Billy is learning so much everyday!
This past week...he has gotten into climbing, on everything he can! We already knew he liked perching, as he has been perching on the back of the couch and on our shoulders often. And he likes boxes....anytime we get anything that comes in a box, we keep the box. Joey sleeps in them and Billy divides his time between sleeping in them and on them.
I left the step stool in the laundry room next to a set of shelves...I hear Billy's bell and realize he has climbed the step stool and has ventured onto the top shelf! I had to make sure we moved the step stool because we store plastic bags on the shelves, and he has gotten stuck in them before. Once the step stool was moved, he still climbed it, but would just sit like he was royalty on the top shelf looking around.
To the BIG NEWS of the WEEK!!!!!
BILLY KNOWS HOW TO CLIMB THE STAIRS YAY!
We have tried to introduce him to the stairs slowly...as he still gets confused sometimes. He will climb onto a windowsill, and fall asleep. A couple hours later, will wake up, try to feel for the ground under the ledge, and when he never does, he will cry until we come get him. It is very sad, but the fear not knowing what is under him or how far down it is, stops him from jumping.
The same type of philosophy goes with the stairs. Billy has walked to the bottom of the stairs, and we have even tried to "help" him walk up a couple, by moving his front paws up. He typically in the past has just sat at the bottom of the stairs, "looking" up. A couple times he has reached his paw up but could not touch the top of the next step, so he has given up on figuring it out, probably assuming it is a wall of some sort.
Thanks to our old house, the stairs are creaky. On Friday, I was taking laundry upstairs when I heard his little bell ringing, sounding a lot closer than it should be with him downstairs. I looked out into the hallway, and Billy is just trotting down the hallway, moving his head from side to side. He had heard me climb the stairs, and followed me up! He walked around the hallway a bit, than explored the guest room, climbed onto the bed and promptly fell asleep.
He has spent the last day climbing the stairs, and hanging out in the guest room sleeping on the bed. Our guest room is a "cat room" basically, we keep an old quilt on it for the kitties to lay on, and they spend a lot of time on the bed!
Billy can't yet climb down the stairs, which is the problem!! He sits at the top and just washes himself, or sleeps. I am working on teaching him how to get down on his own so he can be independent. I started by trying to talk him down the stairs. We have three stairs, a landing, and than about 10 more. I was able to talk him down the first three, and he sat on the landing like he expected me to just carry him down the rest. :)
I tapped the step underneath him a few times and he finally took a step down. I repeated it the entire way down, and he was able to make it.This morning, we woke up to find him sleeping on the guest bed. Later in the day, he climbed the stairs again. He is getting awesome at going up, and loving exploring something new...so I am just going to have to keep working on getting him to climb down on his own!
Saturday, July 24, 2010
Saturday, July 17, 2010
All you need is love...
That is all Billy needs to lead a happy life. He is the loviest, sweetest kitten in the world, well aside from my Joey.
I have a theory about Billy loving Korey more. It is easier for Billy to lay on Korey's flat chest...and not my chest. He apparently does NOT like laying on a womans chest...I am thinking the boobs get in the way?? haha! TMI sorry.
Right now, Billy is laying on Korey's chest, licking his face....his cheeks, nose etc. If Korey talks, Billy is right there, trying to sniff at his mouth. Billy is just rolling around on his chest, sniffing his face and nuzzling up to him. I must admit, I am a little jealous. I am home all day caring for him and loving him. At least Joey loves me more I guess :) As long as Billy knows he is loved, I am fine with him loving Korey more.
Last night Billy slept in our bed with us. We haven't let him yet, as we don't have a litterbox in our room, and Billy can't quite get the stairs yet. We have tried a little but he doesn't like it. He lOVED sleeping in bed. He curled up with us for a goof 5 hours before he woke us up with his little cries to get taken to the litter box. He is SO good about that....he has not yet had an accident.
