Green-eyed Monster

Jealousy, that green-eyed monster, is in our home in the form of a green-eyed cat named Fergus.

A little about Fergus. Jon and I adopted Fergus from the Collingwood Humane Society. I was looking for a Manx (a tailless breed of cat) and they had Ferguson. Fergus was afflicted with giardia or what is commonly known as beaver fever. Who knows where he got it? When Humane Society found him, he was living with an old woman in a home with 33 cats!

Anyway, we fostered this special needs black and white Manx and got first dibs for adoption. For the first month or so of Fergus' life with us, I nursed him back to health. It was tough work -- the giardia meant diarrhea and we had to be vigilant about keeping everything clean. After each visit to the box, I had to clean up Fergus (his paws and his bum), empty the contents of his litter box and disinfect the box and surrounding areas. Our garbage bin got so heavy with litter that the garbage guys actually refused to pick up my garbage one week.

Eventually, Fergus got completely healthy and since we spent some serious bonding time while I was wiping up his bum, we cemented the relationship: he was my cat and I was his human. All is well with the universe.

Things irreversibly changed on February 23, 2007. Fergus' human disappeared to the hospital and when she came home two days later, she was exhausted and slept a lot. She had no time for stretches or cuddles. She also started to disappear for ten to 14 hours a day. Two weeks of that, and here's the clincher: she came home with a crying baby who took over the house. Suddenly, there was chaos in the universe! Fergus was displaced. There is now a bassinet near where he used to sit. His littler box got moved from the office he shared with his human. He also encountered new house rules that were not to his liking. All the attention was being devoted to the small thing that does nothing more than cry, latch on to his human, and sleep. That was Fergus' previous job!

Fergus has been expressing his jealousy in a number of ways:
- whatever space recently vacated by his human, he occupies (this includes the bed, pillow, chair)
- if there is a space between the baby and his human, he will occupy (he squeezes himself between his human and the bassinet)
- if a new place has been created for baby, he will occupy (crib, bassinet, change table, car seat, stroller)
- if his human has been holding the baby for too long, he will bite his human

Increased attention from Jon seems insufficient. I think he wants things the way things were. Poor cat. Just think, he will look back on these days as the good old days once Dexter starts to get mobile and starts pestering the cats.