Vee's Thursday.

Today Vee-cat is having the Terrible, Awful, No-Good, Very Bad Day. My poor bossypants cat.

Well... at least she knows who to blame == me. :[

Some things I learned today: 

• Feral cats are treated differently when taken to be spayed. They don't get struck with the Instant Paindeath of fleas... 

Instead of that trauma, Vee will get a flea spray. I bet that will reassure her... as much as anything can.

I'm so sorry for her... but she's pregnant again. I don't want her to miscarry. Her first pregnancy was late April, and she lost three kittens.  Plus, she's been in heat almost constantly these past five weeks.

=-=

I caught her. It wasn't fun. More grief for Vee, and the odds are strong that she'll distrust me now forever. I hope she doesn't hate me. I... understand if she does, though, my poor girlcat.

In human years, Vee is a 15-year-old teenage mom. IRL, she is 12.5 months old.

My plan was to catch Vee first if possible. To stop her misery, and how constant hormones are making her act and feel horrible, and also her being in heat so much.

Vee's visibly pregnant AND she was in heat again last week! 8(

=-=

I grabbed her scruff, spun her around a bit, and despite claws, I stuffed Vee-cat into the cat carrier. It had newspapers [and she did pee about halfway through our short drive]. She wailed a bit, and then driving made her stop wailing. I hope she didn't feel carsick. Gamble hated car trips for that reason.

I talked to her the whole way, all 3.6 miles.

By the time she entered the clinic, Vee-cat had curled up in the back of the carrier. I saw one shining eye peeping at me from its depths.

=-=

I think knowing that other cats were also unhappy, waiting to get into the clinic, probably helped. The toms wanted her to know they felt for her...

Luckily for us all, the toms didn't wail the cry of "seeking queen in heat" and for that, I was very grateful. Possibly because they were tame cats, and with their humans.

=-=

• The cone of shame isn't used for feral cats.

They might hurt themselves wearing it, or strangle. I'm glad.

If I'd somewhere safe to keep her indoors, like a garage, or another bathroom... then I might consider a cone to keep Vee from trying to pull out her incision. The lady taking my [Vee's] info said they usually don't.

I'm going to trust her on that.

=-=

• And Sweetpea still trusts me. 

That's huge. I really didn't want to wreck that love, that trust.

When I got home, Sweetie wanted to be petted, and was perfectly fine. I know she fled when she saw me snatching up Vee. I'd worried Sweetpea mightn't trust me anymore. I am extremely grateful -- no, thankful! -- that my cat loves me yet.

I haven't seen Gatito, but Smoky might be sleeping. As Allen pointed out t'other day, he IS a kitten, and they do sleep a lot.

Or hiding. He doesn't trust us Big Things. The noises Vee-cat made would reinforce that opinion.

What's kinda funny is that I poured out a whole bowl of dry cat food for Sweetie and Shadow when I left. Sweetpea was hiding; Shadow, normally the most scaredy-cat ever, was calmly chowing down.

Apparently Shadow felt that Vee was the target, so everyone else was quite fine. Heh!