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The litter tray

Join our community of cat lovers on the Mumsnet Cat forum for kitten advice and help with cat behaviour.

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Original poster

Positive stories of cats returning after a long stay away from home

48 replies

Daisy1992 · 28/10/2022 17:12

Hi, I just need some positive stories to keep my hopes up.

My lovely cat has been missing for 3 days now, about to go into the 4th night without her. She is only 1, and before this she has never stayed out overnight before. Her and her brother have been going outside during the day, and we call them back in with their treats and keep them in overnight. They never normally go far, and they will return to the sound of their treats in a matter of seconds normally, so we think they only go into a few of the neighbours gardens. So this is so unlike her, she is definitely more adventurous than her brother, and loves being outside so we think maybe she has just gone off exploring, or maybe she is stuck somewhere.

I am sick with worry, I have posted leaflet through all the neighbouring houses, at the local shop, posted on all the Facebook groups etc, listed her missing at all the local vets and websites. I have cried so much thinking the worst, she is chipped so trying to stay positive that we haven't received any dreaded phone call yet.

Has anyone else's dcat returned home after a long stay away? I could really use some positive stories to hold on to.

OP posts:

jugglerofballs · 28/10/2022 17:15

So sorry to hear this! Hopefully she is off having adventures and will be back soon. Mine was gone for over a week, she was eventually located in a neighbour’s garage, rather tired and hungry but otherwise fine. She wasn’t there when they checked earlier in the week so we never did figure out where she’d been all that time.

RunningFromInsanity · 28/10/2022 17:16

4 months, over the harshest Winter. Found living it up as a king in a feral colony a couple of miles away.
The farmer thought he seemed too friendly to be a stray so took him to be scanned. I had to put him on a diet when he returned.

dragonbreaths · 28/10/2022 17:18

our cat went missing for 36 hours recently, and strolled infor breakfast without shame.
I noticed on a local cat Facebook group that most cats seem to come back within a 2 week timeframe. so early days yet.

so worrying though

BigSidLittleSid · 28/10/2022 17:18

Oh how worrying I hope she turns up soon!

Earlier this year our cat went AWOL for nearly 20ish days, she's old so assumed she'd taken herself off to die. She reappeared when we were on holiday. The landlord rang us to say there was a cat desperate to get into the house, was it ours!! Fortunately we were home that same day so he shut her in the kitchen.
She was fine in herself, just skinny and desperate for fuss

MotherOfCatBoy · 28/10/2022 17:19

When I was a kid our young tabby disappeared for a week (she was a similar age, maybe about 8 months). My Mum thought she was gone for good. I was really upset and Mum got another kitten. The next day, the first cat reappeared. She was very hungry, we thought she must have got stuck somewhere. Of course we kept the kitten, they got on and both had more than 10 years together with us.

vodkaredbullgirl · 28/10/2022 17:20

6 months, a cat I used to have. She came back during the night when I was on a night shift. When I was having a break, i dreamt that she had come back. Thought about it on the way home and thought strange dream. When I got home I noticed a tin of tuna had been opened, guess what she came downstairs meowing at me.

Isaidnoalready · 28/10/2022 17:21

I used to tell my one cat to go get his brother for tea he would wander off and return with his brother

MotherOfCatBoy · 28/10/2022 17:23

Probably a daft question but have you walked around the block calling and rattling the treat box? One of our present day cats also disappeared into a neighbour’s house for several days while they had builders in. We found that while he would lie low and quiet, scared of other people, when he heard us he would yowl. You might hear something from a shed or garage?

strawberryice90 · 28/10/2022 17:26

My cat went missing for 6 weeks earlier this year, I'd nearly given up hope but she came back through the cat flap one day. Very skinny, hungry and thirsty. I really hope your girl turns up soon 🤞🏻❤️

Hottimesahead · 28/10/2022 17:26

My childhood cat decided to sleep in neighbours car. Car turned on and cat got badly injured. She ran off into nearby woods. Neighbour’s told us what happened. After a few days we thought she had died and was really upset. She turned up in the garden day 5, badly injured but vet managed to help. She lived for another 15 years.

we reckon she hide close by for a few days scared. Don’t give up hope

Dotcheck · 28/10/2022 17:27

Mine was gone for 6 days, she came back really hungry!

