My big round cat Louie was huddled in his carrier in a sterile room that nonetheless smelled to him of other animals, and where he could hear dogs barking somewhere not far enough away. He had his face tucked down so you could only see one ear. “You can take him out,” I said to the assistant, who looked awkward about it, but I wasn’t going to put my hands on Louie and betray him like that. Let someone else be the bad guy. I’ve had other cats who would need the comfort, but not Louie.

The veterinarian, a slight woman of tender years, watched as the assistant put him onto the scale. “He’s gained about a pound since last year,” the veterinarian said. “What do you feed him?”

What do I feed him? I feed him a great deal less than he wants me to feed him, that’s what I feed him.

I reported on his perfectly good and healthy diet. “Louie and I are engaged in a pitched battle over food,” I added. The last vet, who had a fat cat herself, understood that sort of thing, but the last vet has left the practice.

While this vet palpated his abdomen and examined his teeth. I could tell that she and the assistant expected me to coo over him and hold him while they violated his personal space, but he is not a baby and it would not soothe him to have me add more stimulation. It would just be performative. I would showing off for the vet. Meanwhile, Louie would be wondering why I was betraying him.

The vet suggested a mechanical feeder and diet canned food. She said otherwise Louie’s in good shape but will probably need more teeth removed next year, and I told her I expected that; she asked if I brushed his teeth and I said that wasn’t going to happen. I turned down the offer of doing bloodwork, because he is a middle aged cat and has not entered the age where I need to know that his kidneys are failing.

They could disapprove all they liked. I was there basically to get his shot, make sure his teeth weren’t actively falling out, and ensure he didn’t have any weird lumps or heart problems.

I could feel the polite pressure to do all kinds of things that would cost me money, make Louie unhappy, and eventually bring the same result as if I did nothing. I have seen many cats and two human beings (my mother and my husband) through the ends of their lives, and I’m all too familiar with the eagerness of health professionals to do something, anything, at great expense to everyone.

In the end, they gave him his rabies shot and put him in his carrier, and I spirited him away from the Bad Place, which is not just the veterinarian’s office but everywhere that is not his own home.

As I was walking away, he finally gave a heartrending wail. “I know, baby,” I said. Because he is my little baby, my Uncle Louie, my bunny-kitten, and he doesn’t need this kind of thing from me, but I walk that thin line between passive neglect and deliberate torment which keeps a cat healthy. Cats do not understand why you are doing the awful thing, unlike humans, who will stubbornly demand every possible test and go on regimens of poison if it means they can live longer.

Next year I will undoubtedly take him to get more teeth removed, because Louie does love to eat, and painful teeth get in the way of eating.

I did not order any diet canned food because it’s twice as expensive, and because every time I have tried to feed a cat special food, both the cat and I have suffered unnecessarily. And meanwhile, I’m waiting for a mechanical feeder to arrive, so that Louie will stop picking at me with his claws and staring into my face from six inches away when it’s two hours from feeding time. He can stare at the damn feeder instead. It will not have the tender feelings I have for him.

At any rate, I know Louie will eventually lose weight, because I have had many long lived cats. We all lose weight in the end. We lose all of it, just like that.