"Our life evokes our character. You find out more about yourself as you go on. That's why it's good to be able to put yourself in situations that will evoke your higher nature rather than your lower. 'Lead us not into temptation.'" Joseph Campbell
Showing posts with label Chloe the Mommy Cat. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Chloe the Mommy Cat. Show all posts
Last we left Oliver he had been introduced to the Petco structure, and climbing over the dowels. In this week's exciting installment, we see his little attempts to climb it!
I don't think he ever quite managed to do it, but it was worth a try, right?
Well, it was very worth a try, actually, because it helped strengthen
his back legs. It was fabric, so he could use his little claws to
hold on, and he managed to stretch up his entire length, he just never
got any higher than that at this stage. But it was still a
accomplishment and he was impressed with himself. I think it sort of
counted as getting off the ground.
Cats climb, right? Oliver worked on his climbing.
You can see little back leg all stretched out!
Notice how Mamma Chloe is coaching him.
I also got him this little collapsible hut, and it's another thing that got a lot of use.
But really I wanted you to see how eager he was to head out and
explore everything that was put in his immediate area. And I wanted
you to see how he was using his little legs.
Moving from one place to another took him a very long time, but he was
determined to check everything out and find every way to use things
that he could. And he got stronger every day.
"Check me out, Other Mommy! Rowr!"
I don't know about you, dear readers, but I thought about little Oliver this week (and BarbN's daughter) when faced with some seemingly entrenched problems. Just focus on one part, and work work work at it, til you pass out from exhaustion. That is what I reminded myself. (As opposed to the lessons I learn from my Haley, such as "If someone stands in your way, cut 'em. That's what claws are for." Or "If something's too hard to do, annoy your hue-mahn until they do it for you.")
Dear Faithful Readers, thank-you for your patience in awaiting the next adventure of Oliver Kitteh. You shall be well rewarded by another exciting tale of fortitude, and another adorable picture.
I got this little structure at Petco. I thought Oliver might like it
because he liked 'climbing over' thingsand it's made with plastic dowels.
The picture shows Oliver 'climbing through' after climbing over his
towel mountain and down the other side into this little structure. He
appears to be lying, and his is resting at the moment I snapped the
picture, but this is what he looked like walking.
And all this took a lot of time, a lot of effort, and lots and lots of
practice. Whenever he wasn't sleeping, he was working at mastering
getting about. I've never seen a kitten who worked so hard.
He slept very soundly in between his adventures, because he was
completely exhausted. But he took advantage of everything given him
that gave him an opportunity to master a new ability.
You may be able to spot a small 'window' in this little structure.
It's an opening in the 'room' part of the structure to the left in the
picture, and the opening you can see is in the upper left corner of
the picture. There was another opening opposite. Once Oliver was
stronger [and bigger] he made it a point to master getting through the
window. Once, he could, he made it a point for a few days to always
go through the window when going in or out of the little structure.
Oliver Kitteh: Hardest working kitton* in show business. I shall remember him this week whenever I face any daunting tasks.
________
* Kitton: Not a type-o. Pronounced: kee-tohn (silent "n"). My old roommate used to like proncouncing "kitten" as though it were a French word.
As told by Ms Brownlow (italic narration by Mabel).
Chapter one here. Chapter two here. Chapter three here.
In our last installment little Oliver recovered his lust for life, and conquered crawling over the rattan table base. By the way, Oliver is an older kitty now, these are stories that Ms Brownlow emailed me when I asked for examples of her kitty physical therapy. Little did I know how enthralling the story would be. Take it away Ms Brownlow!
Having successfully climbed over the rattan tablebase, I decided to
build him a towel mountain. Because Oliver was having trouble
covering much distance horizontally, I thought it would be worth a
try.
I folded a couple of bathtowels into a soft little moutain with
sloping sides. You can't really tell from the picture, but it was a
pretty steep climb and a few layers high. This gave him something he
could climb up, with the terry loops giving him something to hold on
to, and he wouldn't have to be able to lift his body 'off' as he would
on the floor, but could just kind of hug it as he climbed. Like his
own little rock wall, but made of white terry cloth instead. Cuddly.
He noticed right away and immediately headed toward it. Well, it was
right next to his sleeping spot, so for a regular kitty 'heading
toward it' would have been a couple of steps and the climb would have
been nothing. The towel mountain might not even have been all that
interesting.
But Oliver loved it. He worked hard to get to it and immediately set
about trying to climb it. It obviously took a lot of effort, but my
little hero kitten gave it all he had. And when he got to the 'top'
he collapsed, exhausted.
