Above, right to left: Bette, Einstein, Darla, Ms. Patches
Above: Bette
The end of last week I went to visit Mrs Patches and her three kittens. The kittens now have names - the black on with white chest is Bette, the little white with black one is Darla, and the tortoise-shell one is Einstein. AAWWW!
Each time I go there, they are more comfortable with me in general and with being touched. Frist I worked on Mrs. Patches a little bit, doing circles on her head with the wand and ace bandage wrapped around the end. She is still quite shy but once I started touching her she calmed down somewhat. Then I took Bette out, and she is the most comfortable of the bunch. I placed her on the floor near me and gently did abalone and chimp touch on her body, and ear strokes and raccoon touches on her head. She was a bit squiggly when I picked her up to take her out of the cage but settled down quite well as I began to do TTouch on her. I made sure that mommy could see her and she could see mommy at all times. When I put her back, I put her back near mommy and she went to her for a little grooming. Then I took Einstein out, who is the most skittish, and he was more relaxed than he had been before. I gently contained him by wrapping a little dishtowel around him like a cape, holding it in the front around the upper chest area, and he settled for some abalone touch, chimp touch and ear touch. Darla was mostly staying right near her mom so I did ttouch on her while she was in the cage, which she was quite comfortable with.
Above: Ms. Patches
The cats all seemed hungry so I gave them a bit of food, which they all ate with gusto. The kittens went wild and were playing, wrestling etc Mom started looking more relaxed, so I tried to do a bit of TTouch on her with my hand. I started out on her head. She is still shy, so moved towards the back of the cage when I did this but she didn't totally run away from the touch so I persisted a bit, and was able to work a bit on her body, doing strokes and circles (chimp touch and abalone touch and Noah's March with the back of my hand). Her body was still tense but relaxed somewhat in this process. It was a big breakthrough for her to let me have this much direct contact with her body.
Today I went back to visit them again, and again they were all increasingly receptive to touch. I did TTouch individually on Bette and Einstein, who I took one by one out of the cage. Each time I work on them they let me keep them out of the cage for a longer time before they get squiggly to get back in the cage w/mommy. Darla was cozy in the cage again so I worked on her inside of the cage.
I wanted to see if I could work on more of Ms. Patches' body today, so I nearly got completely inside the cage to do this, as she was behind a small cat carrier that is within the cage. She was comfortable with me working on her there, as she was hidden enough so she didn't see me looking at her. I did raccoon touches and ear strokes on her head, then worked little by little down her back, doing llama touch and chimp touch (these are touches using the back of the hand, so are less threatening), and Noah's march with the back of my hand. Though her body is still tight, she did not move away while I was doing this and relaxed somewhat while I worked on her. She gets more and more comfortable with me each time I work on her.
All of these cuties are up for adoption now, so please contact Kathy Yates at ktyates@gmail.com if you are interested, and check out this website
to see more photos of these cats. She is hoping to adopt them in pairs, preferably Ms. Pathces and Darla, and Einstein and Bette, as these pairs really are bonded w/each other. Enjoy!
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