“It was like turning a switch, she was transformed”
Charlie and Louise Smith, from Manchester, have lots of experience with cats with disabilities.
“A local rescue had a one-eyed cat called Oscar who had been in a traffic accident,” says Charlie. “He was quite an old boy who lived with us for three years. Our second rescue, Mr Gingernut, is FeLV positive so has to live indoors, as does our other
FeLV cat, Missy. Caring for Animals, in Cumbria, then told us about Amanda, who was also FeLV positive, feral, and extremely nervous.”
Caring for Animals’ Joan Clifford told them exactly what to expect.
The couple adopted Amanda just before lockdown in 2020.
“Amanda had been found in someone’s garden shed, having given birth to kittens,” says Louise. “We were told she might never be tamed. No-one knew what had happened to her or whether she
had ever had a home or any human contact, but we said we would take her.
“Joan told us Amanda would be a challenge. We thought that she might bond with Mr Gingernut, who is a very chilled cat, even if she didn’t bond with us.”
At first, Amanda lived in the spare room, hiding away in the wardrobe if anyone approached.
“We wouldn’t have known we had her except that her food got eaten and her litter tray filled up!” says Charlie. “Then Louise bought a video baby monitor. We could see that when she was alone, she would sit on the bed and look out of the window quite happily.”
Winning the frightened cat’s trust took Charlie and Louise about six months.
“We started by opening the room up and throwing a few toys around,” says Louise. “We could see her watching the ping-pong balls from under the bed! Eventually, very slowly, she began to engage with us. She would come when we went to feed her, even though she hissed a bit. By that time, she had the run of our upper floor. Eventually, she let us touch her with a pouch of food, though not with our hands. She liked to sniff my hair too.”
“She was starting to meow at us by that time,” Charlie remembers. “She would sit on the stairs and meow, then gradually she began to let us stroke her. Now, she absolutely loves being stroked. It was like turning on a switch, she was transformed. She is really happy and confident sitting on my desk. We knew it would take time and we could have taken her back to the rescue, but we never thought of it. It is a wonderful feeling when she comes up to us for a stroke and we know she has learned to trust us. All it took was patience and a lot of love!”