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Rehoming some cats, and I feel horrible.
- Thread starter Cataria
- Start Date
- Thread Starter Thread Starter
- #43
All things considered, I hate how the drop-off appointment went, but I get it. They are busy people and they have better things to do with their time than entertain someone who is causing them more work, it was just hard.
I finally called them last weekend to ask for a status update and to go visit them. They were in the foster wing because they were planning on calling me that day to come pick them up for fostering, so they were all in cages. All three of them were separate and hiding. I stayed and visited with them for an hour and half, and afterwards they were like different cats. Henna and Shiloh were out interacting with other people, and although Treble clearly wasn't happy, she stopped hiding.
I talked to them about fostering and we decided against it. I don't know how my cats at home would feel after them being gone for a whole week, I don't know how the three cats I surrendered would react to being driven back and forth, and fostering would mean people would only be able to see them on weekends, making it harder for them to be adopted. Since I decided not to foster, they said they would move them to one of the cat rooms (out of the cages) so they could interact with each other and some of the other cats. They said it would be a day or so for the move.
I want to visit them at least one more time to see how they are adjusting to the cat room, but again, I didn't want to be a pest, so I didn't call them yet.
I just checked their web site a few minutes ago and I was stunned to discover that Henna is pending adoption.
This is good, this is what I wanted. It definitely really hurts though.
I'm going to call them tomorrow and ask about a visit, but I don't know if I will get to see Henna again.
I finally called them last weekend to ask for a status update and to go visit them. They were in the foster wing because they were planning on calling me that day to come pick them up for fostering, so they were all in cages. All three of them were separate and hiding. I stayed and visited with them for an hour and half, and afterwards they were like different cats. Henna and Shiloh were out interacting with other people, and although Treble clearly wasn't happy, she stopped hiding.
I talked to them about fostering and we decided against it. I don't know how my cats at home would feel after them being gone for a whole week, I don't know how the three cats I surrendered would react to being driven back and forth, and fostering would mean people would only be able to see them on weekends, making it harder for them to be adopted. Since I decided not to foster, they said they would move them to one of the cat rooms (out of the cages) so they could interact with each other and some of the other cats. They said it would be a day or so for the move.
I want to visit them at least one more time to see how they are adjusting to the cat room, but again, I didn't want to be a pest, so I didn't call them yet.
I just checked their web site a few minutes ago and I was stunned to discover that Henna is pending adoption.
This is good, this is what I wanted. It definitely really hurts though.
I'm going to call them tomorrow and ask about a visit, but I don't know if I will get to see Henna again.
I wish you much peace. You did your best for them and yourself.
Or you could ask the shelter to pass on a note from you stating her favorite foods, personality, background, and other purrsonal information. You could also include an email address, but I'm unsure if the shelter would be ok with that (ASK!! Every shelter/rescue has their own procedures)
And remember you are doing the right thing by your cats, even though it is breaking your heart.
And remember you are doing the right thing by your cats, even though it is breaking your heart.
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- Joined
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By this logic though, people who hoard pets, even when it means the pets cannot get the right amount of vet attention, have to keep all their pets - even if the pets are suffering from neglect due to the owners being unable to give the same amount of care to each pet.
My Tigger - even now - due to being in the situation where her owners (previous home) could not give her the right amount of attention simply due to the number of pets they tried to take in and help - she is still very insecure and clingy towards people. This is 8-9 years after the rescue took her and 15 or so other cats in, plus the dogs, plus whatever other pets they had, I don't know.
But the OP is doing the responsible thing - like Tigger's previous humans did - "I cannot look after this number of pets, it's best if a lot of them get rehomed"
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We had 13 cats at or highest number, though we are down to 7 now (and just lost one I posted about yesterday). It was so hard to have that many and not all of them got along. We have one cat that moved into Chris' room to live with the iguanas (who have passed now too) and we fenced that area off. We put in cat-vertical space on the walls so they had a lot of high spaces to be and that helped solve a lot of problems. We ordered this BIG cardboard castle (3 levels) and put it on a secure cable near a wall in the place and that helped a lot. Food dishes all over, litter boxes all over.
It was a ton of work to keep things clean - we live in a mostly tiled house, so that helped a lot lol. We tried re-homing some of our cats initially, but for whatever reason, it only took with a couple and we had more than a few returned and they weren't particularly bad cats, just couldn't adapt. We've lost them now through natural attrition, and it's been so hard. Amazing how attached you get when they aren't all attached to you lol.
Part of the problem is stimulation too, bored cats - idle hands - devil's workshop lol. We got a multi-beam laser light and put it in a spare room and we'd let it run through the day and that was a big hit, though they do get bored with it after a time. We built a catio (enclosed patio) outside of one of our windows with a cat door, that's always a bit hit, someone is always in there in rain or sun or shine.
But, we found some pheromone collars that work from amazon on some of them to varying degrees, some of the calming scent bottles you plug into the wall on others and liberal use of catnip 2 or 3 times a week. This actually cut down so much of the fighting and spraying. We have a dog and we got this big dog-pad for him to use - and some of the cats use it too lol that also helped out a lot on the mess.
Sometimes rehoming is the only option, as much as you love them and they love you, if everyone is unhappy, it's not a good situation. I hope it all works out well.
It was a ton of work to keep things clean - we live in a mostly tiled house, so that helped a lot lol. We tried re-homing some of our cats initially, but for whatever reason, it only took with a couple and we had more than a few returned and they weren't particularly bad cats, just couldn't adapt. We've lost them now through natural attrition, and it's been so hard. Amazing how attached you get when they aren't all attached to you lol.
Part of the problem is stimulation too, bored cats - idle hands - devil's workshop lol. We got a multi-beam laser light and put it in a spare room and we'd let it run through the day and that was a big hit, though they do get bored with it after a time. We built a catio (enclosed patio) outside of one of our windows with a cat door, that's always a bit hit, someone is always in there in rain or sun or shine.
But, we found some pheromone collars that work from amazon on some of them to varying degrees, some of the calming scent bottles you plug into the wall on others and liberal use of catnip 2 or 3 times a week. This actually cut down so much of the fighting and spraying. We have a dog and we got this big dog-pad for him to use - and some of the cats use it too lol that also helped out a lot on the mess.
Sometimes rehoming is the only option, as much as you love them and they love you, if everyone is unhappy, it's not a good situation. I hope it all works out well.
