Last week, we met the cutest little cat at the Plainfield Area Humane Society. She was the cat that reached her paw through the bars to grab at the boys’ clothing. She brushed herself up against the bars of her cage as a request for scratching and petting. I have always been partial to gray cats and tabby’s are positively quintessential. Her markings are super-cool, part stipey-tiger and part spotty-leopard.

It was noted by the staff at the shelter that she had a funny little grunt or wheeze that she occasionally made. We heard it too. They also mentioned that she had been treated for an upper respiratory infection, but that didn’t register as a problem to me. As the story goes, once we got home, whatever ‘bug’ that Gabby had contracted was getting the better of her. By Saturday night I had a cat that was snorting and breathing so heavily that she was keeping us up and making me VERY nervous.

I began to panic (what?!) that there was something really wrong with her and maybe we had made a bad decision. She was keeping me up at night and I don’t really take too kindly to kids that do that – and a cat, well, that’s just crossing some sort of line. I became concerned that we were going to start spending a ton of money on curing whatever it was ailing her and I could not believe we were at this point in under a week!

I was comforted by another homeschool mom and animal lover that she often has ‘buyers remorse’ shortly after adding a new pet to her family and any concerns quickly abate if I would just be patient and relax – and at least try to treat what was ailing the poor kitty. She was already winning us all over with her adorable antics, and extremely affectionate nature. Too late to turn around, right?!

After a couple of phone calls and an email to the shelter, we were graciously offered treatment by Dr. Loomis at the Westfield Animal Hospital, as he had seen her before. I can really recommend him as a compassionate and competent vet. He was generous financially with his services due to the fact that she was a recently rescued shelter pet. He has put me at ease that the issue Gabby is having is probably the result of a bacteria in her sinuses. Probably. Oh, how I am hoping that it is!

So Gabby is here, knocking over stacks of library books, batting legos and matchbox cars across the wood floors at 2 a.m., snorting loud enough to wake me up, climbing in and out of the dishwasher and basking in the sun. And I am here giving a cat nose drops and antibiotics and procuring her apps for our iPad. What a difference a week makes 🙂