I feel like I say a million times a day, that we love Billy so much. Truthfully, we were nervous when we got him. We were not sure that we were ready for a blind kitten, but we knew we had to try for his sake. In the 3 weeks that we have had him, he has proved a million times over, that blind cats are amazing. I feel bad when people say that we are good people/doing a great thing by having a blind kitten....bc all we did is give him a home. And love/attention. The rest is all him. He is the one who can find his litterbox, his food, who plays with his toys, and cuddles up with us on the couch. He is the one who cries when we wants held/picked up, and the one who hears us first thing in the morning and runs to find us so we can pick him up and nuzzle him against us. There is nothing like walking downstairs to have your blind kitten run up to you each morning and cry because he missed you all night and wants attention. The little thing cant even see, but he knows just where we are and just what to do to get attention. He can't see our faces but knows by our smells and voices who we are. We were worried he would have trouble adjusting after spending 11 weeks in one home and getting suddenly moved...but you would think we had had him since he was born with how much he loves us, our other cats, and being here...and how well he knows us and the house and can get around!
I have a theory about Billy loving Korey more. It is easier for Billy to lay on Korey's flat chest...and not my chest. He apparently does NOT like laying on a womans chest...I am thinking the boobs get in the way?? haha! TMI sorry.
Right now, Billy is laying on Korey's chest, licking his face....his cheeks, nose etc. If Korey talks, Billy is right there, trying to sniff at his mouth. Billy is just rolling around on his chest, sniffing his face and nuzzling up to him. I must admit, I am a little jealous. I am home all day caring for him and loving him. At least Joey loves me more I guess :) As long as Billy knows he is loved, I am fine with him loving Korey more.
Last night Billy slept in our bed with us. We haven't let him yet, as we don't have a litterbox in our room, and Billy can't quite get the stairs yet. We have tried a little but he doesn't like it. He lOVED sleeping in bed. He curled up with us for a goof 5 hours before he woke us up with his little cries to get taken to the litter box. He is SO good about that....he has not yet had an accident.
I feel like I say a million times a day, that we love Billy so much. Truthfully, we were nervous when we got him. We were not sure that we were ready for a blind kitten, but we knew we had to try for his sake. In the 3 weeks that we have had him, he has proved a million times over, that blind cats are amazing. I feel bad when people say that we are good people/doing a great thing by having a blind kitten....bc all we did is give him a home. And love/attention. The rest is all him. He is the one who can find his litterbox, his food, who plays with his toys, and cuddles up with us on the couch. He is the one who cries when we wants held/picked up, and the one who hears us first thing in the morning and runs to find us so we can pick him up and nuzzle him against us. There is nothing like walking downstairs to have your blind kitten run up to you each morning and cry because he missed you all night and wants attention. The little thing cant even see, but he knows just where we are and just what to do to get attention. He can't see our faces but knows by our smells and voices who we are. We were worried he would have trouble adjusting after spending 11 weeks in one home and getting suddenly moved...but you would think we had had him since he was born with how much he loves us, our other cats, and being here...and how well he knows us and the house and can get around!
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Sad times for me!
In all of Billy's triumphs, he does happen to have some struggles.
We think Billy can see some shadow....but we are not sure. When he saw the Vet, she couldn't be sure, but his pupils do contract a little bit in light. He has scratching on the inside of his eyes and damage that caused the blindness, so we spend a lot of time speculating on what Billy can and cannot see, according to us at least :)
Yesterday was a big day of me being sad, and him being scared. I get so sad when he bumps into something, or when he is afraid to play. He is still learning, and I know that to him, being blind is nothing new...so I can't describe why I feel so bad for him...but I do. He and Joey play a lot....and he really seems to love it. But sometimes...man its hard on me! Joey will be playing near Billy, and Billy will do the cutest little jump to try to leap onto Joey...and probably about 1 out of 4 times, Joey will jump out of the way and Billy lands on the ground normally, and mews and looks around like he is confused. He DOES get Joey, PLENTY of times, but I just hate those times where he looks sad. Joey also loves this mouse toy...and will carry it in his mouth room to room like it is a real mouse and he is trying to catch it. As Joey runs around like crazy, Billy wants to get into the "game" Joey is playing so much...but Joey can run room to room and know exactly where he is going....while Billy stops at the edge of each room and slowly walks into the next one. We have two adjoining rooms with carpet, and out kitchen with linoleum. He can tell when he gets from the kitchen to the middle room, but he doesn't like to go fast from room to room, so he sometimes gets left behind in the games.
