what you need - a post by the mom

Daiquiri checking out what mom is posting on Twitter

I have a confession to make. This isn't easy to admit and it won't be easy to read. But here goes:

I didn't want to keep Daiquiri.

There, I said it.

Now, let me back up....and I will warn you, this is a long post.

When I first started to foster, I made a commitment, both to myself and to the cats and kittens I fostered. I would always be there for them. I have been lucky in that not many have been returned (at least that I know of). Chex and Milano came back, and they stayed with me until I could get them adopted again. And there have been foster failures along the way (a foster failure for those new to this is: fostered, failed to return - also known as adopted by the foster family). In fact, now that I think about it, technically everyone here is a foster failure. :)

Last year was hard. Maestro died in May from cancer at 19 years old. I had kittens at the time....and Coral ended up working her way into my heart. So she stayed. And then she got so sick and died from FIP at 6 months old in October. I wasn't ready. While Maestro leaving was hard, it was expected and I had time to prepare. Coral was so young and it took everything I had to admit that I couldn't fix her and had to let her go. And to be honest, I still have problems seeing her picture.

At that same time, Daiquiri was tested and came back faintly FeLV positive. I could have moved her to another foster home, but committed to her and rearranged some things at the house. By the time we got the weird test results, and then the final test results, she was over 5 months old and had been here since she was about 3 weeks old. I was afraid she wouldn't get adopted as a teenager. And honestly, as much as I wouldn't commit my heart, I knew on some level that she was staying.

But I wasn't ready. Daiquiri is the POLAR opposite of Coral. While she is slowly beginning to appreciate a good cuddle, it is by far not her favorite thing. Coral on the other hand was always in my lap. Even when she was feeling good, she would play but then when it was time for a nap, she was with me. Daiquiri will happily nap by herself or with Tim. Yes, she decidedly loves Tim more than she loves me. haha

I thought long and hard. I knew I couldn't give her up. But I also knew I had to make some changes to ME in order to be fair to HER. I just didn't know where to start or what to do.

Fortunately, this was right about the time of the last painting session, and I met up with my friend Kelly. Sitting at a table painting for 6 hours, you talk about all sorts of things. And Daiquiri and Coral were among the topics. I hadn't spoken about it to anyone at that point. I wasn't even sure I could get the words together, no less finding someone who wasn't going to judge me and take it all the wrong way. Kelly was a saint!

6 hours of painting and lots of revelations

And putting it out there helped.

The other thing that helped....getting Mae West adopted. I know, sounds strange. But the woman who adopted her was asking me - how do you choose? And after walking her through the process, it made me think.

Miss Mae West

Over that next weekend, I came to a few realizations:

1. Sometimes you don't choose. Sometimes it happens. I was prepared to keep the numbers at 6 after losing Coral. Apparently, my plans were ignored. And I had to accept that.

2. Maybe what I thought I wanted, wasn't in fact what I needed. And it certainly wasn't what that household needed. See, for those of you who have followed for a while, you know about Junior and Ivy and Spud. They have a....hate-hate relationship. However, Daiquiri LOVES Junior. She doesn't know his background - he has always just been her dorky older brother. While Spud and Ivy think Junior is weird and annoying, Daiquiri just sees Junior. And heavens she plays with him to no end. Surprisingly, it has made a difference....while he doesn't entirely leave the other two alone, and while the other two still take him at face value and find him annoying, having someone else to chase around who loves the game is much more fun. And a tired Junior is a very good thing.

In fact, the other evening, Daiquiri was down in the entry way to the condo, singing about something (or testing the acoustics - who knows with that girl). Junior looked over the edge, then snuck down the stairs. A couple of minutes later.....pounding herds of elephants up the steps and down the hall...Junior in the lead with Daiquiri hot on his tail!!!

3. I needed to let go. Losing Maestro was hard. Losing Coral broke my heart. But trying to force Daiquiri into a mold where she was never going to fit wasn't fair to her....or to me. I had to learn to love her for who she is....a nutty loveable goofy kitten.

Now if I could only get her to like me as much as she likes Tim.....  Or maybe that really IS wishful thinking.

By the way.....hard as it is to believe - the nut is 6 months old now. Happy Half Birthday Daiquiri!!
(oh - and she is going to be a big girl....not fat, but tall and sturdy)

Year 2014 in review (part 1)

a few numbers before we get started:
   this is post 1380
   mom transported 16 dogs this year
   foster: 3 momma cats and 19 kittens

wow....

