We took home 3x 7 month old kittens a month ago from a rescue. We previously had an mature adult cat. We didn't do enough research and totally underestimated the impact of 3x kittens.
I keep having mental wobbles and thinking, "I can't do this." Each time I fall into a bit of depression but eventually come out of it, find a solution to whatever the new challenge is and tell myself, "nope, cats are a commitment".
My husband is doing and saying the same out loud. We're both prone to depression, but his is medicated. However, over the weekend, my husband broke down to his mum about finding it all really hard and not being able to cope. He then admitted to me that he now dreads coming home after work.
The things we're finding hard are:
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One of the kittens has also had illness during this time, which required trips to a vet far away, which has been an added stress. He's now on the mend.
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The kittens have destroyed a lot of parts of the house. Not from boredom scratching (they have so many toys including puzzle ones, scratching posts, I try to do interactive play with them when I can). The damage occurs just from them playing together. It's sweet to watch, they're bonded littermates, but through simply playing chase and pounce with each other, they've destroyed furniture and curtains. I started to price up buying replacements for the damaged stuff over the weekend, got beyond £1K, then stopped and just cried.
To minimise the destruction we have removed all curtains, rugs, an armchair (replaced it with a massive cat tree), and removed all ornaments.
Yesterday evening, my husband sat down next to me in the living room and said, "the room is cold and echoe-y. I don't like the lack of privacy. I'm going to my office." Five minutes later, he then left the office as it's so overcrowded with our ornaments (it's the only cat free room we can reasonably have, as our kids forget to shut the other doors). He says our house doesn't feel like our house anymore, it feels like a cattery with people inserted into it.
I asked an online cat forum and they recommended Jackson Galaxy. I watched his videos this morning and he said each cat just need 30-45 minutes strenuous play a day. Individual play needed as some cats dominate the play and prevent others getting attention. So for three cats that's 2 hours and 15 minutes play a day. I've managed 15 minutes and then ten minutes play with all three cats so far today, not done separate play yet. They mostly wanted to play chase and pounce with each other.
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The rest of my life has gone out of the window. I was told at the beginning of the year that I needed to lose weight as my heart health is bad (my dad died young of heart disease so it's a big worry for me). I started a strict diet and exercise routine and lost some weight. This all stopped with the cats, the weight is back on and I'm now stress eating again, although trying not to.
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Our kids (7 and 9), who are both diagnosed ND or likely ND, recently told me that I never pay attention to the anymore. I've tried to encourage them to join with me in playing with the cats, which occasionally they do and to be fair my 7 year old helped me build a new cat tree for them over the weekend, but mostly they don't want to and ask "can't we do something else?" They're also overwhelmed by the smell and mess, and chose to play in rooms away from the kitchen-diner, where the cats are based. I asked on a parenting ND children forum, and most people said pets helped their ND kids.
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The house cleaning has gone out of the window, which is another stresser for my husband. He likes a clean, immaculate house, which I never fully achieved, but I used to get close to. Now, there's food, litter and cat toys in lots of places. He's also likely ND and finds it overwhelming. My husband works FT, I work PT (3-6 hours a week, depending on need), so housework falls on me. He is picking up more household chores without me asking, but I can see it's adding to his stress levels.
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I made some pin money selling secondhand baby clothes, which had the bonus of decluttering the house and helping my husband's anxiety levels. That has also gone by the wayside.
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I keep forgetting to do stuff. I forgot to get my kid's uniform washed in time for today. I forgot we'd run out of food so couldn't do my son's packed lunch. I forgot the stuff my daughter needed for Brownies. My brain can't seem to remember the previous emotional load.
I can't do it all and at the moment, the cats take up most of my time. I'm suspected to have ADHD alongside depression, so it's an effort for me to focus on a task. Maybe if I could be more productive, then it would be easier. But it's beginning to feel like there isn't enough hours in the day.
So, at the moment I'm saying, lets keep going with the kittens, they'll grow out of it in a year or so, we can do this. But the rest of my family aren't feeling it and are either depressed (my husband) or highly strung (my kids - who pick up on their parents not being ok mentally by becoming more disruptive, fighting more, shouting and screaming more - so I'm trying to manage their behaviours on top of everything else).
My MIL says "get rid of the cats, your and your family's mental health is more important".
Have I made the wrong choice?