “evil” and “a grim reaper” — as if he’s somehow causing death rather than gently easing the harshness of its eventuality.
Happily, Oscar has plenty of supporters in the media, this reporter included (it goes without saying). The cat has even received praise in newspaper death notices. And now, a best-selling book. “He’s the opposite of evil,” Nadel says. “He’s a soul who’s taken on this assignment: He’s an angel.”
The cat’s dispassionate compassion qualifies him as a four-footed Zen master. “The empathy that Oscar has for people who are about to cross over is a natural ability, and we should look at it as a God-given gift,” Nadel adds. “Buddhists would call him a bodhisattva cat — an enlightened being who helps ease the suffering of others.”
Providence’s Steere House Nursing and Rehabilitation Center specializes in the care of people with severe dementia, so the people in this amazing cat’s ministry are, for the most part, too near death to fear it. For the rest of us who have a tough time accepting death as a natural part of life, Oscar is a kind and generous teacher.
“We are death-phobic in this culture,” Nadel concludes, “and here we have a wonderful opportunity to realize we don’t have to face death alone. Pets are wise, compassionate beings who can bring us comfort when we need it most.”
The story of this amazing cat is tangentially connected to Climategate. Consider: If Anthropogenic Global Warming were a patient in the Steere House Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, Oscar would be up on its bed lying next to it.
I appreciate this thoughtful, well-written and yes life-affirming piece here at PJ media. Stories here at this site usually make me upset or just plain mad, or sometimes warrant the occasional laugh, but rarely stimulate me to gape in sheer awe at the majesty of creation. I’ve heard of this story before, but not quite to this level of detail. Thanks Julia!
Great story, except Oscar isn’t a tortoiseshell. He’s just a mostly white tom with gray tabby patches. Tortoiseshells have brown, black, cinnamon and cream and are usually female.
I love, love Oscar. My own kitty seems to read people well so I don’t find it hard to believe that he has the power to conduct an accurate “cat scan”. His desire to be with people in their last hours warms my heart, everytime I hear about him. Hooray for Oscar!
I’ve been following the story of Oscar for several years now. Just another reason why I love cats. And the story shows that there are so many things in life that we just can’t explain rationally–nor should we be able to.
“The empathy that Oscar has for people who are about to cross over is a natural ability, and we should look at it as a God-given gift,”
imaginary friend aside (god not the cat) how do you get that the cat has empathy for the dying? maybe just attracted to the scent of dying people.
there are many companies working to make artificial sniffers that can detect illnesses and disease and they are getting close to marketable devices.
My cat slept with me last night.
What do I do?
Todd D. Hear this my friend, “Don’t hold your breath!” Kitty death is not the mission of all cats. My cousin had a 100 lb+ Doberman that would push her down and lay on her when she was getting ready to go into a seizure.
I had a blood loss, and in recovery, our sitszu would not leave my side, she was part of my recovery team.
6. I take it you have never seen a Christian on his/her deathbed. Hospice nurses will tell you that it’s common for them to see angels, or even Jesus Himself.
I have seen this cat story in a good number of media outlets. There is certainly a universe of odors that we cannot smell and animals can. Anthromorphizing this into something beyond a cat that likes the smell of impending death is pure speculation.
John Acevedo,
I used to board a dog when I was traveling. A strange pattern emerged and Vet asked me to stop giving them any warning about when I was returning to pick up the dog. They were able to observe a precise pattern: at what they would later discover was the moment my plane sat down, the dog would sit at attention, staring at the door for hours and until I arrived to pick her up. On those occasions when I waited until the next day they would observe her in “the position” when they closed shop for the night, then unchanged the next day (though presumably she slept). The duration of my trips varied widely, and they never observed her behaving this way except during the time between my arrival in town and picking her up.
Tell me what she smelled to know I was coming to pick her up? If you don’t have an answer, and if you’re intellectually honest you shouldn’t, consider the possibility that the universe might be more complex than you imagine.
john acevedo is just another sour atheist. Ignore him.
#7 move over and give him the best spot on the bed
“My cat slept with me last night.