January came with a kitten in (Cumin) and two kittens being adopted (Milano and Chex who were returned and this was their second adoptions). And mom's brother's family adopted Scooby Doo (yep - he is a kitten):

And mom was involved with Ontario Bloodhound Rescue in saving Summer and Blu


February had a couple of adoptions: Cumin and Amelia (aka the Dust Bunny)

Our grandparents adopted a woofie they call Izzo and mom rescued a feral named Katniss
   oh - and Mo decided he didn't like Al Roker:

March gave us some adoption updates - which we love


April was a wild ride. Licorice got adopted!!!  Jade and Mica arrived....with four kittens coming the next day...and everyone needed a name. This group ended up being our geology kittens: mom Jade, with Mica, Ash, Pearl, Amber, and Coral.

Saffron was adopted (once mom finally got her on Petfinder). And we got some bad news about Maestro.


May is a month we would almost like to forget. While the geology kittens turned a month old and we added Cinco the household as a foster, we lost the old man of our family. Maestro crossed Rainbow Bridge due to cancer.

we love and miss you sweet mancat

June had poor Jade acting as a surrogate mom to...more kittens. We added three more kittens to the geology family: Jet, Topaz and Quartz.  The older kittens turned 2 months old. We celebrated International Box Day. And mom took a vacation with the kid to Best Friends Animal Sanctuary in Utah.

We hope you will turn in tomorrow for part 2.

Maestro

In 2004, mom decided that the resident cat needed a friend. She went to the local shelter and brought home an 8 week old little gray and white bundle of fuzz and named him Maestro after her love of music.

When mom moved out, Maestro and Butterscotch came to live with her. They moved with her several times through several states.

Butterscotch left us for the Bridge in October 2008.

Maestro turned 19 years old last September. He was the elder statesman of the household. Never complaining too loudly, never really making a fuss about much of anything (except maybe the occasional empty food dish). He was sweet and understanding and just wanted a lap to sit on. He never met a stranger and was really only afraid of the vaccuum cleaner. He moved over several state lines with mom and tolerated every new cat that came in the house along with the hoards of foster kittens.

And now he is gone. Those decisions are never easy on pet guardians. But with the diagnosis of a cancerous tumor on his jaw, and it was spreading fast, the issue becomes is he suffering, how do we know and how long do we let him go on. Mom has gone through this before and has sworn that she will not let any of us suffer - and that means force feeding or medicating or whatever. Maestro lived a long and wonderful life with us....and now we know that he is healthy and running across the Bridge with Butterscotch and Tigger and so many others who have gone before. This is the best decision mom could make, but it doesn't make it any less heartbreaking.

We will be taking a short break from blogging. Please know we will be back - with more stories about us and the foster kittens and everything else.

Random Fridays....

Maestro is still doing well. The vet stopped over last night and checked him over. They were going to see if they could drain part of it - the pathologist said it is about 1 part tumor to 2 parts inflamed cells. However, nothing much came out before he started to squirm. But the vet says he looks good to her and he was begging for treats from the tech. So he is on prednisone now for the inflammation and clavamox to stave off any infection from the pred affecting his system. Hopefully we will see some results in a week or so. This is by no means a cure...but it should help keep him comfortable and let's mom breathe.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

That Mica is a cutie.....yes, he is sleeping in a tissue box.

no, you cannot get five kittens to look the same way at the same time

Ash....yawning

why go around when you can go over?

Coral in the top left, sitting on Ash, Pearl closest to the camera, and Mica climbing over Amber

getting more mobile by the day

not so easy Sunday....

We got the update from the vet yesterday. Based on the test results, she thinks it is a salivary gland tumor.

We did some searching and found this on Merck:

Salivary Gland Tumors

Salivary gland tumors are rare in cats, although cats are affected twice as frequently as dogs. They usually occur in cats more than 10 years old. Most salivary gland tumors are malignant, with carcinomas and adenocarcinomas the most common types. Spread to nearby lymph nodes and the lungs is common. Tumors removed by surgery alone tend to recur, so radiation treatment, with or without surgery, offers the best outlook in most cases.

So, it doesn't sound good. Dr T wanted to send off the slides to be tested elsewhere since it is pretty rare. Mom told her to go ahead, though it won't really change much unless it comes back non-cancerous for some reason. They are going to hold off on doing anything until they here back from the secondary test - maybe mid-week. However, based on his age, the goal is to keep him comfortable and maybe try to reduce the swelling at the back of his jaw. Mom told Dr T that she isn't sure if it is getting bigger or if it just that she has been staring at it for a week.

No idea what this means for time....they did discuss maybe trying to aspirate part of it to relieve some pressure but not sure if that will happen or not. The main goal is so long as he seems comfortable and still eating then we will give him all the time he has.

Random Friday....

