1-2-6-5-3
That's how the cat population in our home changed this year. Our pet cat W adopted us in 2014. Since then, she has been living with us. She's an indoor cat for most of the day, loves to take long naps throughout the day and sometimes during her hunts, would bring home a mouse, a squirrel, or a pigeon as gifts for us🙂
This all changed in 2020 when a mom cat named Judy brought her 4 kittens to our apartment complex. Detailed story shared here.
Consider this post as part 2.
All of Judy's kittens became pregnant one after another. The last one to get pregnant was Scady, the grey fearless cat. Sometime in Jan this year, she started coming to our balcony often. We knew she was pregnant and was looking for a place to deliver. We didn't want her to deliver in our home, as we feared our pet cat W might harm the babies. But Scady was relentless and kept coming inside our home often. It was clear that she wanted to deliver in our home, as her three sisters had already delivered in ground floor balconies. We placed a box on our balcony, lined up with a few old towels.
One evening, she came home and sat on our sofa. She was full term. Both D and I had a conversation with Scady - "Scady kutti, don't worry. You can safely deliver in our balcony. We will take care of you and your babies. W won't attack them". We showed her the box and went to sleep that night. The next morning, she delivered 4 tiny kittens. D was thrilled to see the newborns. We were all super excited to see them - eyes yet to open, looked like tiny mice. They didn't have any resemblance to cat family🙂
D is crazy about cats and she named the four kittens - George, Octi, Caleco, and Georgina. As days passed by, we got to experience the life stages of these four cutie pies. First, they opened their eyes, then their ears started to grow, then slowly started to walk, tripped multiple times, slowly started to jump out of the box. In all these stages, Scady mommy was super protective of her babies. She would let us pet her babies but she would be fully on the guard. She nursed them on demand, disciplined them whenever they became mischievous, and would go out only when she was sure that we are baby sitting😉
The kittens grew faster. We got them a litter tray and they started using it immediately. We got their vaccinations done and to our surprise, the vet informed us that all four of them were female and needed to be neutered. Day by day, the mischiefs increased, they would jump out of the balcony and go into the common corridor. Scady would get so angry and sometimes helpless when she wasn't able to bring them back. She would demand that we bring the kittens back into the box🙂
They started running around everywhere, doing pretend fights with their siblings and then cuddling together with mommy during afternoon nap times. We had to consciously keep W away from Scady and her babies. And that's how our Feb-Apr passed.
After raising her babies for 3 months, one morning, Scady went out and never returned. It was all of a sudden for us, but the kittens seem to have adapted. By then, the kittens had started eating solid foods. The real challenge started for us after Scady left. Kittens became more mischievous and they started climbing up to other floors, getting caught in neighbors' balconies, and would shout for help. It was such a huge challenge to rescue them. Since this started happening repeatedly, frustrating the neighbors, we decided to keep them indoors by giving them a room and letting them out to the balcony only when one of us can supervise them. And this is the same time when Covid second wave was at its peak, Appa fell critically ill and we had to admit him to the hospital for a couple of weeks. I was completely stressed out during this time, BUT thanks to these little kittens, D had company at home, playing with them and taking care of them.
There were multiple times from May-Sept when we felt we should find an alternate home or shelter for them. Yes, there were also times of frustration when we felt like abandoning them somewhere, but then immediately felt so guilty to have thought this way.
We got them all neutered one after another. My brother was also visiting us during this time. Appa and his caretaker stayed in one room, kittens occupied one more time and D would take her online classes in the third room. Both my brother and my husband would sit either in the living room or on the balcony to attend their office calls.
Amidst this challenging situation, we somehow managed to convince D that it's high time we put these cats for adoption. I reached out to a cat lovers group and placed the ad, BUT didn't get a single enquiry. It was really sad to see so many pics of "cats need home" ads in the WhatsApp group every single day.
By God's grace, a friend referred a couple who came forward to adopt two of our cats (they were 7 months old now). It was a tough decision to pick two of them and we decided to give George and Caleco. The next few days were tough for us as well as the new family, since both the cats were scared to be in a new place and we missed them terribly. Thankfully, they settled down after a week.
We didn't pursue our adoption search further for Georgina and Octi as we have become attached to them (so are they). W has also accepted the presence of them but keeps her distance.
As our family went through an emergency crisis due to Appa's health this year, these kittens helped us ride the storm in so many ways. They brought us joy and a smile at the end of long, tiring days. When times are challenging, God sends us angels to help us. And these cats - Scady and her babies were those angels that we needed.
From a 1-cat family, we are now a 3-cat family at the end of 2021.