Sassafras

Before I met Hunter and long before we became parents, I had Sassy cat. I call her my Millennium Kitty because I adopted her in 2000 after my previous cat, Nigel died unexpectedly. From the beginning, she was not an outgoing kitty. She would hide whenever people came over. But, amazingly, not when Hunter came into the picture. They were fast friends from the start. She had some trouble adjusting when we moved house after we got married, but things soon worked out and they were inseparable.

During our adoption wait, I always worried how she would respond to a baby in the house. She is not territorial, but she loves our attention. The first night we were home with RJ was a challenge. We had been away for over 24 hours and when we showed up, we had all kinds of family in tow. And after they left, the baby was still here. He screamed that first night at first and Sassy didn't know what to do. Slowly she got used to him and would even share my lap when I was feeding him.

Her normal routine is to sleep all day and go out through her pet door all night. But a couple of weeks ago she started acting peculiar. Try as we might, she would not come inside. It got to the point where she was losing weight because she was not eating or drinking any water. She would only come inside for a few minutes and run if the baby made any noise. The last week has been especially worrisome because of the extreme heat we have had here.

When temps were supposed to be 100+ yesterday, I convinced Hunter we needed to contain her in the house. I went outside to call her, but she was already at the door. I think she had had enough of the heat. We closed off her pet door and when we got home discovered that she had been in the basement all day. She stayed there until after dark and went back outside. I was less worried about her and let her go. This morning, she ran back through her cat door at 6:15am and stayed in all day!

It seems kitty has decided to enter into an Entente-Cordial with the baby for now. This is the closest she has come to the baby in about 3 weeks. I'm so relieved. I hated her being cut off from us. She is so much more relaxed now. Here's to one big happy family!