Embracing the Cat Lady Life 🐈‍⬛

I might be slightly obsessed with cats. They are such unique personalities and I want to meet (and pet) them all, so I’m always looking for them when I travel. My license plate frame says “Tell your cat I said PsPsPs” and a “Crazy Cat Lady” air freshener dangles from my rear view mirror. Yep, I’m THAT cat lady. And proud of it.

I had both a dog and a cat growing up, and always loved both. We had siamese cats, Daphne who I used to use as a pillow, and later Tao, who we picked out together as a kitten from the shelter. Tao was a legend, he lived to be 19.

After losing my two big doggos Juneau and Niko when I broke free of my abusive ex at 27, I decided to stick with cats for a while. My cat Maya, who I adopted in college when I got my first apartment, was much happier not being outnumbered by dogs, and she enjoyed living out her old lady days as my only baby.

Maya’s last couple years were rough. Her kidneys were failing so she was on pills that were hard to give her, and she would frequently get UTIs and pee randomly in my room. I had a hard time knowing when she was ready to let go, and still have not forgiven myself for being five hours away working an event the weekend she finally decided it was time and stopped eating. Her kitty sitter had to take her in to my vet to put her down so she wouldn’t have to suffer longer than necessary.

That was brutal. I was just about to move for a new job in Santa Rosa, and had a new roommate with a dog which wouldn’t be ideal for the old lady, so I guess that was her way of telling me she wanted to stay in Mendo. Can’t blame her there.

I needed a break from elder kitty care for a bit but I always knew I was destined to be a cat lady again. After struggling through Covid with a roommate who was very difficult to deal with (her dog was sweet, but not cool with cats), I finally decided to get my own place where I would be able to adopt cats. It is NOT cheap affording a one bedroom apartment in my area, but wow has it been amazing for my mental health and happiness living alone. But after settling in, I still felt like my apartment was missing something.

Turns out, it’s kitties who make a house a home! Towards the end of 2021, I began checking out the local cat rescue’s adoption listings, Forgotten Felines of Sonoma County. After feeling like I had let Maya down in her final hours, I really wanted to do this cat mom thing right this time around. So I did my homework and found an excellent local organization to support. And I decided to adopt TWO kitties so they could entertain each other, so I started watching the website for bonded pairs.

I met a pair of kittens being fostered by a Forgotten Felines volunteer, but I wanted to wait until after my holiday travel to bring any home, so the timing didn’t align just yet. I also wanted short haired breeds, and I was keen on adopting a black cat since they are often stigmatized. But I wasn’t picky. I could love just about any cat!

In January 2022 a pair that looked perfect popped up and I made an appointment to meet them - they were named Lisbon and Fado, since their foster mama had recently gotten back from a trip to Portugal. But I had already picked out names, and since starchy foods for some reason make the BEST cat names (Ravioli, Gnocchi, and Tortellini were all contenders), I decided to go with my favorite froyo toppings: Mochi and Boba. Plus their names have emojis! 🍡🧋

They were about six months old and had been rescued from a hoarding situation. So we’re not really sure if they’re littermates or just trauma bonded, but they definitely act like siblings. I met them and instantly fell in love, of course. But I needed to stock up on supplies before bringing them home, so we made an appointment for a few days later to pick them up.

They came microchipped and with their shots up to date, and had been spayed / neutered prior to adoption as well. Forgotten Felines really took care of everything to set them up for a happy life, I am forever a fangirl and highly suggest sending a donation their way if you’re a fellow cat lover.

While they weren’t exactly tiny kittens, boy did they ever still have kitten energy. I thought I had kitten proofed my house, but Boba finds a way. Within the first week he had managed to jump up onto my balcony railing (plexiglass is all around the rail so they can’t get thru) and give me a heart attack (the railing is only about an inch wide). Then one evening I couldn’t find him. I was freaking out of course, frantically looking in every nook and cranny, when I heard a small meow coming from outside.

He had somehow jumped off my balcony and gotten stuck in my downstairs neighbor’s porch. So I ran down and opened the gate and there he was, totally fine but scared from his big adventure. I put foil all over the railings and only let him out there supervised for a while, and thankfully he never tried to jump off again. He has gone over to the next door neighbor’s balcony a few times though and I’ve had to lean over the railing and grab him back. Turns out black cats must be the new orange cats: the derp levels are off the charts!

A few months after I got the kitties, I noticed Mochi was getting a little chonky. She had a bulge in her middle that slowly became more noticeable and lopsided. She also seemed to becoming more lethargic and not as spunky as Boba. I took both kitties into the vet for a checkup after asking Forgotten Felines for vets they recommend.