Billy is also learning what he can climb over...and on :) He and Joey love to play on a stroller that is in the kitchen. They take turns sleeping in it, or just sleep in it together. Joey likes to climb to the top and reach down, as Billy sits in the bottom and reaches up. They wrestle around, and I watch nervously expecting little Billy to fall down...but he hasn't yet.
One of Billy's favorite spots is the bottom shelf to my little kitchen island. The shelf is just high enough for him to climb onto but low enough to the ground for him to know he can jump back down. We keep a plastic bag of fresh corn from the farmers market on the back of that shelf and are still learning to put everything away since getting Billy. He of course, if curious over everything and he smelled the corn, and wanted it bad! Billy tried to get into the plastic bag, as I was sitting at the kitchen table. I hear scared kitten cries, and a lot of plastic rustling...I rush over to find Billy tangled in the bag handle Poor thing...I felt like the worst mama ever! I had to break the bag handle...it was not strangling him, but his head and one little leg was through and he was freaking out about why he couldn't get out!
Billy also learned what the cat tree is for. I walked by, and he was sitting on the top of our 3 story cat tree...no clue how he got up there. He started scratching himself, and fell down to the bottom level :( He seemed so confused as to why one minute he was up and the next he was falling, frantically trying to claw his way to hold onto a shelf and not continue falling. He was fine on the bottom shelf, but it is hard watching him, and letting him go knowing he is going to sometimes fall.
When the baby gate is separating two rooms, he can climb over it easily, and than walks down it face first to the ground. Unfortunately, I made the mistake of taking it out of the doorway and leaning it against the wall. Billy thought it was blocking something that he could climb to get to, and he knocked it over on himself. When he does something he doesn't understand, he clings to the ground, crouched as close as possible, and whips his head from side to side to try to figure out what is going on. In the past two days he has been scared of shoes in the washer (the noise...he was about 5 ft from the washer when we turned it on and he jumped and ran), the carpet cleaner ( he was curious about the noise, but not curious enough to come with a foot of it) children ( I watch children in my home, and they love kitties...he doesn't know what they are, so he comes close sniffing. One of the children gets excited and comes close to smacking Billy, so Billy now likes so sit a few feet away like he is "watching" them play)
For the first couple of weeks we practically followed the poor guy to make sure he didnt get into anything he shouldnt, and to make sure he never hurt himself. He is VERY independant and loves to explore on his own. If he wants love though, he is sure to tell us! He likes to stand at our feet and try to climb us. He likes to lay on our pillow next to us and press his nose into ours to make sure we pay attention to him. He loves to nestle on my chest under my chin, or in Korey's arm.
I feel like I write very choppy, and I apologize to those reading...I feel like I want to share all of Billy's moments but I try to link them together so it is easier to read than just a day to day account. Either way, this little guy is just amazing and it is hard to express how much we love him. He is truly a happy wonderful kitten.
We give our kitties canned food each morning/night. We yell "treats" and the kitties come running...it didn't take Billy very long to realize this...one problem...Billy cannot eat off the same plate as others!! He GROWLS!! The low growl that scares Joey away! We think it is because Billy doesn't know how much food there is, so he wants it to himself. We give him a small amount on his own plate...soon as he finishes it he walks over and waits for everyone to leave the other food plate and eats more. There is a bowl of dry food out all day and he does eat it but we wonder if he eats so much when the wet food is out because he is not sure when his next meal will be. We are still trying to figure it out but he needs the food because he is so small so we figure it's okay.
<3 to Billy. He sleeps in box a lot these days, or near Joey a lot. We think he feels safe with an ally, and they are too cute together. Soon as I figure out this picture posting thing on here, I will post some more!