[Look he's collapsed! So cute!!]
Climbing it was hard work, but kittens aren't afraid of hard work, and
Oliver is a a full-fledged kitten, just a little bit challenged in
some ways. (Which Chloe seemed to know but he didn't.)
Climbing the towel moutain helped him get a lot stronger. And he
climbed it repeatedly. Partly because he needed a lot of naps and
he'd decided he should be talking his naps there. It became his new
sleeping space. Or he wanted to keep climbing it and climbing it
wiped him out each time. Either way, that was where he slept once I
put it there.
When we last left our pint sized hero the vet had just predicted he'd never walk, but little Oliver was finally taking an interest in the world around him...
When Oliver got back home, he had a whole new way of looking at the world and an interest in finding more new experiences. He really was a kitten transformed. I put him back in his little spot on the floor where Chloe [his mother] had been keeping him and she groomed him and fed him and groomed him some more. Then, after his nap he decided to look around. Well, he still had a lot of trouble holding up his head, and he couldn't really get his chest up off the ground very well, and all his little legs moved like flippers, held straight out to the sides, but he did what he could. He worked and he listened and he worked and he tried his best.
"I am... a beast. Rowr!"
This picture was taken less than 48 hours after he came back from the vet as Adventure Boy. The photo was taken right after he'd finally managed to get himself OVER the rattan ring at the base of the little table. His 'spot' where he'd been living is the spot of floor directly to the left of the table. It took him almost two entire days to master moving that far and the task he set himself of climbing over the rattan was huge. He worked and worked at it. I don't know if you can tell, but that is one PROUD little kitty in that picture. He felt so accomplished. You could see his chest swell with pride. And I was so very proud of him and so happy for him and I can't tell you how glad I am that I got that picture. So ends the first installment of the story of Oliver's triumphant overcoming. And I am still so incredibly proud of him. I think he's a marvel.
Dear Readers, do you begin to see why I must share the story of Oliver Kitteh? In the following weeks you'll see more of his triumphs, kookiness, and the physical therapy games Ms Brownlow and Chloe set up for him. For he is Puir Oliver no more, but...
When we last left our character-kits, the pregnant feral Miss Chloe had been taken in by the kindly Ms Brownlow, and finally gave birth to live kittens: Henry and Oliver.
She decided she'd stay on or near my bed most of the time, and loved lying right by the window. And she loved the pillows. Notice here, like many a pregnant lady, she's put her feet up. She's got her belly
on the pillow as well.
Oliver's brother Henry died on his twelfth day. Chloe was distraught. She loved her kittens very much and was the best cat mother ever. It's kind of sad she mustn't have any more kittens, she's an amazing mother. *
Henry had seemed to be doing much better than Oliver. He hit all his developmental milestones right when he should have, whereas Oliver's eyes opened days later, he was much slower to be able to hold his head up, he slept almost all the time and he never made any noises. He insisted on staying in his little corner of the floor, facing the wall, deliberately blocking out the world. I tried moving him onto the rug right next to him to give him traction, but he just wiggled himself back to where he'd been.
Finally, on the day Oliver became three weeks old, I panicked. The trains weren't running properly that morning so I took that as a sign, decided not to go to work that day, went back home to get Oliver and took him to the vet.
There was a little girl kitten at the vet's who'd been found abandoned that morning, and she was estimated to also be three weeks old, and she was walking and talking and never stopped. Oliver was still having trouble holding his head up.
When I told the vet Chloe's story, and Oliver's and Henry's, the vet concluded that Chloe had almost certainly had distemper late in her pregnancy with the previous litter, and now she was a carrier and had infected Oliver, who was born with neurological problems.
(Cerebella Hypoplasia, to be exact. More at the end of this post.)
She was very glad that I wanted to keep him and do what I could for him. I couldn't NOT bring him home to Chloe no matter what was wrong with him, as she couldn't stand the trauma of losing another kitten. The vet examined Oliver carefully and spent a long time with us. He used his little legs like flippers, keeping them out to the side, but his reflexes in his legs seemed pretty much all right.
However, when the vet tried repeatedly to 'wheelbarrow walk' him, holding his rear up in the air and moving him along the table on his forelegs, the normal reflex he should have had that would have enabled him to 'walk' was completely missing. This was a very bad sign. The vet did not think he would ever be able to walk.
The kitteh Benatar: Chips is a battlefield
Oh noes! It's looking bad for our hero. A severe case of CH could be a rough go, as you can see from the video above, but a CH kitty in a loving home is still a happy kitty--they're known to be spunky and hard working. The real worry was Oliver's lack of spirit. But at the vet's a strange transformation slowly came over him...