More on the v-e-t report:

Mo got the bad cat report. He wanders around acting all nice when they get here and then WHAM tries to eat people. Mom is afraid one of these days he will actually bite someone so the next visit will require a little more thought. Mom can catch him easy enough. But he is pretty skinny and can turn himself around which makes him hard to hold on to. He actually got a fang almost into the tech this time. His weight is actually up some (which is good - no body fat on that boy). And he isn't due for vaccines for 3 years.... (mom is fairly certain she heard the v-e-t mutter "hallelulah" MOL).

Maestro weighs about the same - which is a very good thing. Still waiting on the report from the v-e-t.

Spud had to be chased around by mom and then unceremoniously shoved in a carrier to wait for the v-e-t to get here. At least he isn't a screamer like Ivy somecat. He got weighed, vaccinated, toenails clipped and his ummm behind shaved (we told him it could have been worse - we hear some of the cats at Katnip Lounge are now nekkid).

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

We got an update on Saffron. She is adjusting pretty well. Mom knew she was going to be a tough nut to crack.....

seriously - you doubt that face would cause problems?? 

Mom and Saff's mom have been texting back and forth. Saff didn't come out much the first couple of days, but by Monday night she was letting them rub her belly. And as of the other night, she had met the other two cats in the house and checked out their climbing wall and the crinkly tube mom sent with her. She has even been out and snuggled on the couch. Though it does appear that she may end up being a daddy's girl. :)

~~~~~~~~~~

Maestro

Our old man turned 19 years old last fall. A couple of weeks ago the pet sitter found a lump at the back of his jaw.

Our v-e-t came last night. Mo and Spud were due for check ups and vaccines. They are doing well though Mo did try to bite the tech (oh my).

As for Maestro, they took some samples from the lump. He is kind of stiff as well but things are limited for cats. We should hear something back by the end of the week. The doctor thinks it involves his salivary gland....either an infection or a tumor. Mom talked to the vet about how much to do and while mom can medicate him she is reluctant to go to extremes due to his age. We will keep you all posted.

wordy Wednesday

Mom gets a little weird about body parts sometimes. She gets a little....fascinated.  MOL

The ear above belongs to Maestro. Somecat musta whacked him pretty good over the weekend. Mom said she was gonna call CSI when she found just one spot of blood on the floor in the kitchen on Saturday. It wasn't until later that afternoon that she found this on poor Maestro. Considering she was giving pawdicures last week, we can narrow it down to Junior, Spud or Ivy (who didn't get hers until Sunday).

Ivy ears

a one-eared Mozart  MOL

oooo - the ears of annoyance from Tim

Our Secret Paws present.....

We gotted another box the other day. It was from our Secret Paws kitty.  Mom opened the card and started laughing like mad. It would seem that the kitty we got also got us. MOL

So - THANK YOU Miss Cathy Keisha for our presents. There was even something for mom in there. We have already opened one of the bags of treats (nommy) and some of the toys. Tommy is stalking that feather but that is for use with mom present only. And mom said one of the bags of treats will be for Licorice since they are all grain free.  You and your peeps rock!!!!

Tommy inspecting the box - check out the fancy tape

Saffron says: is dat fevver for me????

Maestro doing package inspection

Tommy is gonna get that feather

What a haul!!

THANKS Cathy Keisha!

Merry Christmas everyone!

Something different and interesting....

A while ago, our friends at Glogirly did a review of a interview they had with a pet psychic.  We left a comment that mom often wonder what some of us were thinking.

Well then out of the blue we got an email from Sunny saying she had seen our comment and asking if we would be interested in a reading and review it here. We were going to talk to Nancy from Psychic Source.  Mom mainly worries about the three youngest ones here and how they get along with each other, so she sent a picture of Ivy, Spud and Junior.

Last Friday night mom settled into her chair with these two:

And then she dialed in to talk to Nancy. We will let mom take it from here:

I will be honest - I wasn't sure what to think going in. Like many others, I am kind of skeptical about this sort of thing. Now, I do believe there are things going on out there that I don't understand, but someone "reading" my cats from far away based on a picture? Not so sure about that. But I was curious and willing to give it a shot. I was most curious about the youngest three as their dynamic is the one that makes me the most crazy. None of them seem to get along and there are days I am sure Spud and Junior are going to start a death match.

As I started speaking to Nancy, she asked about Ivy first. It was interesting as Ivy was sleeping across the room on the floor vent (no, my house is not that cold but whatever). Nancy said that Ivy is very self confident (check), very calm (most of the time) and very comfortable. At this point I burst out laughing cause I am not sure Nancy meant literally comfortable, but as she said it, Ivy had rolled over onto her back and was heating up her other side on the vent. Nancy went on to say that Ivy views herself as the queen of the household and gets annoyed with the younger boys when they don't treat her with the respect she believes she deserves. But she said that Ivy is peaceful and content and knows she is living with us for a reason. I found that interesting since of all the cats, especially the foster-failures, she is the one that I can never give people a good reason for adopting. She needed to come back.

