A little over a month ago I adopted a kitten from the shelter. She was the cutest and most energetic kitten I had ever seen and she immediately stole my heart. I was in the middle of a divorce and had 3 cats that I raised from kittens but my ex wife wouldn’t allow me to take them. I had never adopted from a shelter but found a male kitten that I wanted so I decided to go and meet him. However, when I arrived someone had just adopted him but instead of leaving I looked around and saw this beautiful kitty that coincidentally was cage mates with the male kitten I had come to see originally. I felt like it was fate and seeing Kiki in her cage broke my heart. She was 3 months old and was extremely happy when I got her into my car. I let her out of her carrier and she started to roam around looking out the windows and climbing all over me. I was so happy and really excited about her. The next two weeks were awesome, I’m retired so I spent every day with her playing and snuggling and just enjoying my new kitten. Her purring was so loud and calming to me and she loved laying on my chest at night. I suffer from PTSD and having cats has really helped my mental state so I was on cloud 9. At about week 3 I noticed she was really lethargic and wasn’t jumping. I figured she sprained something and just let her rest and helped her get up and down from the bed to her food bowl and litter box. She seemed to be coming out of it and was becoming more active and back to her normal self. Then four days ago I woke up and her stomach was enlarged a little bit. I was worried but she was still eating and drinking and acting normal so I thought maybe she had eaten too much or was constipated. I told myself that I’d see how she was the next day and would take her to the vet if it didn’t improve. Well the next day came and her stomach had almost doubled in size. I was so worried and scared and began to do researched on what it could be. Nothing I read was good but there were other non life threatening things it could be but I knew she had to go to the vet. So I get her to the vet and they take her temperature (which she did not like at all) and weight and wait for the Dr. to come in. The whole time she was either exploring or laying in my lap. She seemed fine and actually saw her jump for the first time in a long time. About an hour after we arrived the Dr comes in and sees her. Immediately his reaction to her belly began to worry me. He told me they were going to take an ultrasound of her stomach and see what was causing the issue. The next twenty minutes felt like two hours but the vet tech came in and dropped her off and she seemed okay so I had hope that she was going to be fine. Then the Dr came in and said they did the ultrasound and her stomach was filling up with fluid. He showed me the syringe they used and asked me if I had ever heard of FIP. I hadn’t until I did research earlier that night and as soon as he said those words I knew she was going to die. He told me that she would maybe make it another week or two but she would gradually get worse. I had to make the decision and as hard as it was, it was easy. I couldn’t bare to see her suffer I knew what had to be done. I held her as long as I possibly could and told her how much I loved her and thanked her for bringing joy to my life. I kept holding her as they stuck the needle into the catheter and felt her tiny heart stop beating and her lungs stop breathing. I couldn’t speak I couldn’t move, I hadn’t cried in almost four years but I cried watching the life drain from her body. FIP, a disease I knew nothing about the day before took my precious Kiki from me and these last four days have been so sad without her. I’m thankful for the time that I got to spend with her and I hope she knows how much I loved her. It’s not fair that something so small and innocent was taken by such a nasty deadly virus. I adopted two kittens from the shelter that day and am extremely paranoid that the other one is going to end up with the same fate. My heart is broken and although I know I’ll be fine it sucks that she’s not around anymore. I pray that a cure is distributed across the country so that no one else nor their cat suffers the way I am or Kiki did.