Tripawed Adventures: Being Held

Of course, for the first part of her healing process after the surgery, Asuka did not like being held much. And truth be told, it was easier to pick her up and hold her when she had the huge, stiff wrap around her because it gave me something to stabilize her body with.

So the first few times picking her up after the wrap came off were challenging. I was used to hooking my fingers around both her front legs and scooping her up, but I quickly realized that wasn't going to work anymore. And she yowled at first because everything was raw and sore. (I know, I state the obvious, but this is part of the learning process, living with a newly tripawed kitty.)

Now her scars are healed up and the crusty stuff has fallen off. Her fur is nearly grown back in as well, making the surgery scar even less obvious. And she no longer yowls when I pick her up. She's beginning to like being held once more. One of her favorite things to do before was to stretch herself out while hanging over my shoulder. She's beginning to figure out how to leverage herself so that she can do a variation of that stretch. Asuka is very trusting and literally drapes her body over my shoulder when she feels stable enough.

She also no longer minds the surgery site being petted. This is nice because I can pet her whole body now, rather than skimming by the sore areas.

It's difficult to tell if the ES Clear is helping her all that much. Asuka behaves as normally now as she did before (with adjustments). She even caught a shrew a few weeks ago! And she played with it by tossing it in the air, just like before. She's not as skinny because I've been giving her an extra feeding of canned food with the ES Clear drops on it. I discovered she does not care for the canned food that looks like small cubes of meat in stew. She just licks all the stew off and leaves the cubes. So I have to mash it all up before she'll consider eating it. Never knew she was that picky!

She has adapted to the missing front leg much better than I hoped, and she seems to be completely healed. I pray that we caught it in time, and that she lives a long, happy, healthy tripawed life. So mote it be. :)