cats · Writing

Susie’s Origin Story – Part I

Amy

It all started with Mama Kitty.

Mama Kitty, 2016

She was a pretty Tortie, a green-eyed stray with a home. I know, that seems paradoxical, but in reality she was. Her home was about four houses down from mine. She would walk the fence in the backyard to come to my house. As is the case with the Cat Distribution System, we couldn’t figure out why she began to show up. But as this is a cat house, cats who show up get fed.

Mama Kitty was different. An anxiety suffer for most of my life, I could tell that she suffered from panic attacks and anxiety. Any attempt to bring her into the house to eat on the landing, she would run away. After a time, she would enter the house to eat, but the door had to remain open for her to have a clear escape. I know all too well that feels like. Anxiety is stifling and the flight response is overwhelming. Once she was done eating, she would go back outside and disappear for a few days. She slept on our front porch glider that was covered for winter.

It was during the late winter of February/March 2008 when one day we noticed Mama Kitty was a bit round in the belly. A few pets to the area revealed what we didn’t need a vet to tell us: Mama Kitty was pregnant. Capturing her to bring her into the warmth of the house became of utmost importance. As I mentioned, it was winter. If she’d had the babies outside, they all would’ve died. As I’ve also mentioned, Mama Kitty had an anxiety disorder. Getting her in the house without causing a full-blown panic attack was going to be challenging, if not impossible. The guest room became a nursery.

We prepared a large cardboard box with old sheets inside and placed it in the closet on the floor. This would serve as the birthing area. Cats will seek out confined areas that are private in which to give birth. After several attempts to capture Mama Kitty, we succeeded, but she was terrified. Our course of action was to place her into the guestroom and shut the door. I would visit the room and coax her out to eat and have a gentle scratch or two (hundred). She was a very loving, sweet cat – but she was terrified of men, dark pants and boots. (You can guess why.) She eventually ventured out of the nursery and was comfortable enough to sit on my lap in the living room.

It was one such occasion that she was on my lap and I was rubbing her. She allowed me to rub her belly, and I often felt the babies rolling around and kicking each other. There was one baby that was very active and seemed larger than the others. We could count three with our hands, but weren’t sure about a fourth. Mama Kitty was not a very large cat. She was quite small, in fact, so we weren’t quite sure where she would store a fourth baby.

On the early evening of April 15, 2008, Mama Kitty was enjoying a relaxing massage in my lap when she suddenly stood up and quickly jumped to the floor. I noticed after she jumped that there was water on my lap. Her waters had broken and she was in labor.

Stay tuned for Part II . . .

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Published by Amy

I love words. And animals. Photography and fedoras. Welcome. And stay awhile.

28 thoughts on “Susie’s Origin Story – Part I”

      1. That’s awesome. lol
        We have a cat like that around here named Tiger. I swear he’s lived in every house on the street at some point. He seems to have settled in nicely with an elderly woman across the street these days. He’ll sometimes wander over and say hi for a few. Everyone loves him. He’s a mainstay!

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