Oliver Kitteh - Chapter Twelve: Which contains the substance of Oliver's Back Leg Rehabilitation

As told by Ms Brownlow (italic narration by Mabel).

Click here for chapters one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine. ten and eleven.

The Serious Bidness of straightening out Oliver's back legs continues!

I placed the box in the living room, along a path he used when going from the bedroom, and right in front of a new play area we were putting together. He was beginning to travel quickly enough that he wanted to play games with Chloe and have her chase him.

At this point, Oliver was about two and a half months old and he and Chloe were having a lot of racing games. I decided to take the long green scratching post and the wonderful box and that green suede sleeping box I'd gotten Oliver and make him a sort of 'track' to run through.

My idea here, again, was that I wanted to force him to be using his back leg closer together as he made his way around the apartment. He was already improving.  His belly was a little bit further off the ground, he was holding his legs at a slightly different angle, still out to the sides but no longer entirely flat on the ground.  It was such a subtle difference that the vet wasn't certain I knew what I was talking about when I said he was improving.  He really was though.

 Pictured here: The fabric bolts that Ms. Brownlow 

had to keep rolled up because Oliver was learning to climb on them.

Also, the lovely Chloe.

Anyway, my idea with this 'track' was that Oliver could run along the scratching post, or along the top of the box, or through the box or the suede box.  The suede box was the only one where he could spread his legs to the sides, but he'd be slowed down going through the circles on the ends and it was just slower to travel through.  My hope was that he would want to go one of the other ways. And, as he and Chloe were playing these chasing games throughout the day, he would get a lot of practice making speed with his little legs closer to his body.  Of course, I had no idea quite how he was going
to do that, but it seemed worth a try.

Oh, boy, was it.  At first he opted for traveling along the tops of the box and the scratching post.  The post was easier because the corrugated cardboard gave him the best traction.  He had a bit of a balance challange on the box.  Both let him have his legs out to the sides a bit, but because the pieces were all close together, they made 'walls' so he couldn't just let his legs hang over the sides as he'd done previously.

Once he got even better at running this track, and as he got faster and more impressed with himself, he began to run through the box.  And he got really good at it.  And he began standing much more on his feet.

Of course, we also played with toys like the goldfish on a stick. You can see here how much he's still keeping his legs out to the sides.  You may be able to tell he's holding himself up a little bit higher on his back legs.

And another view showing his improvement.  He was definitely standing up better, not all the time but increasingly frequently.

Alright my buddies... next week is The Big Reveal!