How I helped raise kittens. Me and my cat Mashka are raising kittens together.
Five years ago, my husband passed away. We had lived a long and happy life together. I was grieving a lot and didn’t want to live. Kind-hearted neighbors brought me three kittens who were no more than a month old.
I forgot about my troubles and started taking care of the kittens. For a whole week, I trained them to use the litter box (how to train a cat to use a litter box), cleaned their ears, and got rid of fleas (how to deal with fleas on cats).
When the kittens grew up, I gave two of them away at the store. But no one wanted to take the third one. So Mashka the cat came into my home. We became very close friends. She became my joy and comfort.
Kittens are regularly abandoned and when I bring them home, Mashka’s maternal instincts awaken. She licks the foster kittens, sleeps with them, and raises them. Now, it’s not me who trains them to use the litter box, but the foster cat-mom.
But when it’s time to give the kittens away, Mashka and I are very sad because we’ve grown attached and have come to love them. Mashka walks around the apartment looking for the pets. She meows mournfully, calling for them.
And so it goes until the next time when abandoned babies appear in our home. And then both Mashka (the caring mother for stray kittens) and I start our usual troubles again.
Sometimes it’s hard to tell who’s taking care of whom — Mashka taking care of me or me taking care of Mashka. That’s just how we live. We share our troubles.