How my cat has prepared me for a baby.

I've been reading about what to expect from babies and young children, and I keep finding myself thinking "I already do this with my cat. Hm.". It's all very silly stuff...

1) You cannot pee/shower alone.
Lea, my youngest cat, follows me into the shower if she can. If I close the bathroom door, she flings herself at it while howling. Then she jams her paws under it and reaches for me. Before her stroke (more on that next), she used to scale the shower doors and sit there. Watching.

2) Illness, serious or not, is scary.
When we brought Lea home, she had a bad URI and this rancid, watery poop. It was horrific. But I spent the hours giving her Pedialyte, holding her, soothing her and generally making her feel 'all better'.

Last year, this gorgeous kitten had a stroke. She was barely a year old. We didn't expect her to recover- everything we'd heard regarding her recovery was bleak. As it turned out (so you don't worry), she's tenacious and fought her way back to health, and proved us all wrong. I stayed up all night, holding her and just telling her how much I love her. I'd fall asleep with her in my arms. We had to syringe feed, clean her when she messed herself, give her meds... it was emotional and one of the most stressful things we've been through.

3) Waking up every two hours to feed a screaming little one is completely doable.
You might be sleep deprived and forget things, but it's doable. When Pandora (now 12) came to us, she was about 2 weeks old. That meant I got to bottle-feed her every two hours, through the night and day. Not to mention the other things that kittens that little need done for them at that age.

If I can do that at age 12, I can handle it now. It's completely different with a tiny human.

4) What you seem to think is your alone time... isn't.
They're always watching. or trying to climb into your lap. Or begging for your soda, that they don't really want but OMGNEED because it's yours.

5) Your food is no longer your food.
Instead, it is a bite of chicken for you and most of the broccoli, but the rest gets snarked by a whining kitten.

6) 'Up-ups' are a normal part of your day.
Lea is trained to ask for up-ups. She comes to me, sits pretty and says "skeek?", then hops onto her back legs and streeeeetches up. I lean down, she hooks her front paws over my shoulder, and the up-ups are completed. : )

7) If I can train a cat, I can teach my child.
My cats current tricks?
Lea- 'back up', stay, get it!, settle/lie down, and "happy kitty".
Pandora- sit, stay, lie down, down, leave it, get it, find it... and the ever important "GET THAT BUG!!"

(I am falling asleep... I'll finish this in the morn~ in the meantime, a picture of my cat.)