Hi everyone:
I’m new to TDK but I’ve been reading your posts for over a month and found much of the information here very helpful. On July 10th, I lost my 12-year-old cat to bone marrow failure. His name was Norman Bates (no, he wasn’t a psycho kitty) and the love of my life. He was always so healthy and athletic-looking for an indoor cat, that I thought he’d live to be an old man. The silver lining, if there was one, was that I was able to bring him home to pass and comfort him through the 2-day process. It was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do.
The same morning that he passed, a litter of kittens was born in the animal hospital that helped me try to save him. I wasn’t planning on adopting again, but the coincidence was just too strange for me to ignore. I met the kittens and fell in love with a little white girl with a grey smudge on her head. Norman was mostly white with a grey head and tail, so it was like he marked her for me.
I began prepping furiously for her (since I had purged most of Norman’s things) and visited her as much in the hospital as I could in order for her to feel comfortable going home with me. During our visits, she’d fall asleep on my lap and groom me and the nurses said it was clear she had already bonded with me.
During the fourth week, the kittens were already eating crunchy food and using the litterbox. Their mom, having been found on the street, did not like humans and the animal hospital wanted to have the kittens adopted out as soon as possible so as not to learn to dislike humans from their mother. I took Roxie Hart home on Monday night and have been a nervous wreck. I believe I had adopted Norman at 12 weeks old and she’s so tiny, I’m not sure what’s “normal”. I feel like she’s been doing great (I live alone and there are no other pets). She eats and drinks like a champ and has been using the litterbox. I bring her to it every time she eats just to make sure, but she did successfully enter it herself and poop.
I did notice that two times I put her in it, she scratched around and did the “crouch” but nothing happened. Then she would successfully go a little bit later. Is this okay? She also seems to meow right before going. Is that an announcement or a problem?
I stayed home with her on Tuesday, but I had to go work the rest of the week. Fortunately, I live only a few minutes from the office and am able to visit her during lunch — play with her and wear her out. She seems to be sleeping while I’m gone. But today at lunch, she just kept meowing at me, even when I was holding and petting her. And it seemed like she wouldn’t let herself sleep. Is this just separation anxiety? I can’t really bring her back to be with her siblings because they all left on Monday as well.
She sleeps with me at night and seems to feel very comfortable around me. I’m just a nervous wreck because of what I’ve been through. You all seem so supportive, so I decided I would take a shot and post.
Thank you. – EB