TurkeyTeeth · 28/10/2022 17:28

It's half term. She may have got locked in someone's house or garage when they left to go on holiday. This happened to our Dcat. We were distraught for a week and then on the following Saturday morning the owners must have come back because he turned up for breakfast looking very well indeed.

fiorentina · 28/10/2022 17:28

We had a stray cat in our garden previously and it tried to adopt us. We took it to the vet to check for a chip and it had been missing for six months! Had come a long way during a harsh winter. Hopefully yours returns soon.

feellikeanalien · 28/10/2022 17:30

Our girl went missing for about four weeks and just walked in one day looking very skinny. There were lots of outbuildings nearby so we thought maybe she'd got locked in. She was quite young at the time. We also lived very rurally so she may just have wandered too far and took her time to come home.

Our boy also managed to escape from his basket on the way to the vet but turned up at home about four or five days later. We were a twenty minute drive from the vet. Cats are very enterprising.

Hoping she turns up soon.

Pumpkinpatchlookinggood · 28/10/2022 17:32

I boy dcat was missing for 10 cold October nights.. Managed to crawl home with a broken leg. . Lived fine on 3!
Dcat Molly was gone 6 months! Saw her sitting under a tree at very very local shops!! Few broken teeth and skinny but recovered well. They saying about dcats having 9 lives is true ime!!

We get the grey hairs!

GuppytheCat · 28/10/2022 17:37

One of ours used to vanish every summer holiday and worry the cat sitters (we had two cats, but her sister was a pudgy homebody). She would stroll back in after four, six or even eight weeks, looking lean and lively and shouting for room service.

There was inevitably a year when she didn't return, and by the time we'd started really looking, she'd been missing for weeks. I miss her.

Swivellingbrat · 28/10/2022 17:37

We had a cat go missing for 3 months once. We put up posters everywhere and he was retuned to us.

A local cat just returned home after being missing for about a month - his owner put up posters locally and just posted on FB to say he’s home.

Don’t give up! Stay strong.

MrsPelligrinoPetrichor · 28/10/2022 17:38

MotherOfCatBoy · 28/10/2022 17:23

Do this at night when it's quiet and dark.

zaffa · 28/10/2022 17:38

My house cat disappeared out the front door at the age of 16. He had never been out before and never spent a night outside. He was used to our back garden but couldn't get out the garden.
I leafleted and went door to door and spoke to the local shops etc and put it all over fb and someone came to my house to tell me they had a cat matching his description in their back garden and it was him! Another afternoon of luring him out and I was in tears, carrying him in his carrier down the road whilst my husband had to carry my toddler daughter who was also in tears as we were so happy to have found him.

So please don't give up hope! I didn't think I'd see him again and I was so so so happy

Maximo2 · 28/10/2022 17:38

Our Loki went missing for 12 days recently, like you we were sick with worry. Our insurance paid for a marketing and telephone campaign and would have covered a reward as well, so it might be worth checking yours. We spent every night haring off on wild goose chases to find other black cats that weren't him. He turned up at 1pm one Saturday, clearly starving and quite distressed. We think he must have been trapped somewhere. He is fine now!

daffodilandtulip · 28/10/2022 17:40

After sixth months, a bloke posted on fb that he'd just found out his elderly dad had been feeding it for months and keeping it in his greenhouse...he was only two street away!

InvincibleInvisibility · 28/10/2022 17:45

My childhood cat when missing for 3 nights and came back scared stiff of plastic bags so god knows what happened to her.

My SIL lost her cat the day they moved. Put up posters etc. 6 years later she sees her cat in the garden of a house a few streets away. Cat had been adopted and they had a little boy who was very attached to the cat so SIL left him. She was both upset and relieved. It was odd though as cat is chipped.

Evvyjb · 28/10/2022 17:48

My story for this kind of question is always the gorgeous (but very straggly) looking cat I found outside my house a few years ago. Fed her, took her to the vet, she was chipped. Had been missing for 16 years and was reunited with the owner, who rang me in absolute bits. Lord knows where she had been, but I like to think she was welcomed back home for a very luxurious twilight years.

grey12 · 28/10/2022 17:55

Is she chipped?....

Our cat was a lost cat with a collar. Vet said she could have come from the other side of London, they can walk far..... sorry 😕

Friendly reminder to chip your cat!! It isn't nearly as pricey as I thought it was

oakleaffy · 28/10/2022 18:02

Three days is nothing-
If she is a fancy breed she might be stolen, but if just a 🐈‍⬛ Moggy, she is more likely to be unmolested by thieves.
I hope you’ll get her back.
A huge worry when a much loved cat goes missing.
we found an injured cat once- I had a Lurcher and Whippet with me, they found him-
We hitched a lift with a stranger to my vets
Henry had a broken pelvis and femur-
Thankfully he made it.
Met him once he was better.
Ask about, look under hedges & c where injured cats hide-
Cars are the danger.

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