Irreconcilable Differences

Mostly this here is in defense of the decision I made regarding Max. We have separated due to irreconcilable differences. No, I did not give him back to the shelter. What kind of person do you think I am (although to be fair I did consider it that first 6 weeks I had him)?

Here's the deal: Max is new in my life. I got him right before Thanksgiving last year and there were a lot of problems. He started out in pain due to the shelter insisting on doing the neutering (I would have taken him to my own vet and gotten pain meds for him), and sick because the kitty cold showed up one day after I took him from the shelter. So he was sick and had three vet visits in as many days.

And I was in emotional pain and not ready to connect to a cat who was the same size as Pippin (who had passed away two months earlier) but was a giant kitten at heart.

But we worked on it. I worked with Max and Max tried to work with me. And I waited until we had reached an arrangement where I liked Max and (more than I realized) Max liked me. Because I didn't want to make a decision from a place of anger or hurt or pain (mine).

So at this point, I realized that I could not give Max what he needed to thrive. Max is a very high active cat who needs a lot of stimulation. Had I known this to start with (he did not act like that at the shelter), I would have known to get a second kitten to keep him company. However, Max is also extremely territorial. He was even challenging me for territory in my own house (and getting so annoyed when I kept sitting in his chair). If I'd brought a kitten in then, the kitten would have been a threat to Max's territory and Max's person.

Max grew up without another cat, just with a single human. So cats aren't companions to him, they are competition.

Back when Max and I were having a lot of trouble (I even consulted a veterinary behaviorist because quite obviously I'd had way too many years of having a cat -- Pippin -- who was so far from a typical cat that I'd forgotten everything I knew about kittens, adult-sized kittens, and relating to them), Chuck and Dawn (my brother & his wife if you remember from previous posts) had offered to take him if I just couldn't deal with him.

I decided to take them up on this offer. They have a large household consisting of three cats and a medium sized dog (who is well trained with the cats), and they stagger their work schedules so they are only both gone in the middle of the day for 3-4 hours (contrast that with my work/sleep schedule, where I'm only awake and at home for 3-4 hours!) and, if Max becomes a behaved kitty, he can even go to work with them with the other cats (minus the most elderly).

This provides Max with lots of stimulation and play buddies (if they can reconcile the differences). He is going into their territory which means he has none to defend and has to learn their cats' rules rather than trying to inflict his own on someone smaller than he.

Well, all last week Chuck and Dawn came over to my house after work to play with Max and get him familiar with them. You read about some of it. Now Friday afternoon around 6 I brought Max to their house to live.

I wish I could have kept Max. He had the makings of a really sweet cat. But he's just too high-energy for me to give him what he needs to be happy, and although he was working hard to resign himself to my constant fatigue and not-being-there, I didn't want him to have to settle for resignation. I want him to be happy. Even if that means he's happy without me.

Also, lesson learned. If/when I get another cat, I will get them in multiples of two (the house isn't big enough for more) so that when I'm too tired to play or interact, they can interact with each other.