The vet was very concerned about Mochi since it seemed that her abdomen was swelling with fluid, and she took some samples to test. She was worried since they came from hoarders that she could have FIP - Feline Infectious Peritonitis, which is very hard to treat (months of daily injections).

Babygirl was only nine months old, how could we be dealing with a massive medical crisis so young? After testing the fluid in Mochi’s abdomen, doing some blood tests and taking an ultrasound over the course of a couple weeks, the team at Alderbrook Pet Hospital were able to finally rule out FIP, but now we had an equally daunting diagnosis: it looked like a blocked ureter had caused hydronephrosis, and the only treatment was to remove her infected kidney surgically.

Needless to say, I didn’t get much work done or much sleep during the few weeks between taking her into the vet for the first time and finally getting surgery. I started a GoFundMe to help me pay for the vet bills, called every surgeon on the list the vet gave me, researched FIP and connected with advocacy groups, and spent as much time with the kitties as possible. As I got one discouraging and daunting estimate after another, there was a moment where I wasn’t sure if I could afford to save her. And that reality was just heartbreaking.

Finally, I got a call from our amazing local vet at Alderbrook who had spoken with one of their sister clinics in nearby Sonoma called Arroyo. She found a surgeon who was willing to do Mochi’s lifesaving surgery for about $4,000 — half what I’d been quoted anywhere else. I’d just have to get her there at 7am. An amazing veterinarian came through with a miracle and gratefully gave her a shot at a full, happy and healthy life.

I could barely sleep the night before her surgery, and early in the morning we drove about an hour east to Sonoma. I handed over my little angel without knowing for sure if I’d see her again, but after so many appointments with the vets I was working with, who genuinely cared and spent hours looking for a solution alongside me, I put my trust in them. I waited nervously for the phone call after surgery was complete, but the good news finally came that she did well and I could come pick her up after observation time.

Boba seemed lost and distraught the whole day. For how much he picks on his little sister, he sure doesn’t know what to do without her around! Which is why the thought of losing her was extra heartbreaking. The surgeon reported that the fluid in her abdomen was encased in a big capsule around the infected kidney, and it had started to adhere to some of her organs (which sounds kinda like endo, huh) so they got everything that they could out, but had to leave some of the adhered tissue inside. She was on antibiotics and some pain meds to hopefully ward off an infection from the tissue they had to leave, and despite what she had been through, was surprisingly energetic.

Keeping Boba and Mochi separated at night so she could recover was not easy, he meowed and pawed at the door while Mochi derpily walked around in her cone in the bedroom, where I’d set up a separate litter box and food and water dishes. I kept waking up to check on her, trying to keep her in her cozy bed instead of wandering around knocking the cone on everything she couldn’t see. It was hilariously adorable but I felt SO bad for her that I tried to take the cone off as often as possible and just supervise her closely so she didn’t irritate her stitches. Sorry Mochi, but cones on cats just can’t avoid being really funny.

A few days later we took Mochi in for a post-op check up at Alderbrook and they were so impressed with how quickly she was recovering. They took an ultrasound to make sure fluid wasn’t refilling her abdomen and told us to come back in about a month after she’d finished her antibiotics to check again. Within a week or so she had all her energy and more back, was playing with Boba and her toys again, and her coat seemed shinier and healthier. I was one very happy and immensely relieved cat mama.

Thanks to my amazing friends and family (and Forgotten Felines who helped share my GoFundMe with their network), I was able to cover a good chunk of the expenses from all the vet visits, meds and surgery. I had never had to do a fundraiser before, and it’s very humbling to be vulnerable and ask for help. But there is no way I would have been able to save Mochi without that support. I am so beyond grateful.

Mochi reminds me a lot of Maya, who was selective with her affection (one of the things I like about cats like her is they teach you about consent and boundaries). But she is a bit more cuddly and VERY playful. She doesn’t have quite the sassy meow that Maya did, but she makes these little squeaks and chirps when she’s chasing a toy that are just about the most adorable thing I’ve ever heard. She gets the zoomies so hard that she’ll clumsily run into things while chasing the little plastic spring toys that I call “boing boings” and dishevel every rug in my apartment along the way. And she ferociously goes after this Millennium Falcon on a string toy that I’ve had to reorder about six times from Chewy because it eventually gets destroyed.