We think Billy can see some shadow....but we are not sure. When he saw the Vet, she couldn't be sure, but his pupils do contract a little bit in light. He has scratching on the inside of his eyes and damage that caused the blindness, so we spend a lot of time speculating on what Billy can and cannot see, according to us at least :)
Yesterday was a big day of me being sad, and him being scared. I get so sad when he bumps into something, or when he is afraid to play. He is still learning, and I know that to him, being blind is nothing new...so I can't describe why I feel so bad for him...but I do. He and Joey play a lot....and he really seems to love it. But sometimes...man its hard on me! Joey will be playing near Billy, and Billy will do the cutest little jump to try to leap onto Joey...and probably about 1 out of 4 times, Joey will jump out of the way and Billy lands on the ground normally, and mews and looks around like he is confused. He DOES get Joey, PLENTY of times, but I just hate those times where he looks sad. Joey also loves this mouse toy...and will carry it in his mouth room to room like it is a real mouse and he is trying to catch it. As Joey runs around like crazy, Billy wants to get into the "game" Joey is playing so much...but Joey can run room to room and know exactly where he is going....while Billy stops at the edge of each room and slowly walks into the next one. We have two adjoining rooms with carpet, and out kitchen with linoleum. He can tell when he gets from the kitchen to the middle room, but he doesn't like to go fast from room to room, so he sometimes gets left behind in the games.
Billy is also learning what he can climb over...and on :) He and Joey love to play on a stroller that is in the kitchen. They take turns sleeping in it, or just sleep in it together. Joey likes to climb to the top and reach down, as Billy sits in the bottom and reaches up. They wrestle around, and I watch nervously expecting little Billy to fall down...but he hasn't yet.
One of Billy's favorite spots is the bottom shelf to my little kitchen island. The shelf is just high enough for him to climb onto but low enough to the ground for him to know he can jump back down. We keep a plastic bag of fresh corn from the farmers market on the back of that shelf and are still learning to put everything away since getting Billy. He of course, if curious over everything and he smelled the corn, and wanted it bad! Billy tried to get into the plastic bag, as I was sitting at the kitchen table. I hear scared kitten cries, and a lot of plastic rustling...I rush over to find Billy tangled in the bag handle Poor thing...I felt like the worst mama ever! I had to break the bag handle...it was not strangling him, but his head and one little leg was through and he was freaking out about why he couldn't get out!
Billy also learned what the cat tree is for. I walked by, and he was sitting on the top of our 3 story cat tree...no clue how he got up there. He started scratching himself, and fell down to the bottom level :( He seemed so confused as to why one minute he was up and the next he was falling, frantically trying to claw his way to hold onto a shelf and not continue falling. He was fine on the bottom shelf, but it is hard watching him, and letting him go knowing he is going to sometimes fall.
When the baby gate is separating two rooms, he can climb over it easily, and than walks down it face first to the ground. Unfortunately, I made the mistake of taking it out of the doorway and leaning it against the wall. Billy thought it was blocking something that he could climb to get to, and he knocked it over on himself. When he does something he doesn't understand, he clings to the ground, crouched as close as possible, and whips his head from side to side to try to figure out what is going on. In the past two days he has been scared of shoes in the washer (the noise...he was about 5 ft from the washer when we turned it on and he jumped and ran), the carpet cleaner ( he was curious about the noise, but not curious enough to come with a foot of it) children ( I watch children in my home, and they love kitties...he doesn't know what they are, so he comes close sniffing. One of the children gets excited and comes close to smacking Billy, so Billy now likes so sit a few feet away like he is "watching" them play)
For the first couple of weeks we practically followed the poor guy to make sure he didnt get into anything he shouldnt, and to make sure he never hurt himself. He is VERY independant and loves to explore on his own. If he wants love though, he is sure to tell us! He likes to stand at our feet and try to climb us. He likes to lay on our pillow next to us and press his nose into ours to make sure we pay attention to him. He loves to nestle on my chest under my chin, or in Korey's arm.
I feel like I write very choppy, and I apologize to those reading...I feel like I want to share all of Billy's moments but I try to link them together so it is easier to read than just a day to day account. Either way, this little guy is just amazing and it is hard to express how much we love him. He is truly a happy wonderful kitten.