We then went on to talk about Junior. Now, if you have been following us for a while, you know that Junior was live-trapped at just over 3 months old as a kitten and came to us from a feral colony. I am fairly certain based on kittens we caught the following summer that one of the girls we trapped then was his mom as well. However, Nancy wouldn't have known that based on the picture. She said that he is afraid of people due to being kicked as a kitten by a young boy. Which is interesting....I am not certain anyone could have gotten that close to these kittens, though a couple of the memorial day kittens were pretty friendly once we caught them. Nancy also said that Junior is a big kid and that is part of the issue with Spud. Junior thinks he should be number one and is struggling a little to find his place. She did say that given some more time (maybe a couple of years), he will learn to trust me and our relationship will blossom. OK, I have waited this long, I am willing to give it more time. I told her this is his home no matter what.

And then on to Spud....Nancy said it felt like he was healing from something. I told her that he hadn't been injured or had surgery or anything. But then I told her about how I decided to keep him and have felt guilty that I was trying to replace Tigg (that is a whole other story). She said it could be emotional healing but that he is balanced and centered and looking for peaceful coexistence.

Nancy went on to say that Spud and Junior may never be best friends but as Junior settles into his place, they will learn to get along.

At this point, Junior came walking out from behind my chair and went over to lay down (seen above) next to Tommy. I would have sworn he was in the back bedroom as I knew that Spud was under the end table behind my chair. Junior had been in the room the entire time.  :)  I have to say that it is definitely the dynamic between him and Spud since Junior is visibly relaxed with the older cats - and will seek affection from them as well (Tommy had been grooming Junior's head just prior to the picture).

Ivy on her floor vent - warming her buns

At this point she asked if I had any questions and we went through the rest of the crew. She didn't have pictures, so I described them and gave her their ages.

Maestro: peaceful (he was sleeping on the arm of the chair next to me - his favorite spot). He sees himself as the center of my world.

Mozart: Nancy saw him as "religious" and an "emporer" (we may not want to discuss that part in front of him). She said that he is relatively undisturbed by the other adults in the house as he sees their mysteries and understands them.

Tim and Tom: she said they are very bonded and peaceful and happy.

I did ask if there was any sense that they were unhappy about the foster kittens that are constantly coming and going in the house. I have often wondered. They seem ok with it but....  Nancy said that they really are fine with the kittens. They see themselves as mentors and playmates and helping me help the kittens.

Then she said she had a couple of things about me. She said that I love what I do with the cats and the rescue and that I was meant to be doing this work. And here is the scary part: she said that in 2014 she sees a yellow male cat coming into my life that is meant to stay here.  YIKES!!!  :)

Overall, I was impressed. Sure, the cynic in me could say that she used a lot of generalities and could have learned some of the things if she read the blog before the call. But....I don't often discuss the "bad" dynamic in the house, so someone would have to do some digging to find all that. As for the other part of me, it was interesting to get the perspective of someone who has never met the cats and yet got a similar impression of them that I do. It was reassuring to know that they seem ok with the constant changes and are really ok with each other for the most part. And that maybe, just maybe, there is an end in sight for the conflict with the younger part of the crew. It was a very interesting phone call and I enjoyed talking to Nancy.

*We didn't pay for the interview but all opinions are our own.

Happy Gotcha Day Maestro

Mom says that 19 years ago today she never could have forseen the journey she has taken with our old mancat. For those of you who haven't heard the story, mom got Maestro when she was in college. Her brother was allowed to get a kitten (see the orange guy in the second picture) and mom was SURE that Butterscotch was lonely. Turns out not so much.....B would chew on Maestro's ears until he yelled. And then one day Maestro went off and got neutered...sympathy was a good thing and they were buddies until Butterscotch left for the Bridge.

Maestro may not LIKE the kittens, but they do seem to like him

and Maestro is just too old to care enough to get up and leave

a good flashback picture - Maestro, Mo, Butterscotch, Tim and Tom

(not sure when it was taken though)

Maestro favorite habit now-a-days

looking good

snoozing with Ivy - sun puddles ROCK

We hope you can join us in celebrating 19 years with the old mancat. He has moved many times with mom and has gone through cats, fosters and roommates. He is pretty mellow and laid back. And for being 19 years old, pretty healthy.