My favorite Mochi quirk might be the elusive “kitty dance” she does only on the black and white moon rug in my bathroom (maybe because she is black and white, that’s her special matching dance floor? I wish she could tell us). Usually she’ll do this while I’m on the toilet, making it harder to capture on camera! She runs into the room, checks to make sure her audience is watching, and then dramatically flops onto her side on the rug. Then she wiggles her legs and flops around, doing little rabbit kicks as she bunches the rug up around her, and then as quickly as she arrived, jumps up and darts off through the door. I may be biased, but there is nothing more amusing, hilarious and CUTE AF as Mochi’s kitty dance. And it ONLY happens on that rug.

Boba is definitely not without his quirks. He is literally obsessed with me, and the biggest weirdo I know. While Mochi is quite content to play on her own, chasing toys around, Boba gets bored of this quickly and always wants to play with me or Mochi. He’ll mess with my fridge magnets to get my attention if I’m not giving him enough playtime or pets. Boba seems to think that humans are furniture. I made the mistake of carrying him around on my shoulders a couple times as a kitten. And now he tries to launch himself from any nearby surface onto my shoulders, claws out and all. In short, Boba is a weird little asshole.

While Boba and Mochi can often be found “yin yanging” in their cuddly bed or grooming each other, there is some sibling rivalry going on. Boba is basically twice Mochi’s size. I think that bum kidney stunted her growth! She really isn’t much bigger than when I adopted them at six months old. Boba of course uses this to his advantage, but Mochi definitely fights back or outsmarts him to get away. They can play a little rough sometimes, and Boba eats super fast so he has to be supervised with the wet food or he’ll start going for Mochi’s bowl. But the way they cuddle and play together and clearly love each other is super cute and I always recommend anyone wanting to adopt cats get TWO. Best decision I ever made.

I hope it’s at least a few more years before I need to worry about crazy vet bills and kitty health issues. But I definitely need to get the kitties on some pet health insurance before they get much older, so if anyone has recommendations for an affordable policy they love, please send them my way! Despite the stress of the diagnostic roller coaster, the constant scooping of kitty litter, the cost of owning pets and the difficulty it can bring with housing (duuuuude pet rent is the most ridiculous 💩 ever but it’s so common around here), sharing my life with weird little furballs is the only way for me. I may never be able to go into the bathroom without being followed by little stalker ninjas, but life is never boring with cats.

Last summer, my mom found a pet stroller online and brought it to me at the annual family reunion. So now I’m the weird cat lady who takes her cats on walks in a stroller. I tried getting them used to harnesses and leashes. That was a spectacular failure. They just froze and got overwhelmed outside, and forget trying to get two cats on two leashes to walk in the same direction! I can kinda do it with Boba on a leash and Mochi in a kitty backpack, but we never make it far cuz Boba is a big scaredy cat and just darts towards home. I may have experience herding cats (from my festival production days), but I know when I’m beat.

So now we just wear harnesses when we go on a stroller ride. Boba likes to stand up and look out the screen window, sniffing the outside air, but Mochi just gives sits in the bottom of the stroller glaring at me. I get it after what she’s been through so I try not to put her through this enrichment activity too often. Car rides are also more traumatic for her because they ended in some pretty awful vet visits that Boba is just blissfully inexperienced with.

I am a believer in keeping cats indoors. Even though I always grew up with indoor-outdoor cats who lived long lives, have you seen how people in California drive?! I am not risking my babies’ lives to the mean streets. I hear cat fights all the time in my neighborhood, and they poop in the damn garden beds and hunt the local wildlife. Of course, this means that indoors needs to be an enriching environment for them, or they’ll tear up your stuff and let you know they’re bored.

Since my favorite thing about social media is cute cat videos, I get some fun ideas for enrichment activities from it. Sometimes I will fill a baking pan with a little water and put treats in plastic bottle caps floating on the “pond” so kitties have to fish them out. They have SO many toys and scratching posts and comfy lounge spots. But the dream is owning a house that I can fully catify with ramps, platforms up the walls and tunnels for kitties to climb on. And then I can help Forgotten Felines out by fostering some kitties!

If you made it this far without thinking I’m absolutely insane for being this obsessed with my cats, thank you for reading. I will not stop, and I feel like I actually need to share MORE cute kitty content just to counteract all the horrific stuff happening in the world lately. So if you’re into that sort of thing, I post Mochi and Boba quite often in my Instagram stories (there are several highlights and posts dedicated to them too) and once in a while I’ll share a Caturday post on LinkedIn.

I also try to slip a little extra cute kitty content to my Paid Subscribers, along with other useful perks like my Ultimate Marketing Calendar template. So if you want to support my cat lady dreams of owning a catified home and taking in fosters, Upgrading to a Paid Subscription is a great way to help me get there. Purrrrrrrr.

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