We give our kitties canned food each morning/night. We yell "treats" and the kitties come running...it didn't take Billy very long to realize this...one problem...Billy cannot eat off the same plate as others!! He GROWLS!! The low growl that scares Joey away! We think it is because Billy doesn't know how much food there is, so he wants it to himself. We give him a small amount on his own plate...soon as he finishes it he walks over and waits for everyone to leave the other food plate and eats more. There is a bowl of dry food out all day and he does eat it but we wonder if he eats so much when the wet food is out because he is not sure when his next meal will be. We are still trying to figure it out but he needs the food because he is so small so we figure it's okay.
<3 to Billy. He sleeps in box a lot these days, or near Joey a lot. We think he feels safe with an ally, and they are too cute together. Soon as I figure out this picture posting thing on here, I will post some more!
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
Billy is sooooo smart!! pt 2
Okay....I am trying to fill in Billy's first two weeks in just two posts...after that, I will update more frequently. I could write about Billy every single day. :) He is just amazing. I believe I left off with him being able to scale the gate so we ended up taking it down. One thing about blind kitties....well atleast ours, is that they sure have a good memory when it comes to getting around! Billy's first few days, he stayed in the living room. One or two times, when we were with him we would take the gate down and he would start to walk into the middle room. We were trying to experiment with ways for Billy to be able to tell the difference between the two rooms. A recommended way for a blind cat to tell the difference between two rooms is to spray perfume/room spray or light a certain candle in the rooms so that the cat can differentiate the smell. Once he got to the kitchen, he was fine because he would tell it was tiled...it was the two carpeted rooms that gave him trouble.
We had different candles in each room, and it seemed to help. Once he got into the middle room, he would make a straight beeline into the kitchen. He LOVES the kitchen. I don't know if its because its usually a little cooler due to the tiled floor, or because more light gets in from the windows, or all the magical toys we buy seem to congregate in the kitchen...but he loves it. It could also be that he was so sick of being stuck in one room that ANY room seemed amazing. He finds new things to do in the kitchen still. There are cabinets to try to climb on, chairs he wants on, a baby stroller that he has learned to climb all the way to the top, and wonderful open windows where he sleeps in the sun and catches nice breezes. With how much time he spends in the window, you would think he could see out it. :)
One of Billys favorite activities, is sleeping with Joey. Only 2 weeks apart in age, Joey is about twice the size of Billy....although with how much Billy eats, he will catch up soon I am sure. Billy loves to follow Joey around until they eventually end up playing together. At first, I was like a scared first time mama with the playing! They were very rough...Joey would just jump right onto Billy and tackle him...and they would roll around for ages like that. Sometimes Billy would let out little cries, and I thought for sure that Joey was hurting him. Billy can hold his own though, and would climb into the couch and leap down onto Joey. Lately, they have taken to napping together....in the stroller, in the funniest of positions.
Billy has done so well adjusting...he now can walk around the entire downstairs floor of our house and doesn't run into anything unless we move stuff on him. He has not had any accidents in the house, he has learned where all the litter boxes are, and regularly uses them...even the covered litter box which we had read that most blind cats will not use! He loves to perch on things...anything and everything he can! He fearlessly climbs the couch to sleep on the back, or the chair, stroller, windowsill. He does get confused sometimes...the first time he climbed up to lay in the window, when he was ready to get down a couple hours later, he forgot how he got up there (he climbed the stroller, than walked from one sill to the second and fell asleep in the second)...he turned around a couple times trying to get a feel for where he was, and started to quietly cry in his scared "mew". I talked to him quietly trying to get him to learn on his own..he felt around the sill, and the edge with his paws like he was trying to judge distance and figure out if he could make the jump. After a couple minutes, I just felt bad for him because he was too scared to jump, and I got him down. He is so smart, and he amazes us daily with the things he can do, so I don't think I am hurting him with helping him every once in awhile!
Somethings I have learned with having a blind kitten:
1. He will learn who his "mom & dad" are by their smell, sound and feel. He knows his mama talks to him softly, usually wears a tank top & he can feel skin instead of cloth, and holds him up close to hear hear and nuzzles him. He knows his dad because he always has some kind of tee or polo on, has a deeper voice, and naps with him. He has only met a couple other people since we have had him, and his first instinct is to go up to the person and smell them before deciding if he will let them pet him or not.
