Show me the Kittens!!!

I volunteered at TLAC to cuddle kittens.

That’s it, that is all I really wanted to do.  I was lucky at the time there was a program called In House Fostering (IHF) so with little training and not a lot of effort I got to spend time with kittens (and sometimes their moms) playing and cuddling in different staff offices at the shelter.

I managed to eke out the required 6 hours a month, but I rarely volunteered for more than 6.  Unfortunately, for me, there were not always kittens in IHF and since ‘kitten season’ was coming to an end I was left with no idea what I was going to do.  Should or could I find something else or just give up on volunteering at TLAC?

                                                                                                           

Enter a very dedicated and hard working volunteer named Maggie.  She let me (and everyone else) know that the cats in ISO-1 would love to have someone come and give them attention.  ISO-1 is where the cats with upper respiratory infections are - they have colds. So I slowly started going over to ISO-1.  I still didn’t have to work all that hard and there really wasn’t any special training for what I was doing.  I just had to love on the cats in ISO.

The more time I spent in ISO-1 and saw what the volunteers were doing the more I thought “I think I can do that. I think I want to do that.”  You see the volunteers that work in ISO-1 are called nebbers.  Twice a day a volunteer will put the cat/kitten (sometimes even a puppy) in a special box where they can breath in medicine that will help their congestion so they can get better.  They also make sure that they are eating and generally improving.

So I signed up and trained to be a ‘nebber.’  I worked with other nebbers before I took my own shift, but it didn’t take long. I have weighed, fed, nebbed and loved the ISO-1 cats. I have cleaned their kennels and even them.  I even learned how to special feed the ones that are so sick they have stopped eating.  I feel like I am making a difference in their lives and helping these wonderful cats make it to their forever homes.

After being a nebber for a while I started getting involved in other TLAC programs like Desperate House Cats .

There have been a few bumps in the road, but as my volunteer experience has grown so have I and that is the second best part of being a volunteer at TLAC.  The best part is helping these wonderful animals in whatever small way I can.

Of course I still love to cuddle kittens.