Oliver was very interested in the little girl kitty and seemed to like all the handling by the vet [she's always been incredibly considerate of the animals I've brought there and they've all loved her]. When he got back home, he had a whole new way of looking at the world and an interest in finding more new experiences. He really was a kitten transformed.
Ahhhh. Hope dawns.
"Cerebellar hypoplasia causes jerky movements, tremors and generally uncoordinated motion. The animal often falls down and has trouble walking. ... The disease does not get better or worse with age, but the cat or dog can usually learn to somewhat compensate for it and should have a normal lifespan." (wiki) In the toughest cases, pee on the carpet can be a hazard. But the cats aren't in pain, and some people only adopt CH cats cause they're so lovely.
A mild case.
Tune in next week (hopefully Tuesday, ahem) to find out about Oliver's new eyes on the world. Oh, you're wondering what Oliver looks like?
Melt. My. Heart.
____________
* A combination of Chloe's feral-ocity, Ms Brownlow's present health, and the local feral shelter that never shows up, Chloe remains unfixed. However she is safely sequestered on the second floor and contented to be so. Her attempts to get pregnant currently consist of sitting in the window singing her sweet song to the local boys, and scheming on how to lure them up to her sweet new pad. Luckily she hasn't got Minion to invent a boy-catching elevator for her. Or does Minion knows how to perform spayings? "Dr Evil is in! You! Get me some towels. You! Get me some vodka. And you! Put on the rock and rollll. That's not a knife, this is a knife!"
Through my last blogs I met a woman whose kitty stories I'm going to share with you over the next few Tuesdays. It's the story of Oliver, and his mother Chloe. I'll call my friend Ms Brownlow, after the kindly Dickens character Mr Brownlow, who took in Oliver Twist. What follows is a tale that begins with some sadness, but contains much kindness, love, overcoming, and happiness. Annnd cute kitteh photos.
Chapter One: Treats of the place where Oliver was born, and of the circumstances attending his birth.
Chloe was a feral cat whom a few neighbors were feeding. (If she was ever a housecat, Chloe acts like a feral now.) Ms Brownlow could tell she'd given birth before and wanted to take her in so she wouldn't get pregnant again, but the landlady hated cats and didn't allow pets. Sure enough Chloe got pregnant again, and soon after all her kittens were discovered in a neighbor's yard--they hadn't lived, because Chloe had distemper. (If passed on to kittens at birth, 95% will die.) She'd even brought one of the dead kittens across to Mrs Brownlow's building to tell them what had happened (to get help?) giving the more sensitive neighbor a bit of an upset. Poor Chloe. :'-( Ms Brownlow believes she was only about a year old herself at this time.
When she was discovered pregnant for a third time:
"everyone was pretty traumatized by the story of the kittens and no one wanted to deal with the guilt of knowing that might well happen again, and pretty soon, too.
So one night my landlady approached me and said if I could get the cat into my apartment it would be all right for me to keep her there. The next day the computer system was down for hours at work. I took an early lunch hour and rushed to PetCo where I bought a cat pan, dishes, some toys, as much stuff as I could carry. That night I deposited those in my apartment, then rushed to the local supermarket for litter and food. I was set.
Early Saturday morning, about 6:00 AM, I went outside with a can of cat food and began looking for Chloe. She came by soon after and I began talking to her and walking toward my building door and she followed. Soon I was able to get her to follow me into the front door of the building. Every time she'd balk and head back outside I'd calmly and quietly follow her back outside, wait a few minutes, and then begin talking to her and coaxing her to follow me again. Each time we got a little further.
The whole thing took about 4 and a half hours, but eventually she came into my apartment. She was a little bit concerned that the door was closed and she couldn't get out again. She probably already had a spot picked out to deliver so it had to be a scary situation for her; but I stayed quiet and calm and gave her a lot of space. And resolved that I was not opening the door again until I had to leave for work on Monday morning.
"Holy mother of kittygod what have I done?!"
But Chloe is a smart and brave girl and knows how to make the best of things. She decided my bed, the farthest point from the door, was the space she liked the most and that was where she spent most of her time, by the bedroom window.
She woke me, deliberately, to have me there when she had the kittens. Perhaps because of the four dead ones born the last time, she wanted me there in case she needed help with these. I sat on the floor right beside her and when the first kitten was born, and was well, she purred so loudly. And she's not a purrer."