2. While it is not recommended to pick up a blind kitty a lot at first, it doesn't harm them. Everything we read said to let him navigate on his own...and we did a healthy amount of this but sometimes, we had to pick him up. He is no less intelligent by this, and he has adjusted really well to being held. When we pick him up, we talk softly to him (we each have our own "billy" voices for him) and we tell him where we are taking him. Once he is put down, he stays near us for a minute until he figures out where he is, which he figures out pretty quickly. If he has to use the bathroom and doesn't recognize where one is from where he is at, he will cry until we either "lead" him to it, or pick him up and take him to it. In the past week, he has only "gotten lost" once.
3. He can play really well with other cats. The first day we were VERY worried about how he would interact. He hissed and cowered away from the other cats. We introduced him slowly to them, and now he does pretty well. A couple of our meaner cats hiss at him when he passes but he just ignores them. He keeps up really well with Joey when it comes to playing...except when Joey leaves the room. Joey has a mouse toy that he loves....I swear he thinks its real. He will grab that thing in his mouth and run from room to room growling at it and "catching" it. When he finally drops it, it will be soaked with catspit and he will leave it for a day than resume playing. Poor Billy will hear/smell him come by, and want to play so bad but as Joey runs wildly from room to room, Billy will run in the room he is in, but will NEVER run to the next room. When he gets to the border of a room he slowly steps over it to make sure he knows which room it is. It is so careful and calculated.
4. He doesn't know he can't see....so even if I feel bad, he is fine. I still have trouble with this one...I could cry sometimes because of it. I can't imagine not having my sight but this little tiny thing, only 13 weeks old, is so happy! If he wants love, he seeks out either Korey or I, and cries at our feet or tries to climb our legs/the couch to get to us. I was reading the other day, and he decided he wanted my lap instead, and climbed onto my book and settled down purring for me to pet him. He still plays even if it is a little more careful than others...He was born blind, so he has never known what it is to see. He can use his whiskers, his nose, his ears and be just fine. But sometimes when the other cats are playing and I see him perk up like he wants to join them and "look" around for them, it breaks m y heart. When he runs into something, I could cry. I know it is all a part of learning and he is doing so well and is the smartest kitten I have ever seen...but it tugs at my emotions. And for a kitten he is so loving. He came into our home at 11 weeks of age, and you would think we had him since the day he was born. He seems to know we are his family even if its only been two weeks. He had no trouble adjusting to us. In the morning, he seeks us out as soon as he hears us as if he is saying "okay you had your alone time, now its my turn for love".
We had different candles in each room, and it seemed to help. Once he got into the middle room, he would make a straight beeline into the kitchen. He LOVES the kitchen. I don't know if its because its usually a little cooler due to the tiled floor, or because more light gets in from the windows, or all the magical toys we buy seem to congregate in the kitchen...but he loves it. It could also be that he was so sick of being stuck in one room that ANY room seemed amazing. He finds new things to do in the kitchen still. There are cabinets to try to climb on, chairs he wants on, a baby stroller that he has learned to climb all the way to the top, and wonderful open windows where he sleeps in the sun and catches nice breezes. With how much time he spends in the window, you would think he could see out it. :)
One of Billys favorite activities, is sleeping with Joey. Only 2 weeks apart in age, Joey is about twice the size of Billy....although with how much Billy eats, he will catch up soon I am sure. Billy loves to follow Joey around until they eventually end up playing together. At first, I was like a scared first time mama with the playing! They were very rough...Joey would just jump right onto Billy and tackle him...and they would roll around for ages like that. Sometimes Billy would let out little cries, and I thought for sure that Joey was hurting him. Billy can hold his own though, and would climb into the couch and leap down onto Joey. Lately, they have taken to napping together....in the stroller, in the funniest of positions.
