How a ‘foster fail’ and a ‘philanthrocat’ are helping others with getting older
It’s not enough that Olivia Rauktis, who recently earned a bachelor’s degree in nursing, has been working 12hour shifts in the trauma unit at UPMC Mercy Hospital throughout the COVID-19 crisis. And it’s not enough that she took in a beat-up 15year-old street cat she named Reggie.
Now Olivia, 25, her cat and her mother, Mary Elizabeth Rauktis, have started The Reggie Fund to donate $100 per month to an older cat or its older owner to help cover costs of care.
Reggie had a home in Squirrel Hill, where he was an indoor-outdoor cat, but when his family was evicted, they put the longhaired orange feline out on the street.
An older woman in the neighborhood was putting out food for Reggie, but he had become very thin and very skittish. A volunteer with a rescue organization picked him up. Late last year, Olivia agreed to foster him at her parents’ home in West View, where she has been living during the pandemic.
Olivia is what animal lovers call “a foster fail.” She couldn’t say goodbye, so she adopted Reggie and gave him what the animal rescue world calls a “fur ever” home.
“At first, Reggie was very shy and often hid from us, but he never bit or scratched,” Olivia said. His general health was further compromised by a mouth full of rotting teeth.
She paid his veterinary dental bills and nursed him back to health.
“He only has three teeth left in his mouth, but it doesn’t stop him from eating everything. He has gotten chubbier,” she said. “Now he spends most of his time attached to me. He is cuddly. He gets along with my parents’ cats, Mr. Chips and Maggie. Reggie hangs out with them when I’m not home. He has no desire to go outside.”
In an email to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Mary Elizabeth Rauktis’ subject line was, “My daughter’s love story.”
Reggie “is her companion,” she wrote, because her daughter is “a health care worker on the front lines who cannot go out and socialize.”
“He is a stress relief, as well,” she added, and he’s also “a philanthrocat.”
Olivia is following in her mother’s footsteps, starting with her career choice and her volunteer work.
Mary Elizabeth is a registered nurse who has a doctorate in social work and is on the research associate faculty in the School of Social Work at the University of Pittsburgh. She volunteers with Oakland TNR (trap neuter release), Hill
District Cats and the Animal Friends Chow Wagon that collects donated pet food and delivers it to food pantries.
“During COVID we have worked hard to make sure that pet food is in pet pantries,” she said.
She and her students, as well as Pitt alumni and faculty, have created what she
calls “a comprehensive guide to aging in place with your pets,” and Mr. Chips stars in the video on social media. His Twitter handle is @Mrchips_the_cat.
The Reggie Fund has given $100 each to four cats, including Charlie, a threelegged former street cat, and Mr. Bailey, who needed veterinary care.
Last year, Elizabeth Constantino started GoFundMe page to help an 82-year-old woman who has
been rescuing cats her entire life. In recent months, she has struggled to afford vet care and high-quality cat food for her five cats.
From Reggie’s Fund, the woman got a $100 Chewy gift card. “She and her family are over the moon and so grateful for this,” Ms. Constantino said in a social media post.
Reggie’s Fund “is pretty much mom and pop stuff ... a grassroots effort,” Mary Elizabeth Rauktis said. “It’s
informal. Facebook friends donate money. Olivia does crafts, which she gives to donors. When we don’t have enough money, I just cover it from my salary.”
To make a donation, go to @Mrchips_the_cat on Twitter or send a friend request to Mary Elizabeth Rauktis’ Facebook page.