by Yesterday was quite a day, catwise -- I had some real ups and downs.
First the down part, my poor black kittygirl, Midnight, has been battling a
yeast infection in her right ear for a couple of months now despite eardrop
treatments and ump*** recheck visits at the vets. Yesterday, I took her in
yet again to recheck to see if the drops have made any difference and found
out that she still had an ear full of stuff. After so many trips to the
vet, Midnight has now become much better about car rides but much worse
about vet visits and the vet suggested we might try putting Middy under and
cleaning out her ear while she's asleep -- so that's what I decided to do.
Since I've picked her up and brought her home, Midnight now is very skittish
around me and the other family slaves, although she is doing fine with all
the other kitties. I am hoping this phase will pass as I love her dearly
and feel like she thinks I've betrayed her and doesn't trust me... :o(
The up part comes thanks to you, Mark E., as without your stories of petting
"difficult" cats at places like the Petsmart/Humane Society adoptions, I
wouldn't have dreamed of trying to do what my daughter Celeste and I did
yesterday. We were both at Petsmart, getting what else, more cat food and
we always like to stop by and look at the kitties up for adoption. We oohed
and aahed over a beautiful b & w Main Coon kitty called "Jack" who was in
the large cat playpen and began chatting with the Humane Society volunteer.
We mentioned that Celeste was now part of the Junior Animal Humane group and
was loving working with the animals on Saturdays and the lady volunteer was
very pleasant and happy to talk with us. She told us about one of the
kitties in the back room that we could see curled up in a cage -- a gorgeous
longhair grey tabby male with long white eartufts and gold eyes (maybe also
part Maine Coon or Norwegian Forest Cat?) who she said was completely
terrified and shy and who would not eat except when the store was darkened
for the night. She said she'd been working with him for a week and he would
let her brush him but otherwise would try to hide under the cage's
newspaper.
Thinking of your experiences Mark, I thought to ask her if we could possibly
visit the kitty "Baby" in the back and after thinking for a moment, she said
we could as we were "part" of the Humane organization.
We went back and talked to this beautiful big furball and I stretched my
hand out and let him sniff it and then I took a pellet of the food from his
bowl and held it under his nose and he hungrily ate it out of my hand! The
volunteer was amazed. Poor "Baby" was just waiting for someone to pay him
attention while he was eating I think, and to think I'd never heard of
"social eating" before reading this group! Celeste and I got to handfeed
him food pellets and pet him and the volunteer thought this was a
breakthrough and she would notate that he needed company when he ate on his
records. It was so gratifying to think that we might have made some small
difference in helping this sweet kitty become more socialized and adoptable.
Celeste and I left Petsmart about 20 minutes later with cat food in hand and
a warm glow in our hearts.
Christine