Billy has done so well adjusting...he now can walk around the entire downstairs floor of our house and doesn't run into anything unless we move stuff on him. He has not had any accidents in the house, he has learned where all the litter boxes are, and regularly uses them...even the covered litter box which we had read that most blind cats will not use! He loves to perch on things...anything and everything he can! He fearlessly climbs the couch to sleep on the back, or the chair, stroller, windowsill. He does get confused sometimes...the first time he climbed up to lay in the window, when he was ready to get down a couple hours later, he forgot how he got up there (he climbed the stroller, than walked from one sill to the second and fell asleep in the second)...he turned around a couple times trying to get a feel for where he was, and started to quietly cry in his scared "mew". I talked to him quietly trying to get him to learn on his own..he felt around the sill, and the edge with his paws like he was trying to judge distance and figure out if he could make the jump. After a couple minutes, I just felt bad for him because he was too scared to jump, and I got him down. He is so smart, and he amazes us daily with the things he can do, so I don't think I am hurting him with helping him every once in awhile!
Somethings I have learned with having a blind kitten:
1. He will learn who his "mom & dad" are by their smell, sound and feel. He knows his mama talks to him softly, usually wears a tank top & he can feel skin instead of cloth, and holds him up close to hear hear and nuzzles him. He knows his dad because he always has some kind of tee or polo on, has a deeper voice, and naps with him. He has only met a couple other people since we have had him, and his first instinct is to go up to the person and smell them before deciding if he will let them pet him or not.
2. While it is not recommended to pick up a blind kitty a lot at first, it doesn't harm them. Everything we read said to let him navigate on his own...and we did a healthy amount of this but sometimes, we had to pick him up. He is no less intelligent by this, and he has adjusted really well to being held. When we pick him up, we talk softly to him (we each have our own "billy" voices for him) and we tell him where we are taking him. Once he is put down, he stays near us for a minute until he figures out where he is, which he figures out pretty quickly. If he has to use the bathroom and doesn't recognize where one is from where he is at, he will cry until we either "lead" him to it, or pick him up and take him to it. In the past week, he has only "gotten lost" once.
3. He can play really well with other cats. The first day we were VERY worried about how he would interact. He hissed and cowered away from the other cats. We introduced him slowly to them, and now he does pretty well. A couple of our meaner cats hiss at him when he passes but he just ignores them. He keeps up really well with Joey when it comes to playing...except when Joey leaves the room. Joey has a mouse toy that he loves....I swear he thinks its real. He will grab that thing in his mouth and run from room to room growling at it and "catching" it. When he finally drops it, it will be soaked with catspit and he will leave it for a day than resume playing. Poor Billy will hear/smell him come by, and want to play so bad but as Joey runs wildly from room to room, Billy will run in the room he is in, but will NEVER run to the next room. When he gets to the border of a room he slowly steps over it to make sure he knows which room it is. It is so careful and calculated.
4. He doesn't know he can't see....so even if I feel bad, he is fine. I still have trouble with this one...I could cry sometimes because of it. I can't imagine not having my sight but this little tiny thing, only 13 weeks old, is so happy! If he wants love, he seeks out either Korey or I, and cries at our feet or tries to climb our legs/the couch to get to us. I was reading the other day, and he decided he wanted my lap instead, and climbed onto my book and settled down purring for me to pet him. He still plays even if it is a little more careful than others...He was born blind, so he has never known what it is to see. He can use his whiskers, his nose, his ears and be just fine. But sometimes when the other cats are playing and I see him perk up like he wants to join them and "look" around for them, it breaks m y heart. When he runs into something, I could cry. I know it is all a part of learning and he is doing so well and is the smartest kitten I have ever seen...but it tugs at my emotions. And for a kitten he is so loving. He came into our home at 11 weeks of age, and you would think we had him since the day he was born. He seems to know we are his family even if its only been two weeks. He had no trouble adjusting to us. In the morning, he seeks us out as soon as he hears us as if he is saying "okay you had your alone time, now its my turn for love".
Sunday, July 11, 2010
Billy is sooooo smart!!
Korey and I have had Billy now for 2 weeks exactly. I meant to be a little more diligent about keeping up with this blog, but was not sure anyone wanted to hear about our beautiful little kitten. Today, as I was reading "Homer's Odyssey" I really just wanted to write about my blind kitty also, and decided to keep updating this blog, and share it with people on the cat sites I have been posting on since finding Billy.