What do I do?”
Same here. Our cats take it for granted that they will sleep with us. I think our cats only wish to prevent our escaping during the middle of the night. It also makes it easier for them to wake us when they are hungry.
How is it that the moment I get off the elevator and proceed to walk to the end of the hall to my apartment, at varying hours in the evening, I can hear my cat crying for me? How does he know it is me? I have asked my elderly neighbour if she ever hears crying from my apartment and she told me never. No one can convince me that animals do not have a sixth sense.
This sounds like a crock. Tomorrow I expect to see a PJM article: “headless woman in topless bar”
Actually I have been called a “sour atheist” also but I prefer “agnostic” because I cannot accept “certainty” in matters of religion and that includes the certainty that there is no “god” by any definition. But everyone is welcome to their belief system if not forced on others.
Anyway, what I really wanted to say is that I too have experienced things that could not be explained and while I still don’t understand how they happened, I can point to a potential (non-mystical and non-religious) possibility. In general, for information to pass between two entities there needs to be something carrying the information, i.e. sound, smell, light or other type of field or particle. Physicists thought they understood all of the possible means of transmitting information until the 1980s when something called “quantum entanglement” was verified in laboratories. What it means in a nutshell is that sub-atomic particles often exist in pairs. Each of the pair has a property called “spin” – one spins in one direction and the other in the opposite direction. When the pairs are isolated from one another and one has its spin reversed, the spin of the other of the pair is also reversed instantaneously – no matter how far away. Mathematics suggest that the individual particles in the pair could be separated by a galaxy and they non-manipulated one would still reverse instantaneously (if using the fastest information messenger that we know about now, i.e. light, it should take millions of years). Strange!
Since learning of such affects, I have always kept an open mind about phenomena like Gordon’s dog – and about the time I bolted from a business meeting, without forethought or suggestion from anyone, drove 40 miles to see my father on the day he died.
This is an interesting book that discusses quantum entanglement along with 24 other things changing our world: http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/reader/1851683917/ref=sib_dp_pt#reader-page
My mother’s cat stopped jumping on her bed about two weeks before she passed, although she was Mom’s faithful companion when she was resting on the sofa. On the day she died, four people watched the cat jump on Mom’s bed and settle down briefly. We arranged Mom’s hand on the cat’s back, just in case the fur still felt pleasant to her. Mom died less than five minutes later. Her cat jumped down. Who knows how they do what they do? The cat lives with me now, and sleeps in the bed every night and much of the day.
I bought this book on Kindle. I don’t usually read books like this … not a Chicken Soup for teh Soul kinda gal, but this book was an excellent read. I highly recommend.
12. Banjo:
hardly sour. am I to guess that is what you think of atheists? not wery christian of you.
11. Gordon.
you fly your own plane and the airport or landing strip is in hearing range of the vet. …yes / no ?
I don’t believe in god nor magic. but I have no problem if others do.
I believe Oscar can sense something that us humans can’t. It’s a proven fact that animals can do this. Haven’t you heard of service dogs that will alert, before their person has a seizure. Yes, I said BEFORE… even the person has no idea they are about to have a seizure. It has nothing to do with being an atheist or christian; it is a fact!
House figured this out last season, I don’t see what the big mystery is.
Dr. Dosa: “Mr. Johnson, it’s Dr. Dosa down at the home. Yeah. It’s the cat. She just crawled up on your mom’s bed. You better get down hear quick.”
You can’t make this stuff up.
The walking down the hallway is easy. Its the sound of your footsteps–we walk differently (or maybe it can smell you through the door). We can smell a neighbors roast, who knows what more a dog can smell through the crack under a door.
I worked with a woman who said she could tell everybody’s footsteps that walked by her office. My folk’s dog seemed to inexplicably know the minute they were going to let it out before going to bed. They later realized that they said the same phrase to it each night at that time…
Lacking speech, animals look at behavioral clues. I recall a beloved childhood pet dog who would watch for mom standing on the back of the car seat when mom went into a store. The tail would start wagging when mom emerged from the distant store in the parking lot, and that dog sure had sharper eyes than we did.
