Surrogate mother

In a desperate middle-of-the-night battle with a feral tom cat, our Siamese, Pearl, lost all four of her Mother's Day kittens, less than a week old. She wandered around the porch listlessly, calling for them and searching every corner over and over again. Her belly swelled up hard and hot with milk for babies that were gone forever.I had to break the news to the children. No matter how many kittens we have, each litter is precious. They spend hours huddled around the box that is birthing center and nursery, carefully holding kittens days old, whose limbs look oddly human in their flexibility. Little pink paws knead the children's skin, but without claws, they giggle when the kittens touch them.They crumpled like wet tissue paper when I told them the kittens had been killed. It was almost more than I could bear, to hurt them with the truth so. But hurt we must when the circle of life closes the gap at the end.And on goes the cycle. Two days later, Pearl was still listless and now running a fever from the sugary milk that was now serving as breeding ground for bacteria as it lay stagnant. Pearl's twin sister Shelly had been looking like she was in labor for weeks, her belly so full it was square and hard, as if she had swallowed a small box. Last night, she finally went into labor in earnest, and an hour later 6 kittens were cuddled up to her belly. One was born dead, as is often the case. I squirreled two away during her labor and brought them to Pearl.Pearl sniffed the wet ne...
Source: Turquoise Gates - Category: Cancer Tags: loss kittens mothering grief God's faithfulness Source Type: blogs