Billy has had a wonderful two weeks with us. He was spending most of his time in his own room, and loving constant attention. Each night I had to tear my husband away from the living room to go to bed, because he hated leaving Billy alone in the living room all night alone. We left the radio on all night so Billy wouldn't feel so alone. We left toys with bells, and a fleece blanket for Billy to sleep on. Anytime we woke up in the middle of the night, we would walk down and check on Billy.
We took Billy to the vet after his second day with us. The vet checked him out, and he is healthy. His blindness was a condition from his birth, and we probably wont know what caused it. At the runt of his litter, Billy was only 1lb 4 oz as of a week and a half ago. I am sure by now he is a little fatter, as he is a grub and loves to eat!
By 4 days after we got Billy, he was able to climb over the baby gate separating his "safe room" from the other areas in the house. At first, Billy would sit on the side of the gate crying as he heard us moving around in other areas of the house. It was heartbreaking to hear, and see. We would always go into the room to hold him, pet him and give him love, but it was hard to leave him. After 4 days, he started to climb the gate. He would get to the top, perch on it and sit as if he was trying to look around. I had read that blind cats would usually not jump a gate because they did not know what was on the other side. Billy climbed and sat on the top of the gate for awhile than climbed back down his side. After 3 or 4 times doing such, he decided it was time to see the other side, and gingerly climbed down the other side into the middle room.
He walked a straight line through the room to the kitchen to find the other kitties and play. The kitchen also holds a bowl of dry food, water, and lots of kitty toys. It is also a few degrees cooler than the other rooms, and has a tile floor. Billy loves sleeping on the tile floor. We picked him up and brought him back to the living room, and he stayed there that night. By the next day, Billy had decided that the gate would no longer keep him in. He climbed over it every single chance we moved him back to the living room. We tried doing it for Billy's protection, as the other cats were not yet very nice to him, but he was not interested.
We ended up taking the gate down and let Billy have the run of the house as of last week. He can easily get around, and we make sure to leave everything picked up so Billy doesn't run into things.
In the interest of not mkaing this post incredibly long, i will update on Billy's second week in another post :)
Billy has had a wonderful two weeks with us. He was spending most of his time in his own room, and loving constant attention. Each night I had to tear my husband away from the living room to go to bed, because he hated leaving Billy alone in the living room all night alone. We left the radio on all night so Billy wouldn't feel so alone. We left toys with bells, and a fleece blanket for Billy to sleep on. Anytime we woke up in the middle of the night, we would walk down and check on Billy.
We took Billy to the vet after his second day with us. The vet checked him out, and he is healthy. His blindness was a condition from his birth, and we probably wont know what caused it. At the runt of his litter, Billy was only 1lb 4 oz as of a week and a half ago. I am sure by now he is a little fatter, as he is a grub and loves to eat!
By 4 days after we got Billy, he was able to climb over the baby gate separating his "safe room" from the other areas in the house. At first, Billy would sit on the side of the gate crying as he heard us moving around in other areas of the house. It was heartbreaking to hear, and see. We would always go into the room to hold him, pet him and give him love, but it was hard to leave him. After 4 days, he started to climb the gate. He would get to the top, perch on it and sit as if he was trying to look around. I had read that blind cats would usually not jump a gate because they did not know what was on the other side. Billy climbed and sat on the top of the gate for awhile than climbed back down his side. After 3 or 4 times doing such, he decided it was time to see the other side, and gingerly climbed down the other side into the middle room.
He walked a straight line through the room to the kitchen to find the other kitties and play. The kitchen also holds a bowl of dry food, water, and lots of kitty toys. It is also a few degrees cooler than the other rooms, and has a tile floor. Billy loves sleeping on the tile floor. We picked him up and brought him back to the living room, and he stayed there that night. By the next day, Billy had decided that the gate would no longer keep him in. He climbed over it every single chance we moved him back to the living room. We tried doing it for Billy's protection, as the other cats were not yet very nice to him, but he was not interested.
We ended up taking the gate down and let Billy have the run of the house as of last week. He can easily get around, and we make sure to leave everything picked up so Billy doesn't run into things.
In the interest of not mkaing this post incredibly long, i will update on Billy's second week in another post :)
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