Quantum entanglement? Folding space and all that? I hope its true, but there is precious little empirical evidence of that in the physical world–and folks are looking pretty closely for that sort of thing.
PLEASE tell me the patients at death’s doorstep were already unconscious or sleeping. If I was patient in this nursing home and Oscar the “death cat” cuddled up next to me, I would FREAK out.
“House figured this out last season, I don’t see what the big mystery is.”
Don’t keep us waiting, TQ. Tell us all that Dr. House noticed that the cat was sleeping with the WARMEST patient: the one with the fever, the one with the electic blanket on the highest, etc.
Geez. Commenters these days.
Has anyone considered that IT’S THE CAT that is the cause of the patient’s death ???
Peter2: See “Cat Named in Nursing Home Deaths”
http://itsaboutfreedom.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=general&action=display&thread=140
As a man who just recently lost his wife I have to congratulate you on writing this worthless piece of Excrement.
While my wife disintegrated from cancer, I received various Christian friends who would variously try to sell her magic sugars or tell her to forgive someone from her past so Jesus would then heal her.
Garbage, just garbage.
#29 Don – my sincere condolences on the loss of your wife. My mother suffered from ALS for 5 years and she too had people who tried to ‘convert’ her before she died. I was angry at first, but later I realized that what they were doing came from their heart. Again, my sincere condolences to you and your family.
Oscar DOES seem to perceive things that medical professionals do not. On the surface, there is nothing odd about that: Most animals have sensory abilities that exceed those of humans.
On the other hand, animals — Oscar included — can’t do calculus, conduct medical research, or explore outer space. So let’s not get carried away over the (supposed) “superior” nature of his gift.
Moreover, there are certainly humans who possess unusual observational skills and abilities. (Oftentimes, they are accompanied by deficiencies in other areas: physical, emotional, cognitive, etc.)
More interesting to me than Oscar’s diagnostic ability is his motive in spending time with the soon-to-be deceased. By all accounts, he is an otherwise aloof creature. Yet he chooses to spend time with the dying. Why?
I am prepared to be generous in my assessment. It comforts me to believe that Oscar chooses to be a comfort to others. And, since none of us will ever know for sure, I have as much chance of being correct in my assessment as does anyone else.
On a lighter note, I believe that most animals “know things.” See: She Knows http://emmeffemm.com/id68.html
Also see: Mostly Dogs (animal stories) http://emmeffemm.com/id167.html
Dr. Nadel is correct. Oscar is responding to many signs that humans do not recognize. Perhaps energy leaving one body affects his own body. No one can know. We don’t even know enough about a cat’s sensitivities to establish a hypothesis.
I recall an experiment someone conducted about fifty years ago. The researcher put a camera at the foot of beds of patients likely to die in an ICU. (Could this be done today? I doubt it.) The camera recorded energy leaving the bodies of persons who died. I remember seeing several frames.
I have personally interviewed more than two dozen people who have died and been resuscitated and described life between life. Many described wierd “fluctuations” of energy in themselves at death and at resuscitation.
I suspect Oscar is picking up something that attracts him.
Animals are very sensitive to slight changes in the environment. They can sense of something that is about to occur, like earthquakes and all. It just happened that Oscar is residing in a nursing home. What else should it detect than death.
Animals have very acute senses with a sense of smell 100 times as sensitive as ours and much better hearing. Dogs often hear the subsonic tremors just before an earthquake. Cats and dogs can also smell very subtle changes in a person’s body chemistry before a seizure or even death. Our dogs and cats can tell who is coming up the sidewalk by the sounds of their footsteps and all dogs know the sound of the UPS or mail truck ! No mystery here. Oscar just understands what it means better than most other animals.
It’s a lovely story, but a load of tosh.
Here’s a suggestion: james randi has a million bucks sitting in a bank account if the moggy’s humans are willing to let some people come in and prove their cat can do MRIs.
Sorry to be a party pooper. I like cats, I really do. But lets not be silly.